Well, we’ve done it again. Once again, in the face of unfounded, hysterical, mis-placed fear, America has proven itself to be a weak, paranoid nation. And ironically, in this case, it was none other than Mr. “make American strong again,” Trump who led the way.
Those who have Trump Derangement Syndrome actually cheered his moment of cowardice as “the one reasonable thing he’s done,” while true Trumpsters did as they always do. Shrugged and said “I’m sure he has good reasons,” even though they, of course, couldn’t cite any. Proving, once again, that Trump was right when he said he could literally murder people in Manhattan and his followers would still support him. Meanwhile, the rest of us, who genuinely believe that Trump has done some really good things and some really stupid and unnecessary things are left in disbelief at where his spine went as we place this decision firmly in the column of “stupid and unnecessary.”
Following an Ethiopian Airlines flight that crashed and killed 157 people last week, on the heels of the same model of airplane crashing in Indonesia in October killing 187 people, the world went mad with hysteria demanding that the Boeing 737 MAX 8 & 9 model planes be grounded, because they, the planes, are clearly the problem.
World government after world government did as governments do; they promised their little people that they, the government, there to protect us, would get to the bottom of what was happening and punish those responsible and keep everyone from getting hurt any further.
Let’s take a look at what had actually happened; In the two years the 737 MAX 8 & 9 have been in service, 250 flights per day in America alone have used that model plane, safely transporting 43,000 passengers PER DAY on average. That works out to just under 32 million Americans who safely took off and landed in this exact plane, mainly on Southwest, American, and United Airlines.
In the wake of the two disasters within 5 months oversees, how did those American corporations respond? They kept flying the planes, citing nary a problem.
This, of course was nothing more than greedy corporations willing to risk the safety of their customers and employees in the face of the overwhelming evidence that Boeing had, with its’ fastest selling airplane in history, created a pile of junk in its haste to fulfill orders. Clearly, two of these planes, flown by substandard airlines in questionable parts of the world with poorly trained pilots, crashing and killing people, indict the entire airplane without question.
Ooops. I just did that thing. I had the audacity to point out uncomfortable facts. As did JP Pristani, who has spent 43 years as a pilot and now aviation consultant, who was one of the few to speak out loudly against countries that were grounding the Boeing 737 MAX. “Lion air, Eithiopian Air, they’re not major carriers,” said Pristani, “I look at the training.”
Southwest airlines alone has 88,000 total hours of flying these jets with no problems at take-off. Many believe, but refuse to say out loud, it’s a simple matter of American trained pilots being the best in the world and knowing when and how to disengage the autopilot takeoff with this particular jet so that they can use their human training to compensate for the center of gravity challenges the design of the 737 MAX present.
But that of course can’t be the answer. It can’t be white privilege or American dominance, so a smear campaign was launched. Stories emerged of American pilots and their well documented concerns about this jet which have been ignored.
Proof emerged quickly that the total number of pilots who had expressed any concerns in America was 4. And two of them were anonymous. For a point of reference, there are approximately 580,000 working commercial airline pilots in America. But hey, 4 of them can’t be wrong, right?
Surely President Trump would stop this PR campaign by the paranoid and afraid amongst us who were starting to call their airline and make sure they wouldn’t be on one of these death traps! Surely Trump would puff out his chest as he always does, talk of the greatness of the American worker based in Boeing’s plants around the country and headquartered in Washington State, and most importantly, proclaim that if the very companies who fly these planes and have the most intimate knowledge of them doesn’t want them grounded, the federal government, on his watch, is not going to step in and perform some “nanny-state” maneuver such as ordering the planes grounded out of an unfounded excess of caution.
Alas, Trump tucked whatever it is that he has in his underpants between his legs and ordered the planes grounded, betraying Boeing, its workers, and pilots across the country. More than that, he betrayed his self-stated mission statement and simply caved to the worldwide mob and made America as afraid as the rest of the world.
Wonderful. Just like we spent $50 billion on a vaccine for a bird and swine flu that never had any chance of infecting America a decade ago (and we clearly prevented it by making those vaccines which were never dispensed), we’ve again prevented another tragedy that was never going to happen. Congratulations, President Trump, you’ve shown that it takes less than one full term for you to turn into just another spineless, feckless, follower of a politician. There have been plenty of signs before this, but you’ve solidified your place in history with this and your asinine National Emergency Declaration that I wrote about weeks ago. You abuse your power, you placate the minority, and you ignore the will of the people. You’re Barack Obama, Gavin Newsom, and George W. Bush. You’re just another swamp creature.
https://www.foxnews.com/shows/outnumbered-overtime (search for video of “Aviation expert says Trump acted prematurely”
