LDSGator

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  1. Haha
    LDSGator reacted to Vort in An Opinionated Rant   
  2. Like
    LDSGator got a reaction from NeuroTypical in An Opinionated Rant   
    That’s a reason why I never friend anyone from my childhood. I don’t want to ruin the few pleasant memories I have due to adult disagreements. 
     
    Sorry it happened to you bro 
  3. Sad
    LDSGator reacted to NeuroTypical in An Opinionated Rant   
    I had that, and I lost it.  My old childhood friend and I were so happy to have found each other on facebook and were gleefully solving all the world's problems by battling it out and arguing online.  Dude was disabled former military, who married a lady who transitioned apparently.
    Then COVID lockdowns and social strife occurred, and my buddy's PTSD kicked in, the conversations got so personal for him he just turned nasty.  No more arguing online with the opposite side of the fence.  It's one of the reasons I'm glad you're here, PP.
     
  4. Like
    LDSGator got a reaction from Phoenix_person in An Opinionated Rant   
    Agree. Like I said I can’t really relate to life in the military. Nor do I particularly want to, to be honest. 
  5. Haha
    LDSGator reacted to Grunt in An Opinionated Rant   
    Me either.🤓
  6. Like
    LDSGator reacted to Phoenix_person in An Opinionated Rant   
    I think most people in the military generally respect other people who wear the uniform, even people from demographics that they normally might avoid associating with in civilian life.
    I'll admit that I've been out of uniform for a little over a decade, so I don't know the current dynamics of military readiness, but my gut reaction is that social politics and combat readiness aren't mutually exclusive, or at least they don't have to be. 
  7. Like
    LDSGator got a reaction from Phoenix_person in An Opinionated Rant   
    Interesting. Thanks. 
     
    I cringe when civilians like me try to make military choices. You want women on the front line? You want LGBTQ there too? Poll the people in the armed forces. If they want it, great. If they don’t, great. People like me who never served should keep their mouths shut on this topic. 
  8. Like
    LDSGator reacted to Grunt in An Opinionated Rant   
    I do.  However, I think LGB is also broken out.  But that isn't what we're talking about.  We're talking about being physically and mentally fit for duty and combat, specifically the job to which you're assigned.    When my peers refer to "woke" in that context, they are generally referring to switching the focus from combat readiness to social politics, which don't have a lot to do with combat readiness. 
  9. Like
    LDSGator reacted to Phoenix_person in An Opinionated Rant   
    I've been out of the game for a bit, but I always felt like a lot of civilians have a warped view of what military life is like (or should be like). Conservatives think it should be legions of Alpha Males™️ jumping out of helicopters with M60s. Liberals think it should be a peacekeeping force with a minimum capacity for actual violence.
    The reality is far more boring. Most servicemembers will never fire a weapon outside of a training environment. This was true at the peak of the "War on Terror", and it's a lot more true today. The most deadly weapons in today's military are run by computers. 
    But on the occasions when violence finds us, politics don't matter, especially "identity politics". What matters is staying alive and keeping your buddies alive. The enemy doesn't care if the person they're shooting at is a MAGA warmonger or a transgender leftist pacifist. They're trying to kill you and your job is to kill them first. I don't know where this notion came from that people who don't fit traditional cishet roles aren't fit for combat (and best I can tell, that's what y'all are talking about when you bring up "wokeness" in the military). I've been in the line of fire with LGBTQ soldiers and never had the slightest doubt about their dedication to the mission at hand or their ability/willingness to use lethal force to defend themselves and their unit. I trust them a heckuva lot more than Petey Proud Boy who "almost" joined the Army but didn't because of the wokeification of the military.
  10. Like
    LDSGator got a reaction from Phoenix_person in Executive Order 13817 and logistics   
    It depends on perspective. If you are far right wing, than anyone to the center of the
    John Birch Society is a communist. If you are far left wing, then anyone who critiques Mao is a reactionary right winger.

    Biden is a traditional liberal/moderate to those of us who aren’t donning MAGA caps or rioting with BLM on the streets.  
  11. Like
    LDSGator reacted to Phoenix_person in Executive Order 13817 and logistics   
    Fun fact about gas prices, when they suddenly go *down*, it's usually because something very bad happened (or is about to). The reason why gas prices were going up drastically three years ago is because we were coming out of a global pandemic and the prices were normalizing.

     
    I disagree. It's pretty on-brand. A lot of people seem to have this false image of Biden as being some kind of leftist radical who hates capitalism and loves China. The reality is that he's barely a liberal on a good day and he's perfectly content to help the capitalist machine keep running by any means necessary.
  12. Haha
    LDSGator reacted to askandanswer in Henry Vacuum Cleaner   
    That's a vacuum cleaner? It looks pretty awkward to use, no wonder it was so henryish!
  13. Like
    LDSGator got a reaction from Just_A_Guy in An Opinionated Rant   
    Someone got into my libertarian foreign policy books I see? 😜 
  14. Okay
    LDSGator got a reaction from NeuroTypical in An Opinionated Rant   
    Someone got into my libertarian foreign policy books I see? 😜 
  15. Like
    LDSGator reacted to NeuroTypical in An Opinionated Rant   
    I guess I should have clarified my thoughts more.  It's nice that our government doesn't take our dumbest people, those least-able to advocate for themselves, and train them to act as cannon fodder and run into enemy machine gun fire.  There are countless examples throughout human history where nations do exactly that. (Since long before machine guns existed.)
    Wasn't thinking about morale, was thinking about crimes against humanity.   
  16. Haha
    LDSGator reacted to EH12NG in An Opinionated Rant   
    Lets all do the wokey pokey! Because that's what its all about. 

     
  17. Haha
    LDSGator got a reaction from zil2 in Henry Vacuum Cleaner   
    @askandanswer & @zil2

    this showed up on my memories today. 

  18. Like
    LDSGator reacted to Grunt in An Opinionated Rant   
    Sure you could.  You have to have a baseline, but 80% of it is mental.   Most things we do, the average male could do if they trained.  
  19. Like
    LDSGator got a reaction from Grunt in An Opinionated Rant   
    True. Agree there.  
  20. Like
    LDSGator reacted to Grunt in An Opinionated Rant   
    So there weren't specific requirements because there didn't really have to be.  It was self-sifting.  Fall out on a ruck march?  Infantry isn't for you.  Can't score 270 on the APFT?  Better get working.  The training itself weeded them out.  Many people didn't go Infantry because they knew this.  
     
    As the failure and injury rates have increased, the Army has tried to set standards (requirements).  OPAT was used before BCT.  ACFT was used after.   ACFT is sprint/drag/carry, push-ups, plank, overhead ball toss, dead lift, and run.   It's the same test everyone else takes, you just have to score much higher.
  21. Like
    LDSGator got a reaction from zil2 in An Opinionated Rant   
    “The greatest victory for Satan was convincing the world he doesn’t exist.”-from a movie called The Usual Suspects. 
  22. Like
    LDSGator reacted to NeuroTypical in An Opinionated Rant   
    It's worth noting that you have to take the military ASVAB test to enter military service.  And if you don't score high enough, you won't be joining military service.  The ASVAB is roughly equivalent to an IQ test, so you roughly need an IQ of 83 or higher to join the military. 
    Maybe the most widely-known event was Muhammad Ali scoring a 78, and not entering military service.  "I said I was the greatest, not the smartest."
    It's a flawed and imperfect process, of course, but not a total failure at only letting people fight and die for our country who can actually choose to do so, rather than just following orders to stand in a line and sign your name and get on a bus. 
     
  23. Like
    LDSGator got a reaction from NeuroTypical in An Opinionated Rant   
    That’s nice. As a teenager we didn’t know that. Nor would any of us have cared. We were all stunned she went into the army. I was simply telling @JohnsonJones that the “anti-military” thought was around when I was in high school as well.
  24. Like
    LDSGator got a reaction from JohnsonJones in An Opinionated Rant   
    Sadly, this was popular in the 90’s too when I was a kid. One of my best friends in childhood joined the army right out of high school and all of us were stunned. She could have gone to any college in the Northeast and no one saw this coming. 
  25. Love
    LDSGator reacted to EH12NG in The "Only true and living church" vs "The most correct of any church".   
    @LDSGator If what I'm reading from you is correct and I'm not putting words in your mouth, like what I've seen in this thread. I agree that manners cost nothing and that first impressions are lasting ones. I would hate to think my flaws as a human have left a bad taste in the mouths of non members but so long as I don't use any wriggle room I have in that scenario as a means to get away with being nasty, impolite, arrogant or just down right idiotic. Then I have faith in the plan for said peoples lives. 

    As always Gator, I appreciate your short and concise input in any given thread. I've long given up entertaining the antics of those who peddle in windbaggery. I hope you're well and in good spirits.