Archive for 2012

BUT FOR SOME REASON, YOU STILL CAN’T USE YOURS IN THE PASSENGER COMPARTMENT ON TAKEOFF OR LANDING: The Air Force is Buying iPads To Replace Pilots’ Books and Maps.

UPDATE: A reader emails:

Im a flight attendant at a major U.S. airline, and I keep current on the talk concerning the onboard experience. I feel you are being much too glib about the latest wrinkle in the electronics use debate.

Pilots dont taxi and takeoff with manuals on their laps. Especially at takeoff and the first four minutes of flight, they are extremely busy and focused on getting and keeping that aircraft in the air. They arent consulting manuals; in fact, they take directions from the air traffic controllers to change headings or attain a certain altitude.

As for the ipads, they would not be used below 10,000 ft, JUST AS PASSENGERS’ ELECTRONICS are not to be used during that phase of flight. The ipads benefit lies in its weight versus the heavy manual case all pilots carry, and its ease of use. Multiply that across an entire fleet, times how many flights a day, and in a year’s time you have considerable savings in fuel AND in a smaller measure, savings on the bodies of pilots hauling around manuals all year.

But as a flight attendant, I want to point out another reason for passengers to power down electronics once the boarding door closes: from that time until the aircraft passes through 10,000 ft of altitude, the most incidents, malfunctions, crashes, equipment failures, and aborted takeoffs have historically occured. And as the person tasked with emptying that aircraft in a crash, or keeping it from emptying if no emergency exists, I want your undivided attention. I want you, the passenger, undistracted, until we are out of that critical phase of flight.

We dont mark 10,000 ft because the view is pretty at that height. We dont mark it because pilots are busy. We mark it because past events have been studied. If you want distracted passengers, unready to egress, or follow cogent commands, go catch a cruise in Italy. But avoid airplanes, please.

Well, that kinda makes sense. But it’s not what the FAA says: “Since I wrote a column last month asking why these rules exist, I’ve spoken with the F.A.A., American Airlines, Boeing and several others trying to find answers. Each has given me a radically different rationale that contradicts the others. The F.A.A. admits that its reasons have nothing to do with the undivided attention of passengers or the fear of Kindles flying out of passengers’ hands in case there is turbulence. That leaves us with the danger of electrical emissions.”

Bottom line: “The only reason these rules exist from the F.A.A. is because of agency inertia and paranoia.”

THE TODAY SHOW IS SO YESTERDAY: OMG! The Internet! Guns! Guns for Sale on the Internet!

Well, did you know you can buy guns over the Internet without an FFL and FBI background check? Only one problem . . .

YOU CAN’T! But that kind of factuality isn’t exactly the stock in trade for Jeff Rossen and NBC’s “national investigative unit.”

No, the Internet is only the means buyers and sellers use to find each other. It’s the modern-day equivalent of what used to be called “newspapers.” A printed publication that ran “classified ads.” I hear they used to be all the rage.

At this rate, the Today show won’t be around much longer either.

TOM MAGUIRE: I Still Want My Free Lunch! “As Obama prepares to backpedal on his new contraception rule, we continue to be amused by this liberal spin . . . It’s free because someone else pays for it? Not really. The consensus among economists is that, regardless of who writes the check, payroll taxes and employee benefits are mostly borne by the employee in the form of lower wages. Of course, with health insurance there is also a favorable tax treatment so the government is chipping in, but still – its not ‘free’ to employees just because it is not in their paycheck.”

WALTER RUSSELL MEAD: Brown vs. Green In The Rust-Belt Battleground.

Green complaints about fracking reached a fever pitch over the past year, but Pennsylvania apparently wasn’t listening to them. The Wall Street Journal reports that the state legislature passed a bill on Wednesday that will make state laws more favorable to fracking, culminating a debate that has been raging ever since massive quantities of shale gas were discovered in the state in 2008.

The vote was close, and fell roughly along party lines. Republicans supported the bill because it promises cheaper energy and job creation in an economically depressed state; Democrats opposed it because of the potential for environmental damage and safety hazards.

Don’t doubt for a minute that legislators in other states in the region—many of which may also have shale gas deposits—are reading the tea leaves in this bill’s passage. The industrial states of the Rust Belt desperately need jobs, and judging by the rapid recovery of energy-rich states like North Dakota and Texas, fracking is beginning to look like their best bet for getting them. The historically warm relationship between the greens and local Democrats could grow downright chilly.

Ironically, if the Greens wanted to reduce domestic petroleum extraction, the best way to do it would be to get the Keystone Pipeline approved and bring in competition from Canada to drive prices down . . . .