If user fees go into effect I'm done

In article ,
scott moore wrote:

GA is a gnat on the publics rear end.

except in part of the US, like Alaska.

--
Bob Noel
Looking for a sig the
lawyers will hate

ktbr wrote:
B A R R Y wrote:
Not quite. Most of it _is_ commercial, but it's not scheduled
airline service, so it's GA. LOTS of GA is commercial in nature. G

Exactly. Thanks for making my point.

Glad I could help!

Heck, even flight training is commercial in nature, yet is still GA.

Newps wrote:


Sam Spade wrote:


The airlines will eventually, perhaps, use these advanced piston birds
to train their pilots from scratch, if necessary.


They've been doing that for a long time. Lufthansa uses Bonanza's in
Arizona, some of them have over 14,000 hours on them. When I was at GFK
in the early 90's UND had a program where airlines would send over zero
time students and they would leave UND in less thyan a year as first
officers on Airbuses and 747's. We had students from Gulf Air, China
Airlines and a third one that I can't recall right now. They started
their private pilot training in Piper Arrows and then moved into
Seminoles, King Airs and then finally Citations and Beechjets.


As has JAL in Napa, California. I was thinking in terms of U.S. carriers.

Morgans wrote:


"Newps" wrote

They've been doing that for a long time. Lufthansa uses Bonanza's in
Arizona, some of them have over 14,000 hours on them. When I was at
GFK in the early 90's UND had a program where airlines would send over
zero time students and they would leave UND in less thyan a year as
first officers on Airbuses and 747's. We had students from Gulf Air,
China Airlines and a third one that I can't recall right now. They
started their private pilot training in Piper Arrows and then moved
into Seminoles, King Airs and then finally Citations and Beechjets.


The biggest shame about the whole thing, is that this whole thing
threatens to break a system that is essentially not broken.

All to better serve the big money at the airlines.

It makes me sick to think that I, at the time, supported their bail-out
of the post 9-11 period.

One can hope that this blows over until after the next presidential
election. It would be nice to think that our representatives can think
for themselves, and not allow the package to go through.

The way the Democrats in Congress who now control this stuff are
talking, user fees may die. The airline stooge group, the Air Transport
Association, is now focusing on big increases in fuel taxes.

Mxsmanic wrote:
In principle, the rate of illness for everyone is just about the same, so if
everyone pays for it, it should work out just fine. The problems arise when
greed and corruption enter the game.


Actually, the problems arise when a lot of people get all sorts of
medical care and drugs and are not required to pay for it or even
pay back the taxpayers who did have to pay.

C J Campbell wrote:

Oh, absolutely. I just want to see what happens when California tries to
garnishee 150% of somebody's paycheck, multiplied millions of times. I
especially want to see them try to force a homeless wino in San Francisco to
buy health insurance.

Or force Lord knows how many illegal aliens to buy it.

ktbr opined

Mxsmanic wrote:

Yes, but unfortunately those tests invariably become corrupt, as they are
used to create a voting elite, rather than to assess competence to vote.
The problem is that the tests are usually imposed by the same people who
are elected by the voting, which is a conflict of interest.


True enough... Perhaps there should be a merit based approach to
voting to allow for cancelling out the ignorant. Sort of allow
for Darwin's theory to have its productive influence on govenrment,
instead of the reverse effect as is now the case.

As an example: If you _graduate_ from High School you get one vote.

Then, you can get additional votes like:

Service in the military - you get an additional vote.
Graduate from college - get an additional vote.
For each $10,000 in taxes you paid - get an additional vote.
For each child you raised who becomes a productive citizen
you get an additional vote.


You should also be able to lose a vote for things such
as being a convicted Felon, and one vote for each $10,000 in welfare
benefits you were given.... if you pay it back then you get an
extra vote that year.

In this way people would be more vested in their country and have
incentives to work hard, make good decisions. I believe you would
still need term limits however.

You might be interested in reding Neville Shute's /In The Wet./ Not only does it
deal with a multiple vote system, but it is aviation related as well.



-ash
Cthulhu in 2007!
Why wait for nature?

"elitist hobby" clearly does not include FedEx, et al feeder flights,
medical flights, or serious business aviation. It does include "$100
hamburger" flights, personal transportation flight, personal
sightseeing flights, and warbird activities.

Smart non-flying folks I know clearly know the difference.

I bring this aspect up, because it will become part of the debate
about user fees. To ignore the argument does not make it go away.


Well then driving in my car to a restaurant or a trip accross town to
the
supermarket is an elitist hobby supported by public funding.


Your view is not shared by the automotive public.

It is however, precisely as correct as making the same claim about GA for
personal transportation.

Peter

The biggest shame about the whole thing, is that this whole thing
threatens
to break a system that is essentially not broken.

All to better serve the big money at the airlines.

It makes me sick to think that I, at the time, supported their bail-out of
the post 9-11 period.

You are not alone. :-(

One can hope that this blows over until after the next presidential
election. It would be nice to think that our representatives can think
for
themselves, and not allow the package to go through.
--
We can only hope.

On Sat, 10 Feb 2007 21:41:19 -0000, Dylan Smith
wrote in
:

On 2007-02-10, Mxsmanic wrote:
Europeans are already accustomed to having their lives run for them by
bureaucrats (now in several layers both domestic and international). It does
not occur to them to _resist_ things. The ones who were willing to resist
injustices and incompetence crossed the Atlantic and Pacific centuries ago.

Europeans do actually resist - as evidenced by the massive response to
the CAA's Mode S transponder proposals. However, the GA population is so
small it is effectively disenfranchised - the CAA basically responded
'well we're going to do it anyway so there'. When you are 50,000 voters
out of an electorate of 40 million, your opinion counts for nothing -
especially when the CAA is leaned on heavily by moneyed corporate
interests like the airlines - the executives of which can remove their
donations to political parties if the CAA doesn't do what they want.

In the end your only option if you don't like the CAA is to move
somewhere else (typically the US). However, most pilots like enough
_other_ things about their own country that they aren't prepared to move
over just a single issue.


It would seem there is another option, garner support from other
like-minded groups of voters:

ELECTORS GROUP OPPOSES USER FEES
(http://www.avweb.com/eletter/archive...ll.html#194438)
Well you never know who your friends are, and the aviation
alphabet groups can add the League of Rural Voters to the growing
list of organizations opposed to the Bush administration's plans
for reorganizing the FAA. In a statement issued last week, League
President Neil Ritchie described GA as the "lifeline to rural
communities" and says the mix of user fees and tax increases
contained in the package will force many operators to ground their
light aircraft, reminding the government of just how useful that
fleet can be in times of trouble. "General aviation played a
crucial role in efforts to evacuate Hurricane Katrina survivors
and continues to play an important role in our preparedness for
future disasters," Ritchie noted. The group is even more irritated
about what the plans might do to airline service in the
hinterlands.
http://www.avweb.com/eletter/archive...ll.html#194438