Ground stop on the nation’s air traffic this week triggered some mighty odd memories this week. From a previous incarnation when – at age 19 – I was one of the Cold War’s remote site “whiz kids” with an “O-something” equivalency. Operations matter. SitReps (situation reports) also matter. However transient their data.
Ah, the Cold War. Lived in a BOQ and to drink a good scotch, it took only a checkmark on the “honor bar” tab in the O club to pour some very good 12-year-old.
“Operation Snowtime” happened back then, though the name was common and I won’t tell you which one.
But there is a pressure – and it marks you for life if you’ve ever been affiliated with DoD ops. BS leaves and it’s almost too real.
The penalties for non-performance were financial and severe. A five-minute comms outage (after a 5-minute grace period) could quickly turn into a six-figure issue…
This is not to claim specific knowledge of anything since 1969, or so. But the pressure and the impacts (not to mention the risks)..those were real. It was childhood’s end. Bell’s palsy from stress, too.
Which is, perhaps, why ever since, I have looked at the world differently than most. More as a chess player than citizen, though I’ve only played one Grand Master.
My consigliere plays SitRep daily, too. His motivation (aside from tax attorney/CPA) is a family steeped in years of government service to country at Foggy Bottom.
Since this is a 3-day weekend for markets, we’ll take a little different tack in this weekend’s report. Rather than a “bullet point” approach, I’ll frame you up a whole worldview so as to see where the “data bubble” of events is drifting. Then leave it for you to imagine what can be done to change a damn thing by what Darby O’Gill called the Little People.
Yes, the ChartPack is a part of it, too. Bean up. It’s time.
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