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My grandfather was almost shot down at the White House (2018)

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Re: My grandfather was almost shot down at the White House (2018)

#151

Post by prottog »

jancsika wrote: post #116
phpisthebest wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Symbols can be powerful... That is the issue, the foundational principle of the United States was that we were a federalist system with a weak and narrowly defined federal government. The office of Presidency should be inconsequential to the Everyday citizen of either the US or the world. The fact that we continually shift more power from Local / State government, then from Congress to the Executive is the exact reas…

> The fact that we continually shift more power from Local / State government, then from Congress to the Executive is the exact reason the president is a "Symbol of Power" This is all rank and dubious speculation wrt your general rule about POTUS needing a dedicated security team. Hell, Duane Johnson needs a dedicated security team. If you are positing a federal government so weak that POTUS is not widely known withi…

What part of GP's take on the American federalist system are you describing as radical? Seems to me that the truly radical thing is what the federal government has morphed into over the years, its founding constitutional document notwithstanding.

Re: My grandfather was almost shot down at the White House (2018)

#152

Post by prottog »

gus_massa wrote: post #118
pixl97 wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So how do you plan to deal with the continuation of government and nuclear weapon problem?

For many years the secret code to launch nuclear missiles was for a long time 00000000 https://sgs.princeton.edu/00000000 Now they claim they changed it, but be sure that if the president is dead the military have some workaround to launch the misiles.

> if the president is dead the military have some workaround to launch the misiles.

The presidential line of succession exists for a reason. It's the office of the president that has the power to authorize a nuclear strike, not the person.

Re: My grandfather was almost shot down at the White House (2018)

#153

Post by dctoedt »

fijiaarone wrote: post #122
aidenn0 wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Assassinating the president has little to do with denying him the power of the presidency, and more to do with what he is a symbol of. Kind of like how 9/11 wasn't about killing some office workers

A lot of presidents have been assassinated in America. Not one assassination has affected the continuum of government or been more than a personal tragedy.

> Not one assassination has affected the continuum of government or been more than a personal tragedy.

The formerly-enslaved workers in the American South would like a word about Abraham Lincoln's assassination in 1865 and his replacement as president by the (Union-loyal) southerner and states-rights advocate Andrew Johnson, who had very different ideas about Reconstruction and the rights of Blacks. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrew_Johnson#Reconstruction

EDIT: Recall as well the 1914 assassination of the Austrian archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife by a Serbian nationalist: That one murder started the dominos falling for a 30-year, continent-wide war (with a 20-year intermission) in which tens of millions of soldiers and civilians died — with millions of those being systematically murdered. Moreover, that new Thirty Years War (Churchill's term) destroyed the fairly-prosperous international commercial system of the early 1900s; devastated most of Europe's physical- and economic infrastructure; and catapulted Russia and the U.S. to the status of global hegemons.

So yeah: Assassinations can indeed be quite a bit more than just personal tragedies ....

Re: My grandfather was almost shot down at the White House (2018)

#154

Post by ElevenLathe »

petsfed wrote: post #113
safety1st wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Who cares? The perennial mistake is believing that if any of these guys get capped, it's some irreparable loss to society. It's not. Let them play the odds of life like the rest of us do. A society that depends on strongmen isn't a free society.

I think there's merit to at least forestalling rule-by-assassination. Like, yes, I would not mourn a lot of people who end up having protective details. But I absolutely don't want to live in a world where all it takes to change a policy is one particularly motivated sociopath. Keep in mind that John Hinckley Jr's assassination attempt on Reagan wasn't out of disagreement with Reagan's policies, it was to impress Jod…

Reagan had an elected vice president. Bush Sr. being in charge instead of Reagan is not what I would call a material effect on our civilization. These guys are all interchangeable, as evidenced by the fact that we change them on purpose at least every eight years.

Re: My grandfather was almost shot down at the White House (2018)

#155

Post by dctoedt »

phpisthebest wrote: post #78
pixl97 wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So how do you plan to deal with the continuation of government and nuclear weapon problem?

>>how do you plan to deal with the continuation of government Federalism. The Federal Government does far too much and most of its function should be left to State and Local governments. >>and nuclear weapon problem? MAD is a terrible strategy, and I dont think our Nuclear weapons serve the function many believe they do.

> The Federal Government does far too much and most of its function should be left to State and Local governments.

Except that state and local governments are more vulnerable to capture by rent-seekers and other special-interest groups bent on shaping public policy to suit their desires.

Re: My grandfather was almost shot down at the White House (2018)

#156

Post by dctoedt »

mulmen wrote: post #137
beebmam wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the federal government should be reduced in power, then why should state or local governments have any more power over individuals?

Because I have more power as a voter and constituent to influence policies that affect me. At a national level I am 1 of 331,900,000. At a state level I am 1 of 7,739,000. At a county level I am one of 2,252,000. At a city level I am one of 733,919. At a neighborhood level I am one of 82,123. I have four orders of magnitude more influence over my city council rep than I do over my president.

> Because I have more power as a voter and constituent to influence policies that affect me.

If only things actually worked that way. The vast majority of voters don't exercise that power. Moreover, state and local governments are more vulnerable to capture by rent-seekers and other special-interest groups bent on shaping public policy to suit their desires.

Re: My grandfather was almost shot down at the White House (2018)

#157

Post by [deleted] »

petsfed wrote: post #113
safety1st wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Who cares? The perennial mistake is believing that if any of these guys get capped, it's some irreparable loss to society. It's not. Let them play the odds of life like the rest of us do. A society that depends on strongmen isn't a free society.

I think there's merit to at least forestalling rule-by-assassination. Like, yes, I would not mourn a lot of people who end up having protective details. But I absolutely don't want to live in a world where all it takes to change a policy is one particularly motivated sociopath. Keep in mind that John Hinckley Jr's assassination attempt on Reagan wasn't out of disagreement with Reagan's policies, it was to impress Jod…

[deleted]

Re: My grandfather was almost shot down at the White House (2018)

#158

Post by jamesmoroni »

I had a similar experience in 2008. I was an Air Force helicopter pilot stationed at Andrews Air Force Base just outside DC. I got a last-minute assignment to show a new copilot some of our operating sites on the north side of DC. One of those sites was Camp David. I read through the NOTAMS but didn't notice that the large restricted area around Camp David was active that day because the president was there. So we totally busted through the outer restricted area and the Secret Service wanted my head. They launched a helicopter to chase me away, and they almost launched the F-16s at Andrews. I almost lost my wings. It was a bad day.

Re: My grandfather was almost shot down at the White House (2018)

#159

Post by eftychis »

ufmace wrote: post #150
pivo wrote: post #18

I've just finished reading, "Zero Fail: The Rise and Fall of the Secret Service" by Carol Leonnig [0]. In that book the author describes an incident on September 12, 1994 [1] in which a pilot landed a small plane in front of the white house. Secret Service members she interviewed were dumfounded that they were asked there to run to the white house roof with rifles to protect the building, and that there were no such…

I have no idea how the Secret Service in particular is doing, but I would kind of expect that any actual anti-aircraft missiles would be owned and operated by some unit of the Army or National Guard or something. They own all of the actual missiles, and repair and maintenance people and gear, and probably training for how to operate it and how to try not to fuck up when you have 15 seconds to determine if an incoming…

Yeah you either keep some fighters weapon armed or use them for reconessaince style interception. You can't arm a plane in seconds or under 5 minutes.

I think the rule of thumb is 5' at most scrambling time if plane is on alert-- fueled, armed, and pilot ready.

Re: My grandfather was almost shot down at the White House (2018)

#160

Post by donatj »

jamesmoroni wrote: post #158

I had a similar experience in 2008. I was an Air Force helicopter pilot stationed at Andrews Air Force Base just outside DC. I got a last-minute assignment to show a new copilot some of our operating sites on the north side of DC. One of those sites was Camp David. I read through the NOTAMS but didn't notice that the large restricted area around Camp David was active that day because the president was there. So we to…

Can you explain for the layman what it means to lose your wings?
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