Let's get "ENGAGED"

[MooneyMitch]

Jolie posted the following on the MAPA forum this afternoon and I just had to post it here. 

I was watching the news here in Northern Ca.  last night with my  

father.  It was national news as I think of it, and they were talking  

about the crash in Austin.  My father was a trainer in the Army Air  

Corp.  He was an instructor and held a commercial license.  He was  

the proud proud owner of an M20 C/D for 27 years.  He is 87 now, and  

hasn't flown for 5 years or more.  As the news lady talked about how  

small planes can be dangerous and that we "fly under the radar" "not  

subject to TSA"  and that " we don't even have to go through baggage  

screening" our collective blood started to boil. Further she said  

"perhaps we need more background checks on private pilots."  I know  

you are all perhaps sick to death about hearing about the Mooney  

Ambassador program I am involved with, but our second mission is to  

promote GA.  Even if you don't get involved with the Ambassadors,  

please consider looking at GA Serves America.  http:// 

www.gaservesamerica.com/

Let's all get involved.  Talk to your friends and neighbors about GA.  

If you have a few dollars around think about supporting a worthy  

cause that promotes GA with them.  If you would like more information  

about the Ambassadors, you know where to find me.

[Kwixdraw]

I don't want to jump on too much of a political soapbox but I think we need to look beyond just flying. We really need to link up with other groups that treasure their rights and unique culture if you will. It seems that every interest I have had in life whether it be SCUBA diving, hunting, off road racing, motorcycling, shooting or flying has some group that is adamant that we must be regulated, restricted, licensed,taxed, examined, registered and possibly eliminated since we don't know what is good for us and are possibly dangerous to everyone else. I dropped my subscription to "Fine Woodworking" magazine because all I got out of them for the longest time was how this or that group of woodworkers was wasting our resources and yada yadayada.

I think the Ambassadors program is a fine idea but how about we link up with EAA's local chapter and do the few Young Eagle events they do each year. Maybe get in touch with a Boy Scout troop and become a merit badge counselor or do a career day at a local High School. I'm trying to get my sons high school to allow the kids to do a community service project at a local aviation museum where they have a 501©3 corporation formed to restore the B-17 from 12 O'Clock High. These are all things we can do but what I'm really trying to get at is that we need to understand and support others that are having problems with the powers that be. Most of us can't contribute to all the various lobbying groups and organizations that promote the things we like to do. We need some way to link with other groups so that we don't end up getting slammed by some group that has gotten a toe hold on a different group and used that to go after us. For example. in California we have a restriction on hunting or shooting with lead bullets in areas deemed to be habitat to Calif. Condors. This is strictly whacko science used buy the anti gun crowd and the enviro loons to stop any sort of shooting sport in a wide area of the state claiming that the Condors have low reproduction rates because they ingest lead from the gut piles hunters leave behind. Can you begin to imagine the same argument being used to restrict aviation over these same areas because of the lead in av gas? If it's not the lead it will be the noise or some other nonsense.

I guess what I'm really saying is that we need to look at our local candidates and hook up with others to see where we can forge some common goals so these knuckleheads don'r get too much political power before we find out what makes them tick.

 

[MooneyMitch]

Just in case some of your are not aware, a very good place to keep up on what's going on in GA is AOPA's "aviationebrief".  It appears daily to us online.  Below is a recent article in the Boston Herald.  We have to contact our Washington govt. reps., email or snail mail to let them know our opinions.   We GA folks, along with AOPA and EAA, have had some very good success at beating back some of these riduclous proposals in the past several months.   This is another fight we must involve ourselves in.

"Then, A. Joseph Stack grew angry with the Internal Revenue Service, wrote a mini-manifesto that he posted on the Internet, and climbed into his general aviation aircraft for his final, murderous flight.

Within hours, politicians who hadn’t been heard from when the TSA made its announcement about rolling back security plans jumped on their soapboxes.

“It’s something that has exposed a weakness we’ve seen since 9/11 - airplanes can fly into buildings,” said Rep. Michael McCaul (R-Texas), in what might be the understatement of 2010. He now plans to raise this issue with fellow members of the House Homeland Security Committee.

The simple fact is this: Sometimes there’s nothing you can do. Once in a while, lone maniacs decide to kill as many people as they can. All the name checks and technology in the world couldn’t have kept Stack from flying his plane into the IRS building. But perhaps this tragedy will cause the TSA to reconsider its ill-conceived plan to roll back general aviation security.

Anthony Amore is an aviation security expert and former TSA official in Boston. His column appears regularly in the Sunday Herald."

[Kwixdraw]

Probably be a good idea to smother McCaul with letters telling him how stupid his remarks are and advising that it's that sort of micro legislating attitude that drive people toward acts of desperation like the late Mr. Stack

[MooneyMitch]

Great article today in the Aviation ebrief from AOPA.  Jeff Schweitzer [The Huffington Post] provides tons of outstanding arguments for the positive side of GA, and how absurd the rush to judgement mentality has been with the Austin crash.  As Buster1 previously stated in the "not good" thread, "guns don't kill people, people kill people", Schweitzer's titled his piece, "Airplanes Don't Kill People, People Kill People".  Perfect!

If you want some good amunition to go out and fight for GA, the article is full of it!

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jeff-schweitzer/airplanes-dont-kill-peopl_b_469550.html

[carusoam]

Thanks Mitch,

 

The huffingtonpost.com article supplies good logic.  It is worth the few minutes to read.

 

-anthony-