Pilot's Poem

From the Millville Army Air Station Museum:

TO A PILOT

Into the mist you flew away;
Into the mist--so cold and gray.
Then you soared to a higher plane
And my heart climbed out of the mist again.
You flew right into the setting sun,
Like a homing bird, when the day is done;
Up, and up, like a bird set free--
That's the way I remember thee.

-unknown

251nm flight to New Jersey

So today I flew to Woodbine (1N4) and Millville (KMIV), New Jersey, for my 250nm commercial pilot's licence pre-requisite. I picked an airport that was 251.7nm away. The flight took 5.4 hours round trip, but I saw some interesting stuff along the way.

First, about halfway down long island I flew over Brookhaven National Laboratory. You can see the circular particle accelerator from the air.


I also flew right over the JFK VOR which is located on the JFK airport. I got to dodge some Delta Heavies over the harbor.

JFK was as close as I got to NYC, but I still got some good views of the skyline:

There was a tiny little museum at the Millville airport focused on the Army Air Station that used to be located on the field full of WWII aviation paraphernalia. They had a link trainer with the instructors station, which was interesting. Simulators sure have gone a long way.

The casinos of Atlantic City:









Apparently your mansion at the Haptons has to have a tennis court. All of the large houses there had tennis courts.


Finally, I saw 2 aircraft carriers south of Providence. I'm not really sure what type they are or why they are there.

Ticketmaster Monopoly

I recently was looking at purchasing tickets for a Sister Hazel concert at Avalon. I don't buy tickets for concerts that often, so I was shocked to see the amount of fee's Ticketmaster charges. For a $16.50 ticket, there is a $4.75 "convenience charge" then a $2.50 charge for emailing me the tickets so that I can print them! You can avoid the $2.50 by having the tickets sent by the USPS (which costs Ticketmaster 39 cents). So assuming you want to print one ticket, you must pay 44% of the ticket cost in fees! That is ridiculous.

So others have been pissed off at Ticketmaster too. Perl Jam testified in congress about the Ticketmaster monopoly back in 1994. Their testimony in front of the House Subcommittee on Information, Justice, Transportation and Agriculture is interesting. Ticketmaster forms exclusive contracts with venues and promoters, so bands are forced to use Ticketmaster, and Ticketmaster can charge whatever they want.

I was pleased to read on Wikipedia that Ticketmaster's market share is only 50%. It was also interesting to read that Ticketmaster is part of InterActiveCorp, a conglomerate that owns such diverse websites as LendingTree, Evite, Match.com, Ask.com, and even CollegeHumor.com!

Case for war....in Power Point?

Presentation: Iranian Support for Lethal Activity in Iraq

This is one of the scariest things I've seen in a while. It is the presentation of a military report given to journalists in Iraq, off the record. Why initially would no military officer present this openly?

While recently Bush has defended these accusations, General Pace, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, said that while the material may have come from Iran, "that does not translate that the Iranian government, per se, for sure, is directly involved in doing this" (see the New York Times article). I'm glad somebody has their head on strait.

This presentation reminds me of the presentation done by some Space Shuttle engineers on why the O-rings were unsafe prior to the Challenger accident. Edward Tufte tore apart this shuttle presentation in one of his books, and I'm sure he would tear this military one apart too. While the inadequacy of the shuttle presentation cost the lives of seven astronauts, this presentation could cost the lives of thousands if we go to war with Iran over faulty information.

Wrong Answer

I wish I got something this funny when I graded physics problem sets:







...and my favorite:



Thanks Jay for sending these my way.

A Love Story in 4 Pictures

Here's a good one my dad sent me:


"A Love Story In 4 Pictures" - video powered by Metacafe

FAA Budget

If you've every thought about reading the federal government's budget, here is a place to start, President Bush's FY2008 Budget Proposal for the Department of Transportation.

In it you find interesting facts like the DOT's Office of Civil Rights ($9.14 million) gets about as much money as is spent on the DOT's Transportation Planning, Research, and Development Office ($9.12 million), yet last year in FY2007, they DOT spent $66 million on a new headquarters building.

The FAA does a bit better on R&D, spending $140 million, although this is pretty small compared with the $2.75 Billion spent on "aid" to airports. Do airports really need "aid" like Africa needs "aid"? Call it what it is, money to make airport bigger and better.

Then there is the user fee debate in the FAA. It looks like the paragraph on user fees was written by the airlines themselves (much as the energy bill was written in secret by Cheney's oil buddies). See what you think:

The reform of FAA’s financing structure is necessary because under the existing aviation tax structure, there is no relationship between the taxes paid by users and the air traffic control services rendered by the FAA. For example, when a full plane flies from New York to Boston it imposes the same workload on the FAA as when a less crowded plane of the same size travels the same route. However, since the
current tax structure is primarily based on the price of a ticket, the full plane pays much more in taxes than the less crowded plane. User fees allow commercial aviation users to pay directly for the services that FAA provides for managing
the use of the national airspace. Under the proposal, aviation users would pay a total of $11.5 billion in user fees and fuel taxes in 2008; under the current tax structure aviation users would pay $12.1 billion in excise and fuel taxes, a difference of $600 million. FAA aims to create a more direct relationship between user fees collected and services received, thereby creating incentives to make the system more responsive to user needs and more efficient.

This paragraph doesn't tell you a number of things. First, the general fund, which is funded by the current method of fuel taxes and ticket taxes, is expected to grow in the future, not decline. Second, because of the tax on fuel, business jets users actually pay a significant amount per person since business jets aren't nearly as efficient per person as larger aircraft. Third, why should the flying public have to pay more in taxes to fly on a smaller plane? According to the FAA's own logic about the New York to Boston flight, if each plane was charged equally, the taxes for the people on the less crowded plane would be greater than those on the full plane. Currently, taxes are paid by the passengers, so why should the airlines even care?

One final point about user fee's from the General Aviation perspective. If GA pilots are charged for ATC services, they are less likely to use the services, which is a huge negative impact on safety. Think of a stoplight. If you had to pay each time you used a stoplight, wouldn't you find ways to avoid the stoplights? For pilots, avoiding ATC services is dangerous. As a society, we've determined that stoplights are in the public's best interest, thus we all pay taxes to provide stoplights. People who drive more are taxed more though gasoline taxes, but even those who don't drive are taxed a little to provide the stoplights. Currently the FAA funding works the same way, we all pay a little, and those who fly more pay more though fuel taxes and ticket taxes. If it's not broke don't fix it.

So other tidbits:
We are spending $43 million on the "Orange County (CA) Toll Road Demonstration Project".

We spend $1.12 Billion on the Federal Railroad Administration. Shouldn't the private companies like CSX pay for their own railroads?

This is good, $9.4 Billion on the Federal Transit Administration which subsidises public transportation.

We have a "Pipeline and Hazardous Material Safety Administration" ($137 million) or as the locals call it "PAHMSA". All of these "administrations" has their own giant bureaucracy. No wonder people call the federal government "bloated."

The General Provisions are also fun:

SEC. 152. None of the funds in this Act shall be available for
salaries and expenses of more than 113 political and Presidential
appointees in the Department of Transportation.

113 appointees! Damn! That's just in the DOT, I wonder how many there are across the Federal government (it is about 5,000). I need to get into the kiss up business. I wonder what Bush's appointees do all day. I bet they write General Provisions like this one:

SEC. 709. No funds appropriated by this Act shall be available
to pay for an abortion, or the administrative expenses in connection
with any health plan under the Federal employees health benefits
program which provides any benefits or coverage for abortions.

Obviously that is what we American's care about in the DOT budget, banning abortions. But wait, if you thought section 709 was a little harsh check out section 710:

SEC. 710. The provision of section 709 shall not apply where the
life of the mother would be endangered if the fetus were carried to
term, or the pregnancy is the result of an act of rape or incest.

Oh, thank God, I was getting worried.

All in all, this has been a great learning experience about our federal government.

Super Bowl Videos

You've been hearing about it....

1985 Bear's rap video, the Super Bowl Shuffle!

This is quite a gem. It's just so, so 80s.

Also, not to be missed from the city of big shoulders, begins with a "C", ends with an "O", and in the middle is "hicag"...

The Superfans from SNL.

Thanks Chuck and Go Bears!