[Bill Cummings]

Some people I’ve found are extremely prone to snap judgment. I once sat on a jury and my wife was present for the prosecutions opening and the asking of questions to be answered by the prosecution’s witnesses.
This took up all of the first day. At home that evening my wife was trying to clue me into how guilty the plaintiff was because we, the jury, didn’t get to come into the courtroom until they took the handcuffs and ankle shackles off. Also why would they arrest the guy if he wasn’t guilty?

I said, “You’re kidding me right?

She was serious and said, “You can tell he’s guilty just by looking at him!”

The defense had yet to call any of their witnesses.

Obviously some people should be weeded out by Voir Dire.

My mother-in-law once told me about another trial where, “The guy is guilty! They have DNA evidence that he raped the woman.”

I was unable to convince her that DNA isn’t the end all of evidence since it could be manipulated, planted, tainted, misread or lied about.
Anyway I know two people that should never sit in judgment of anyone.

On the rape trial that I was one of the jurors we came to the decision that all of the elements that needed to be satisfied for each of the two charges to be applied could not be met. A rape may have occurred but the only thing that had been proven to all of us on the jury, beyond a reasonable doubt, was that the police (that were not charged with anything) were guilty of mishandling their duties and shoddy work product.

[Bob Kuczewski]

Anyway I know two people that should never sit in judgment of anyone.

We will need to come up with a way to find suitable volunteers for cases as they arise.

I'm thinking that we could have a topic where people volunteering for mediation duty can sign up. Then people who have a dispute can look through the list to see if they find anyone that they both respect enough to help them out. They could carry out the discussions privately or open a topic for the case.

It might work in some cases, but it might be a disaster in others. As with everything on the US Hawks, we can wade into it slowly with some test cases to see what works and what doesn't. But as Wingspan mentioned, this is a nice thing for a national hang gliding association to provide to its members.

So who's interested in experimenting with this idea?

[Bill Cummings]

Like a mock court as a test?

[wingspan33]

I love experiments!

But details would need to be worked out. As in, from where do we get our guinea pigs?

[Bob Kuczewski]

I love experiments!

But details would need to be worked out. As in, from where do we get our guinea pigs?

We could reach into the "dustbin of history" to pull up interesting cases.

For example, we could investigate the various bannings from various sites (HGAA purge, HangGliding.org, Oz Forum, KiteStrings...). We could pick a case, look into the facts, and render a decision. The only danger with those cases is that they may cut "close to the bone" for some of our members (myself included) and that may introduce a bias. On the other hand, all cases have some amount of bias, so maybe that's part of what needs to be tested.

We could also review some of USHPA's decisions. There have been a number of pilots who've had their instructor's ratings removed or even their membership itself. We could review those cases. We could even make up a case - either from scratch or loosely based on something we've seen.

[Bob Kuczewski]

By the way, before it disappears from history, I wanted to post a copy of what got me banned from the Oz Forum. In the 2010 Region 3 Recall Election, I had asked 4 questions of Bill Helliwell on both the Oz Forum and on hanggliding.org. They've been deleted from the Oz Forum as part of Straub's rewriting of history. But they still exist on hanggliding.org. Here they are:

Questions for Region 3 Director Challenger Bill Helliwell:

1. Bill, would you support some form of the "Accountability Amendment"?

That proposed amendment to the USHPA bylaws would specify a set of rules (Robert's Rules of Order) for the Board so they don't get made up on the fly. It also sets a threshold for some number of Directors (1 in the current version) to be able to call the roll so all USHPA members would have a better chance of knowing how their own Directors have voted. Please let me know what variations of this you would support.

2. Bill, would you work to open up the EC meetings to all Directors?

The USHPA Board only meets twice a year, and the EC makes all kinds of decisions between those meetings. I feel it would be healthy for the EC to welcome all Board members to its meetings - especially those with differing or dissenting opinions. Would you back that change?

3. Bill, would you work to balance the Torrey Pines Soaring Council by adding the Torrey Hawks?

The Torrey Hawks have been applying to the Soaring Council since September of 2007 and USHPA has not offered one word of support for increasing our representation on that Council by adding the Hawks. Much of this resistance by USHPA has been based on personal vendettas. Would you work to end this resistance by USHPA and support adding the Hawks to the Council?

4. Bill, as you may know, David Beardslee was kicked out of Torrey Pines for life, and I was kicked out for a year. Neither David Beardslee or myself were given a written reason for those suspensions and neither of us were given any due process or recourse. The SDHGPA refused to represent either of our interests and refused to bring it up at the Soaring Council - while you were on the board of the SDHGPA. What would you do to correct that in the future?

Bill Helliwell knew that he had no good answers for those very reasonable questions, and everyone - including USHPA insiders - knew that such obvious questions could cost Bill the election. So Davis Straub did the dirty work by removing those questions from the discussion and put them in a separate forum - eventually deleting them altogether. I challenged Davis at the time and demanded that he provide a level playing field for both candidates. That's when Davis banned me.

[magentabluesky]

Bob,

Davis was calling Mark out today on the Oz Report for Mark’s “spin” with regard to the facts of your second arrest.

Be smart, Bob.

Michael

[Merlin]

Davis was calling Mark out today on the Oz Report for Mark’s “spin” with regard to the facts of your second arrest.

That's a fair assessment in my view. Davis seems willing to observe this without holding a grudge. On the other hand, Mark's arguments seem increasingly emotional and ad hominem.

[Bob Kuczewski]

Davis was calling Mark out today on the Oz Report for Mark’s “spin” with regard to the facts of your second arrest.

Davis plays whichever side he thinks will benefit Davis.

Davis allows people like Forbes to say things behind my back on a forum that I can't even read. What's his justification for that?

Then he tries to come off as "fair"?  

Now that I'm operating a forum myself, I know that he can set whatever permissions he wants on any account. If his complaint is that he doesn't want me posting, then why not give me a "read-only" login? That was proposed to him, but he rejected it. Why not create a "Free Speech Forum" like we've got here? The answer is that I wasn't banned for any legitimate reason. I was banned because Davis wanted to do USHPA a favor so they would do him a favor. That's part of what's wrong with the sport and it's what we're trying to fix here on the US Hawks.

If you're still not sure, please read my post above. Those were 4 reasonable questions I asked of a Regional Director candidate during an election. Does that look like a post that should have been removed? Does that look like a post that should get a guy banned from the Oz Forum? Is the sport of hang gliding better off with questions like those being asked ... or is it better off with questions like those being suppressed?

Davis banned me because it got him a role in USHPA's Competition Committee. As I said, if he's defending me now, it's because he sees it as a playing card for something else he wants ... for Davis.

[wingspan33]

Bob,

As a student of philosophy, it is quite possible that the most honorable person you know is truely acting in a selfish manner. How so? Well, if every person were able to view others as being as important as themselves then they can also value that other person's perspective as being as valuable as their own. They may also realize that - in a universal application of such a view - others will therefore value their view(s).

I have an old joke that I used to deliver with a Indian "maharishi" accent. It went like this:

Don't simply be good.
Be good for nothing.

But the thing is, no one can be "good" for no reason. Being "good" loses its broader meaning when it is not in consideration of "the best - for all". But the best for all must also benefit the individual - or the (social) concept fails. I would say, then, that Davis Straub may think he is acting in his best interests. But are those interests the best for the greater social group (the flying community)? Are they good for Bob K?

If he's defending you in response to Mark Forbes' negative(?) comments then what Straub is saying IS good for Bob K! And since the actions taken against you by Air California Adventure Inc.'s personnel can be seen as clearly BAD for the greater flying community, then D. Straub's (supportive of Bob K and/or critical of Air California Adventure Inc.'s personnel) comments can be seen as "good" for the greater community.

To "cut down" Davis Straub's (however) supportive comments ends up being a way of (indirectly) supporting the improper actions of Air California Adventure Inc.'s personnel. For you to do so makes no sense to me. Personally, I would respond as follows:

"Although I have had issues with Davis Straub in the past, I appreciate his recent supportive comments on the Oz Report Forum."

Allies don't have to be the best of friends. They just have to be willing to act in a common front against the "bad guys".