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Over the span of my life, Islam has been a consistently destructive force. Sure, religious fanatics in other parts of the world have started wars, but for pure hate-driven evil nothing tops the Muslims. Islam turns much of its destructive force inward against fellow Muslims; still, it has plenty left over to direct against Israel, and with the 9/11 terror attacks in the USA and subsequent […]
I don’t know how long outdoor grills are supposed to last, but we’ve retired one charcoal kettle grill and one gas grill since moving into this house in 1998, and are some years into our second set. The charcoal grill, a Weber, is holding up well, but the gas grill, also a Weber, is giving up the […]
When they didn’t immediately locate the pilot of the Massachusetts Air Guard F-15 that crashed in West Virginia Wednesday morning, I figured he was dead. An eyewitness reported seeing a parachute, which led to hopes the pilot had ejected and survived, but since there’d been no radio contact with him I assumed he’d either been killed during the […]
That’s our old squadron-mate Crumer, whose memorial service Donna and I recently attended in Alamogordo, New Mexico. Crumer, as you can tell from the photo (click to see it larger), flew in Vietnam … two back to back one-year tours, the first as an F-4 GIB (guy in back), the second as a front-seater. I […]
Whenever black Americans take to the streets over police brutality and killings, racist email forwards follow. Over the past week I’ve gotten two, both claiming the media ignores black on white crime out of political correctness. What world do these people live in? Since when has the press ignored black on white crime? I think […]
When the Eagle got up to around Mach 0.95 you’d begin to feel resistance, as if the air was getting thicker and pushing back against your airplane. As you slipped past the shockwave and through the Mach the resistance went away and the airplane felt normal. The second you retarded the throttles, though, it was as though you’d run into an invisible Stay-Puft Marshmallow Man in the air. You and your jet and everything in it slowed down in a hurry, forcing you forward against the shoulder straps and seat belt. Once you were back below Mach 0.95, Mr. Stay-Puft went away and things felt normal again. Oh, and half your fuel was gone.
When I tell visitors about the Pima Air & Space Museum’s F-14 Tomcat, I always work in a few words about women in military aviation. The Tomcat seems like the right place to introduce the topic: first because the US Navy, along with the US Army, led the way in training woman aviators in 1974, a full two years before […]
President Eisenhower mobilized hundreds of troops to enforce federal law and prevent rule by lynch mob in Little Rock. Yes, Virginia, there once was a time when presidents were courageous.