Dudes and Dudettes,
Sorry for the lack of play in the world of JC recently. Alas, I have been living the dream and putting in twelve hour days as a CFI here in SLC. If you can believe this, I am eight weeks into this and I have just over 100 hours dual given! Things are going great but my freetime is limited to text messages in between landings. Although, despite the lack of freetime, I am checking in all the time, lurking is it may be.
I just completed a class with Embry-Riddle on Commuter Aviation, it was really good. In that class I gave a presentation on Open Skies, it future and past. It is pretty amazing.
DTA, good to see you outside the Squawk Box/Lavatory. Read into the name isolationist and see the very essence of the position. It has never worked in the past and there is no way it will work now. We cannot be the number one GDP with a trade deficit of 500B/yr and tell other countries we want to be left alone. Who do you think buys that debt every year? Your positioning on the right seems just like the majority of that party, based solely on how much you pay in taxes or how much your parents paid in taxes. In both situations your entire basis is greed! Wake up and see that the world turns beneath you and we are all in this together, one way or another. You can preach American this or that, but don't forget we have gotten where we are by the very fact that we had, at one point, a very open trade and immigration policy.
Let's see what our stance is with China on the Open Skies policy in the near term. China, by virtue of both their growth in population and economy will over take the US in GDP in about 15 year, maybe 20. Once that fact becomes reality where will be with our own iron curtain policy surrounding ourselves clasping to the dream that we once were the best?
One more point, if any of you are afraid of the EU with regards to Open Skies you should really reconsider. The EU has dug themselves a trench. The amount of entitlements that the governments there have approved will never be able to be financed. It will not be too long before their economy heads south and make the current US recession look like a play day. The problem with entitlement spending (take note GW) is that once you provide a class or age group with a benefit you cannot take it away or modifiy it. The EU will take 20 years to out live the current internatl policies.
The EU has its own growing pains to get through and we should be in constructive talks with them to Open Skies without eliminating cabotage agreements. Meanwhile, Asia is where we should be focused and putting a lot of attention. The Open Skies potential in to South Asia, India, and China would make any republican sit up and notice, that is, if they get out of the lavatory.