PRESIDENT and EAA QUIZ

[BeagleOne]

It's Vladimir Putin, not Valerie. Or Valeri, which would be the Western transliteration of the Cyrillic.

[Joe LaMantia]

Bill,

Has Vladimir flown his ultralight more then a few times for the photo ops? Does he actually own it and fly it on a regular basis? If so, then OK I'll agree that is in-line with the EAA spirit, if not then Vaflier is right. He is just another politician doing stunts to impress the voters. I still like the tack you took in setting up this discussion, it's good exercise for the brain!

Joe

[Bill Greenwood]

Joe, thanks, but I probably can't take much credit for being that clever. And I don't know anything more about Putin's pilot background, I just saw that one photo, for all we know maybe they confiscated it from some poor guy that built the plane.

But in the photo, and it is pretty clear one, not a Gustav Whitehead one, Putin is flying it solo. And I thought that was pretty cool and especially since many foreign countries don't promote or they even restrict private flying. Maybe Janet or someone can come up with the photo, seems like it was in May or around there.
I didn't even think about his KGB past, but hey Bush, Sr. might have some CIA skeletons laying around,too.It is an interesting study in human nature that even though I clearly stated the politics was not a criteria and you might not like the guys policies, most folks have a hard time getting past that and want to count bad deeds against him or good deeds for someone else.

If we asked which heads of state were painters, we'd have to include not only good guys like Churchill, but also Hitler. If I had the stomach to do it, which I don't, we could make it a play on words, so Hitler would come out the winner,(something like who was the most) since he was not only an artist, but a house painter if I recall right. I don't think either were great artist, but I'd love to have a Winston painting. I don't think I could put a Hitler one on my wall, but it should be in some museum. We know Churchill was a great man and a real character, and a person I really admire, who like JFK was at his best when it counted most. But is it a real shame that Hitler could not have used his influence for good, not evil. Before he became nuts, he obviously had some leadership and charisma abilities. He came to power because Germany had was destitute and he filled a vacuum. What if he could have used this to unite and lead his people in the right way. There is some evidence that his antisemitism was more of a tactic than a deep feeling at first anyway. That would be a little like George Wallace who was not racist until he lost his first campaign.

We need to study and learn as much as we can about human nature and leaders, etc. What made Hitler sink into depravity, and JFK rise to his coolest and wisest in a crisis when those around him like Lemay lost judgement? Was it better parents, teachers. the society, or was it that JFK was rich enough not to need to worry, while Hitler was poor enough to be jealous of others.Our defense spending is more than the next 5 countries, and we still have wars and even smaller ones cost thousands of lives and $Billions/Trillions. Maybe we can't buy a diplomat or a psyscholanylyst like we can a new weapon, but we need to do the best we can in that realm.

A George Bush sr. story that I like is when he was in Louisiana on a campaign trip, and there was a Stearman. The owner offered a flight and secret service of course said no, Bush went anyway. As they came in to land, the pilot had both hands in the air, showing that Bush was doing all the flying. I like folks that don't fit a rigid mold.

[Joe LaMantia]

Well said Bill!,

Churchill and Hitler are very good studies in human nature and despite all the evil committed under Hitler he did convince millions of people in Germany and throughout Europe to join forces with his government and aid in the mess that was WWII. We in the USA could stand to review our own policies regarding various "enemies" and the negative outcomes that come when we make quick decisions based on wishful thinking regarding military force, but that is a whole other topic not suitable for this forum.

Joe

[Bill Greenwood]

We had some fun with the topic about him flying the ultralight, even if some people took it too seriously and wanted to turn the question into something much more important than a quick interest item.
Now on the news is a photo of Vladamir Putin driving or sailing or manning or whatever the term is, in a mini submarine.
He does seem to get around, and make a lot of photo ops, could be the real villain in the next Bond movie.
I am NOT going to have a quiz of Who the most Coustea like President is.

[Floatsflyer]

Yup, saw that. His latest macho stunt, Putin takes a dive and goes deep in a 2 man submersible in the Gulf of Finland to look at the wreck of a 19th century frigate. All these fun activities he does must be a whole lot more fun than governing a nation of 145 million people.