I work for an IT company that has extensive contracts with the Department of the Navy. I am looking for information about US submarines that have been damaged by earthquakes while berthed, but preferably while on patrol. Since we just experienced our own 5.9 bit of excitement here yesterday afternoon, this would be a topic of interest to our in-house Team Sub.So what do you think? Can we help Susie out? I've discussed my ideas on whether or not naval sonar is responsible for marine mammal beachings before (here, here, here, here, here, here, and here), so you could say I'm on the side of the "skeptics". As far as submarine operations shifting the island of Sumatra, I had heard that there are some who think that "Bush/Cheney" set off a nuclear bomb to cause the 2004 tsunami to distract attention from their theft of Ohio votes in the election; once again, I'm a little skeptical about that one. I discussed my views on that topic on other websites.
Based on your comments and your readership, you seem to have extensive resources; most of what I come up with is speculation about how US subs’ underwater testing has been the cause of whales and dolphins beaching themselves, the island of Sumatra shifting, and a trove of other sins so I’m hoping that you have more verifiable information on this topic. If you can assist me in this quest, please send any links that would provide some details.
An investigation report obtained by the AP through a Freedom of Information Act request describes an atmosphere aboard the USS Memphis that tolerated and even encouraged cheating: Sailors were emailed the answers before qualification exams, took tests outside the presence of proctors and openly asked officers for answer keys. One sailor told investigators that test-takers were encouraged to "use their time wisely" during breaks, insinuating that they should look up answers to exam questions.[I couldn't find anywhere that the AP writer posted the report he got from the Navy; has anyone seen it online?] The article goes on with quotes from one former Submarine officer who claims that cheating is pervasive throughout the fleet, and bragged earlier about how he refused to cheat, resulting in him failing what I assume is the BEQ test several times.
A submarine force spokeswoman, Navy Cmdr. Monica Rousselow, said the Navy holds its officers and crew to very high standards and denied that cheating is rampant.
"The evidence we have shows that it's very rare," said Rousselow, who is based in Norfolk, Va.
But three former officers said the episode aboard the Groton, Conn.-based Memphis was an extreme example of shortcuts that occur aboard many of the roughly 70 American submarines in service.
"We had reversed the recession, avoided a depression, gotten the economy moving again," Obama told a crowd in Decorah, Iowa. "But over the last six months we've had a run of bad luck." Obama listed three events overseas -- the Arab Spring uprisings, the tsunami in Japan, and the European debt crises -- which set the economy back.How the Arab uprisings hurt the economy isn't quite clear to me, but be that as it may, recall Heinlein wrote in 1973:
Throughout history, poverty is the normal condition of man. Advances which permit this norm to be exceeded- here and there, now and then- are the work of an extremely small minority, frequently despised, often condemned, and almost always opposed by all right-thinking people. Whenever this tiny minority is kept from creating, or (as sometimes happens) is driven out of a society, the people then slip back into abject poverty.This is known as "bad luck."UPDATE: Great minds thinking alike? Surely independently, Instapundit posted the exact same juxtaposition exactly one hour after I did!
Posted at 10:00 pm by Glenn ReynoldsHa!
Orcs are public sector unions, ACORN, anyone who writes for Huffington Post, and every other evil, statist minion ever identified by Glenn Beck. Speaking of Beck, his closest equivalent is Denethor, Steward of Gondor — well-spoken and intelligent but more-than-slightly crazed.The photographic juxtapositions alone are worth hitting the link and reading it all.
Time to leverage your shipboard nuclear power and submarine warfare knowledge and translate it to land based power plants and other projects in the US, Asia, Middle East and other regions? Bechtel Corporation, one of the largest Nuclear Power engineering, project management and construction firms in the world, is prepared to help transition qualified engineers – Naval Officers and NCOs for engineering leadership positions, into their business. Bechtel currently has many projects and needs for Navy Nuclear Power trained engineers. Bechtel is prepared to help transition qualified engineers into their business and allocate resources to do this.I was intrigued when I read that post, and since I was planning a series about "getting a job after the Navy", I contacted Erik to see if he'd be willing to share some pointers. Hopefully he'll be able to, because I think one of the best uses of this blog, with its combination of active duty and veteran readership, is to help guys transition back to civilian life when their time on the boats is done, and having the perspective of a senior recruiter of a major company would be helpful. For those who want to see what kind of jobs Erik is talking about, the Bechtel career page is here.
Bechtel has 100’s of openings, many in the field of Nuclear Power Generation and are aggressively seeking the usual suspects; US Navy nuclear propulsion trained officers (ranks of O3 – O5 preferred); US Navy nuclear submarine qualified officers (ranks of O3 – O5 preferred); US Navy nuclear propulsion trained Warrant officers – submarine or surface ship; US Navy nuclear aircraft carrier nuclear propulsion trained officers; US Navy Engineering Officer of the Watch (EOOW) nuclear propulsion trained – submarine or surface service; US Navy Reactor Operators (RO); and US Navy Shutdown Reactor Operators (SRO) – submarine or surface, US Navy nuclear propulsion trained Petty Officers (E-6 and up) qualified in Submarines (i.e., Engineering Lab Technicians [ELT’s], Machinist Mates [MM’s], Electronic Technicians [ET’s]) (AS degrees preferred); US Navy nuclear propulsion trained US Naval Petty Officers (E-6 and up) surface Navy (i.e., ELT’s, MM’s, ET’s) (AS degrees preferred); US Navy nuclear propulsion prototype instructors (officers and enlisted); US Navy nuclear propulsion power school instructors (officers and enlisted).
Starting base salaries are high - can range from $95K to $175K and up, not to mention the potential for bonuses, depending, of course, on your qualifications and the position you fill.
Interested? I highly recommend that you contact Erik Plesset, a Senior Recruiter at Bechtel directly at Hotjobs[at]becthel.com, or if you are on Linked-In, hit him up there at – http://www.linkedin.com/profile/view?id=3742469&trk=tab_pro .
In striking down Obamacare’s individual mandate today, the Eleventh U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals used the term “judicial engagement” to describe the proper role of courts in deciding constitutional cases. The Institute for Justice coined that term and today marks the first time a federal court has used it in this context. Instead of deferring reflexively to Congress as courts so often do, the Eleventh Circuit correctly observed that “the Constitution requires judicial engagement, not judicial abdication.” Institute for Justice president Chip Mellor praised the ruling: “We have more government at every level than the Constitution authorizes. This decision is an important step towards the direction of limited government.”If Judicial Engagement is the opposite of judicial activism, by reining in government power to accord with the structure of the Constitution, rather than to arbitrarily expand it for the sake of expediency, I'm all for it!
In a massive change that could affect today’s troops, the plan calls for a corporate-style benefits program that would contribute money to troops’ retirement savings account rather than the promise of a future monthly pension, according to a new proposal from an influential Pentagon advisory board.I can seriously see this proposal being adopted, and if it is, I think we'll see significant attrition of experienced Submariners starting about the 10 year point, the time when they should be running divisions or departments. With the attacks we've seen on public employee pensions from some who subscribe to Tea Party principles, I fully expect to see them move towards attacking military pensions -- not now, but as we finish with the "easy" cuts and they realize that people like me have been getting over $35K/year since I was 41, along with free health insurance. If this proposal is adopted, that's when we'll start seeing problems with getting enough qualified Submariners to man the boats. And then we'll be glad we haven't eliminated 51% (or so) of the population from serving on submarines, like we do now.
All troops would receive the yearly retirement contributions, regardless of whether they stay for 20 years. Those contributions might amount to about 16.5 percent of a member’s annual pay and would be deposited into a mandatory version of the Thrift Savings Plan, the military’s existing 401(k)-style account that now does not include government matching contributions.
