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bradhicks

This was no mother fucking "miracle." This was a job. Praise one or more gods on your own time. The real reason that 155 people lived through this is that dozens, maybe hundreds of ordinary men and women with jobs to do were well-trained for those jobs, and when the time came to do so they did their jobs, and they did them right and did them well. Most of them even did the exact right thing on the first try; those that didn't, fixed their mistakes correctly in plenty of time.

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Sully Sullenberger didn't leave it up to God whether his passengers were going to live or die. He spent a large percentage of his professional life taking time out to practice in simulation how to land a commercial jetliner without engines. When he decided that wasn't enough, he then went on to make a professional study, on his own time, of commercial aviation safety, so much so that telling other people what he learned from studying it turned into a second job for him. And (more goosebumps again) he decided, years ago?, that that wasn't enough margin for safety for him, so he went on to learn to become a certified glider pilot. Nor should you call it a "miracle" that US Airways flight 1549 had someone like Sully Sullenberger at the helm, because that's what commercial aviation is like. If you look at the records of every civil aviation disaster in history, you see the same thing in the story of the pilot at the helm of all of them: the same fierce lifelong determination to be prepared for disaster in any form, and the same calm professionalism on the rare occasions that disaster strikes. Yeah, 99.99% of the day to day job is being a glorified bus driver stuck in traffic. But the other 0.01% of the job is part of the job too, and the history of commercial aviation is chock-full of people who did it.

The National Transportation Safety Board and the Federal Aviation Administration have never believed in leaving it up to God whether or not the passengers are going to live through an accident. Since deregulation of the industry, airlines have gone so far as to eliminate pillows to reduce weight in their airliners in order to save weight and reduce fuel costs: you think they were crazy about carrying gigantic self-inflating rafts, or life jackets for all passengers? If those seem like no-brainers to you, let me point out that in the news over the last several months there was a discussion, initiated by we don't know whom just yet, clearly intended to eliminate just those things. The argument went that almost never do airliners land in water. And when they do, they have to crash into the water at a minimum speed of about 140 miles per hour so the plane is going to break up and everybody is going to die anyway, it will be "up to God" who lives and who dies. But people at the NTSB and the FAA were having none of it, and you know why? Sooner or later, some airline pilot was going to have to do what Captain Sullenberg had to do the other day, and they weren't going to leave it up to God; screw the cost, those airliners were going to have rafts and life jackets. That decision saved 155 lives.
Please go read the whole damn thing

Now onward to Section Three, which deals primarily with the structure of the United States Senate.
Section Three
Clause One:

The Senate of the United States shall be composed of two Senators from each State, chosen by the Legislature thereof,3 for six Years; and each Senator shall have one Vote.

This clause is pretty straight forward, it sets out that each State shall have two Senators, and they serve for a term of six years. What is interesting to the Dog is that the Framers thought that it was important enough to make clear that each Senator would only ever have one vote. It must have been important to them, specifically in the Senate, as they did not use the same language when setting forth the rules for the House of Representatives.
Also notice that originally it was the State legislature that elected Senators not the public at large. In 1913 the 17th Amendment changed that to state that Senators would be elected by the people of the state. Historical fun fact, the State of Utah was the only state to vote against ratification. It was never subsequently ratified by that state.
Clause Two:

Immediately after they shall be assembled in Consequence of the first Election, they shall be divided as equally as may be into three Classes. The Seats of the Senators of the first Class shall be vacated at the Expiration of the second Year, of the second Class at the Expiration of the fourth Year, and of the third Class at the Expiration of the sixth Year, so that one third may be chosen every second Year; and if Vacancies happen by Resignation, or otherwise, during the Recess of the Legislature of any State, the Executive thereof may make temporary Appointments until the next Meeting of the Legislature, which shall then fill such Vacancies.

In this clause the Constitution sets out the rules for the dividing the Senate in to the “classes” so that only one third of the Senate will face re-election at any given time. The Dog wonders how much political infighting went into the selection of each class as two thirds of those first Senators did not have a six year term but a two or four year one. As with Clause One the way that Senators are replaced has been changed by the 17th Amendment. In that amendment it directs the Governor of the state to hold an election to fill any vacant seat, but it allows the State legislature to give the Governor the power to appoint a temporary Senator until the seat is filled in an election that the Legislature determines the timing of.MORE