SivaGanesha

Just to clarify the priest's advice, without commenting on its morality: the priest meant that it is OK to shoplift ONLY in truly extreme cases where, unless one resorted to shoplifting, one would be unable to pay for one's food, rent, or tithe.

First adding billvon's numbers: 60,817+5,800 = 66,617 120+6 = 126 66,617/126 = 528.71 Then adding my own: 66,617+130 = 66,747 126+1 = 127 66,747/127 = 525.57 "It's hard to have fun at 4-way unless your whole team gets down to the ground safely to do it again!"--Northern California Skydiving League re USPA Safety Day, March 8, 2014

Over a time scale of the last 100+ years you are generally correct. But over the shorter time scale of the last 10 years there was another factor in play. Immigration was moved out of the Department of Justice and into the Department of Homeland Security in the immediate aftermath of 9/11. This was done because it was understood that immigration was now a national security issue. In general, yes, crackdowns on illegal immigration have been more prevalent in weak economic times. But the reorganization of immigration into DHS was done for national security reasons, not economic reasons, and it happened at the same time and for the same reasons as we sent troops to Afghanistan. "It's hard to have fun at 4-way unless your whole team gets down to the ground safely to do it again!"--Northern California Skydiving League re USPA Safety Day, March 8, 2014

Well, that is where I guess I disagree. In the early days after 9/11, it was clearly understood that straightening out the immigration mess and going to war in Afghanistan were closely related issues--two different fronts in a single war on terror. However, that has now changed. I believe the sea change happened after a series of marches by illegal aliens in early 2006, but for whatever reason, these two issues--illegal immigration and the war in Afghanistan--seem to have become decoupled in public policy where they were previously understood to be closely related. It is true that there are many aspects of illegal immigration--especially when you consider a typical illegal immigrant who breaks the law only for the immediate economic betterment of him/herself and his/her family--that are not closely connected to the war on terror. However, given that there is a small minority of illegal immigrants whose goals are terroristic, and not economic, addressing the war on terror requires that we fully address the larger problem of illegal immigration. Decoupling these issues--whether into different bills or different threads--has been a big policy mistake IMHO. "It's hard to have fun at 4-way unless your whole team gets down to the ground safely to do it again!"--Northern California Skydiving League re USPA Safety Day, March 8, 2014

But it is relevant. The original justification for going into Afghanistan 8+ years ago was that the 9/11 terrorists--believed to be associated with al Qaeda elements operating in Afghanistan--had obtained US visas under false pretenses and then committed terrorist acts. Thus, for national security reasons alone, even leaving aside economic concerns, the illegal immigration problem is something that should have been solved by now. The fact that it hasn't been is further evidence--along with the absence of a war tax or draft--that the country isn't really ready to make the painful choices needed to be truly secure. The war in Afghanistan can offer only limited additional security to us when we lack the political will to secure our own borders. "It's hard to have fun at 4-way unless your whole team gets down to the ground safely to do it again!"--Northern California Skydiving League re USPA Safety Day, March 8, 2014

True, not all burglars intend violence against the lawful occupants of the home they burglarize. But all burglars are, by definition, burglars. "It's hard to have fun at 4-way unless your whole team gets down to the ground safely to do it again!"--Northern California Skydiving League re USPA Safety Day, March 8, 2014

I'm not sure I understand your choice of pronouns here. When has Australia ever not gone along with a decision that the USA has made when it comes to the military? Australia supported the USA militarily in Vietnam and then again in Iraq--both unpopular wars with limited international support. I think the pronoun you are looking for is "we"/"our". "It's hard to have fun at 4-way unless your whole team gets down to the ground safely to do it again!"--Northern California Skydiving League re USPA Safety Day, March 8, 2014

There are at least 7 million illegal immigrants from Mexico alone in the USA and they are here largely with the blessings of the Mexican government. If that isn't a "large invasion" I don't know what is. "It's hard to have fun at 4-way unless your whole team gets down to the ground safely to do it again!"--Northern California Skydiving League re USPA Safety Day, March 8, 2014

Quick question about FarmVillle since I have noticed a lot of skydivers playing FV on Facebook-- The number of experience points needed to advance to the next level seems to increase--for example, in the lower levels it might take only a few hundred XP to advance a level but when you get to level 33 or 34 it takes 9000 XP. My question is whether the increment needed to advance eventually levels out at some point when you have enough experience--or does it always keep increasing? "It's hard to have fun at 4-way unless your whole team gets down to the ground safely to do it again!"--Northern California Skydiving League re USPA Safety Day, March 8, 2014

Not really. If you want to see someone actually executed in this country, there is nowhere that runs a more efficient death penalty machine than Virginia. In Virginia if they say they are going to execute someone they mean it. There is no other jurisdiction in the country--even Texas--which executes people as efficiently as Virginia. Virginia has something called the 21 day rule which severely limits appeals and results in actual executions rather than endless appeals. Texas executes a similar number of people (proportional to its larger size) but has a huge death row of inmates who are able to game the process for decades. You can't game the process in Virginia if you are sentenced to die--you get one appeal and then you are executed. I'm not commenting on whether any of this is good or bad--I'm merely saying that those who wanted to see Muhammad executed should be glad he was tried by Virginia and not by any other state, or under federal jurisdiction, where he might have committed crimes. "It's hard to have fun at 4-way unless your whole team gets down to the ground safely to do it again!"--Northern California Skydiving League re USPA Safety Day, March 8, 2014

I'm generally a believer in the free market but for some reason the market isn't working as well with regard to health care as it works in most other industries. The biggest problem is that the health insurance industry is so closely tied to people's employment. I don't know why the free market has produced that result in health care when it hasn't done so in any other market--but that is what has happened. It complicates things--especially in the USA where people change jobs much more often than in other countries and very especially during times of high unemployment. If I want to change the parameters of my health insurance, I need to go to my boss. This, with all due respect to my boss, is a nonsensical situation. My boss isn't a doctor, he isn't a nurse, he isn't an insurance salesman. It makes little sense that he is so closely involved in important health care decisions. If I want to buy a car--or even buy auto insurance--my boss will at most have a very limited role of verifying my income for the purposes of qualifying for a loan. The whole thing strikes me as a holdover from a very different past where the notion of "employer as parent" made sense and tying one's health insurance to one's lifetime employment was probably a reasonable idea. But those days are long gone. In the health care industry, the free market hasn't changed with the times. Again--this is an unusual result because usually the free market does change with the times. For some reason it hasn't when it comes to health insurance. The unwillingness of this particular industry to innovate has left them vulnerable to government intervention. Usually if someone were to ask me who would innovate better--the government or private industry--the answer would be obvious--private industry. But when it comes to health insurance, I'm not so sure--they seem very stuck in their thinking and unable to come up with insurance products that work for people. "It's hard to have fun at 4-way unless your whole team gets down to the ground safely to do it again!"--Northern California Skydiving League re USPA Safety Day, March 8, 2014

Even if Obama and/or Bush were telling the truth, the fact is that over 1.1 million new jobs were given to new immigrants over the same time--so even if Obama is correct, the stimulus has not created jobs on a net basis for American workers, as more jobs were definitely given away to immigrants than were alleged to have been created/saved: White House Claims 'Stimulus' Saved/Created 650,000 Jobs (but it imported 1,125,000 foreign workers at same time) Immigration in significant numbers may have a very important and positive role to play in good economic times, but the wisdom of such policies during bad economic times must be questioned. "It's hard to have fun at 4-way unless your whole team gets down to the ground safely to do it again!"--Northern California Skydiving League re USPA Safety Day, March 8, 2014

Please do not read anything more into my remarks than what I said. I am merely agreeing with the assertion that the majority of those born poor, remain poor. I am not speculating as to the reasons why. Lack of motivation (i.e. they don't want to) is certainly a possible explanation--but I don't have enough information to offer an informed opinion. "It's hard to have fun at 4-way unless your whole team gets down to the ground safely to do it again!"--Northern California Skydiving League re USPA Safety Day, March 8, 2014

This is just plain lie. We came to States four years ago - and we got a house. To give you an idea, last year we paid more than 100K in taxes. And we both came from and poor countries and poor families. ... But aren't you the exception that proves the rule? I assume (from your nick) that you are originally from Russia (please correct me if I'm wrong). The vast majority of poor Russians do not emigrate to the USA--they remain in Russia. The moment you set foot in America you had already set yourself apart from the vast majority of poor Russians, regardless of what might have happened after that. Your example shows that there is a way out of poverty, but it also serves to underscore that the vast majority of those born poor--in Russia, in America, or anywhere else--do not succeed in finding that way out. "It's hard to have fun at 4-way unless your whole team gets down to the ground safely to do it again!"--Northern California Skydiving League re USPA Safety Day, March 8, 2014

I would say that during the two instructor phase of AFF (whether that takes three jumps or more) each jump should consist of one AFFI the student has worked with before and one AFFI who is new for the student. On the first jump one of the two AFFI's should be the same person who taught the FJC. This provides both continuity for comparison purposes and introduces the student to new instructors. After the student drops to one instructor, the student supposedly is becoming increasingly self sufficient so it would be better to introduce them to as many new instructors as possible. Most skydivers are going to jump with many, many people throughout their skydiving careers and allowing new skydivers to become to attached to a single AFFI's approach is probably not a good precedent to set at the beginning of a skydiving career. It seems to me that a big part of safety in this sport rests on being able to quickly adjust to jumping with new people. I also presume that, when there are two AFFI's, and one is very senior and the other is a new AFFI, that this decision is also partly at the discretion of the senior AFFI based on how the new AFFI him/herself performed on the jump. "It's hard to have fun at 4-way unless your whole team gets down to the ground safely to do it again!"--Northern California Skydiving League re USPA Safety Day, March 8, 2014

24 minutes in the tunnel Thursday night with the Kaleidoscope guys--Collin and Karl. Decided not to jump this weekend because Collin is leading the next skills camp at Skydance on Nov 7--so I figured I'd focus on non-jumping things this weekend. Now I wish I'd jumped though because it was great weather and the 15 day forecast for Nov 7 is a little shitty. Was great to get in the tunnel though--I had only 4 minutes in the tunnel in my life before Thursday--you really get some great feedback that you don't get in freefall. I hope the weatherman is wrong about Nov 7 because the skills camps have been really kick ass and I hope this next one happens on time. "It's hard to have fun at 4-way unless your whole team gets down to the ground safely to do it again!"--Northern California Skydiving League re USPA Safety Day, March 8, 2014

I think FDR was on the right track in terms of his approach for getting the USA out of the Depression. Unfortunately Hitler was on a very wrong track when it came to his approach for getting Germany out of the Depression, and the resulting events rightly dominate the history books. The USA emerged from the war in a dominant position because the war never touched mainland North American soil, so it is easy to look back and say that the war ended the Depression. The reality, though, is that the war didn't so much destroy the Depression as it destroyed Europe--leaving the USA in a comparatively strong position. However, if Germany had elected a better leader in 1933, I strongly believe that both Europe and the USA could have emerged from the Depression by the mid-to-late 1930's without war being necessary. "It's hard to have fun at 4-way unless your whole team gets down to the ground safely to do it again!"--Northern California Skydiving League re USPA Safety Day, March 8, 2014

I am not suggesting or implying that I or anyone would be flying in a tunnel for the first time of course--so this is a purely hypothetical, philosophical poll...but... If someone who has flown in a tunnel before, but this is the first time in a particular tunnel, do they owe beer for this (somewhat dubious) milestone? "It's hard to have fun at 4-way unless your whole team gets down to the ground safely to do it again!"--Northern California Skydiving League re USPA Safety Day, March 8, 2014

Yes it should, they are a credit risk!! But they aren't applying for credit! They are applying for a job. "It's hard to have fun at 4-way unless your whole team gets down to the ground safely to do it again!"--Northern California Skydiving League re USPA Safety Day, March 8, 2014

There is always a reason, but the reason need not be that they are irresponsible. For example, in the hi tech industry (and perhaps other industries as well) it is very common for angel investors and VCs to refuse to even consider investing in an entrepreneur until the entrepreneur has first put there own credit at risk by maxing out their credit cards, mortgaging their home, etc. This is especially true if the entrepreneur has no previous track record of success. If the business then fails (with or without angel/VC money), the entrepreneur will probably be left with bad credit personally for quite awhile. The economy needs people willing to take entrepreneurial risks. Someone with poor credit because of a failed business may well be a good person with honorable intentions whose business skills just need refining. If such a person wants to go back to working for others for a few years to pay off the bills they incurred and save up enough to try again at entrepreneurship, their poor credit shouldn't be held against them. "It's hard to have fun at 4-way unless your whole team gets down to the ground safely to do it again!"--Northern California Skydiving League re USPA Safety Day, March 8, 2014

Yes it was a lot of fun...still getting to know the people and the DZ at Byron but it will be great to jump again there in a week or two. Yes the avatar is the PAC 750 from Skydance where I normally jump...Byron has a PAC 750 as well so that aspect of it is very similar. "It's hard to have fun at 4-way unless your whole team gets down to the ground safely to do it again!"--Northern California Skydiving League re USPA Safety Day, March 8, 2014

I was asked to leave a DZ this past weekend (not my home DZ) before I even got a chance to jump. At the party Friday night I was accused (bad rap) of trying to steal something (inexpensive non-skydiving item) that someone had given to me and I gave back as soon as they asked. Not sure what their issue was or why they thought I was trying to steal it--although admittedly I was new at this place and they didn't know me. Not sure how long I'm banned from this DZ for. I'm going to try to get it sorted with the DZO tomorrow. "It's hard to have fun at 4-way unless your whole team gets down to the ground safely to do it again!"--Northern California Skydiving League re USPA Safety Day, March 8, 2014

Not sure if this comment fits into the skydiving or the wind tunnel forum because it touches on both. In looking at the price of wind tunnel time, it occurs to me that it is cheaper, but not *hugely* cheaper, than an actual skydive. For example my DZ charges $20 for a skydive whereas the local wind tunnel charges $720/hr (which is $12/min) offpeak. In my case it is no doubt a win to spend some time in the tunnel since I'm still renting gear at the DZ and there are clearly things I need to work on that can be learned at the tunnel. However it occurs to me that there are limits to the tunnel as a training tool. You can't track or practice exits or do big ways in the tunnel. But on the other hand, turns, stability, arching, adjusting fall rate--those can all be learned and perfected in the tunnel. And, of course, the tunnel is an option even in bad weather that may ground real skydiving. Am I looking at it the right way? I can certainly see the value of the tunnel in many cases but I had also thought the price differential might be a bit greater. "It's hard to have fun at 4-way unless your whole team gets down to the ground safely to do it again!"--Northern California Skydiving League re USPA Safety Day, March 8, 2014