Holy War

President Obama talks about Islam often, and he never fails to label terrorist attacks as terrorism. He avoids using the phrase “Islamic terrorism,” however, as many on the right demand he do. I’m with Obama on that. Too many Americans have decided the Muslim faith — its prophet, its holy book, its madrassas, its imams, […]

Air-Minded: Sabres & Horseshoes

The F-86 Sabre has been on my mind lately. The Sabre was a pure air-to-air jet fighter with a high-mounted seat and 360-degree visibility, father of the F-15 Eagle, grandfather of the F-22 Raptor. As a boy living at Ramstein Air Base in Germany in the 1950s, I dreamed of someday flying the Sabres I saw flying overhead. Today I’m a volunteer […]

Making Time Fly

A couple of casual observations to start the weekend. ——————– Lately, Rachel Maddow has been asking why Congress isn’t debating President Obama’s military campaign against ISIS in Iraq and Syria. It’s surely odd that Congress, which interferes with or tries to block everything else the President does, is allowing him free rein to conduct the […]

Air-Minded: the Army & the A-10

Army A-10s? Not gonna happen, folks. Here’s something I posted to Facebook the other day: People ask me why, if the Air Force no longer wants A-10s, it doesn’t just hand them over to the Army. The answer boils down to roles. From the 1960s into the early 1990s, the Army flew an armed observation aircraft […]

Air-Minded: Christmas Photoblogging

Guess who got a new telephoto lens for Christmas? Any guesses where he went with it? Clearly I have much to learn. Here are a few of the less-embarrassing shots I took at Pima Air & Space Museum the day after Christmas: As always, clickage will take you to the full sized images on Flickr. — […]

Why Did They Do It? (Updated 12/23/14)

Never mind there should be no debate over torture, any more than there should be a debate over rape or child molestation. There is a debate and it’s heading downhill fast, witness this statement by one of the most powerful men in the land: “I think it is very facile for people to say ‘Oh, torture is terrible,’” […]

Air-Minded: SERE & Torture

People keep saying torture can’t be all that bad … after all, we torture our own aviators and special operations forces at a super-secret training facility so they’ll be able to stand up to it if they’re ever captured by the enemy …. and you don’t hear any of them complaining, do you? The acronym for this specialized training […]