Kyle Smith opened his piece in The Wall Street Journal‘s Free Expression with a summary of a survey on non-pilots landing a passenger airplane in an emergency. Included in that was this bit about women’s assessment of men’s ability to do so:

To the average woman, the idea that the average man could land a complicated passenger aircraft on his own is ridiculous.

Not only for women, though, the problem with working seemingly complex problems is the mindset that blindly goes along with over-complexifying the challenge.

As an F-106 driver I once worked with said about flying his jet, “Pull the stick back to go up, push forward to go down, left-right just like driving a car.”

The airliner is just the same, for all the dials and gauges and switches and levers in the cockpit. Not easy-peasy, but not that difficult, either.

Misbehaver, my latest Peter Hunt novel has been released as a Kindle eBook. This one concerns an off-the-books favor a police detective lieutenant has asked Hunt and his pseudo-niece Trang Thi Thao to carry out. A cop has been assaulted by a local gang, and the lieutenant thinks there may be a mole. Then Hunt’s lady, a defense lawyer, hires the two of them formally to get her client cleared of crimes he claims he didn’t commit. If they don’t, it’ll be the third conviction for the client, and he’ll get hard time in a Texas prison.

I hope you like it.

Eric Hines

My latest Peter Hunt novel, Dodger, is out and available in Kindle format on Amazon. See my Author Page link in the sidebar.

“Blackmail targets generally fall into two categories in this modern age.” He cocked an eyebrow at that. “One—” thumb up “—the blackmailee really does have something to be blackmailed over. There are subcategories of that.” Index finger up. “The other is the blackmailee is innocent as that chair you’re sitting in, but he’s being scammed by somebody with a good photoshop package. Some folks are timid enough or exposed enough in other ways—a delicate reputation in a sensitive line of work, maybe—to be bothered by the attempt.”

I mentioned sub categories. One—” thumb again “—is the blackmailee really did the thing he’s being blackmailed over. The other—” index finger; I resisted pointing it at him “—is he did something he doesn’t want exposed, maybe is blackmailable, maybe just embarrassing, and he doesn’t want that out during the blackmail about the thing he didn’t do.”

And then Peter Hunt’s client fired him from the blackmail case.

Not too long after that, a hitter took a run at him, and while he’s at the police station reporting the matter in detail, he learns that other hitters had run at his pseudo-niece, Trang Thi Thao, who was chasing a lead on her late sister’s drug supplier.

Hunt decided it was time for Plan C.

I looked from one to the other and said, “Time for me to go to Plan C.”

“I don’t like Plan C,” Thao said.

“You don’t even know what Plan C is.”

“It’s one after Plan B, which means it’s even more desperate and risky and with even less chance of succeeding.”

“What happened to Plan B?” Jackie said.

“Way things are going, it’s time to skip ahead,” I said. “Get out in front.”

Jackie said, “You’ve been out front all along. You’ll get shot. Again.”

“Out front is different from out in front. One of those nuancicals. Been shot before. I’m still here. Besides, if I do, we’ll know who they are and where they are. If I don’t, we’ll still know who they are and where they are. Win-win.”

Jackie said, “And just what is this Plan C of yours, O Wise One?”

“I’ll let you both know right after I figure it out.”

The Colorado Education Association has decided that “capitalism inherently exploits children, public schools, land, labor, and resources,” and it has passed a resolution so declaring.

CEA believes that capitalism requires exploitation of children, public schools, land, labor, and/or resources. Capitalism is in opposition to fully addressing systemic racism (the school to prison pipeline), climate change, patriarchy, (gender and LGBTQ disparities), education inequality, and income inequality.

An earlier version, apparently sanitized for public consumption, was more fulsome in its opprobrium:

CEA believes that capitalism requires exploitation of children, public schools, land, labor, and/or resources and, therefore, the only way to fully address systemic racism (the school to prison pipeline), climate change, patriarchy (gender and LGBTQ disparities), education inequality, and income inequality is to dismantle capitalism and replace it with a new, equitable economic system.

Either way, it’s just From each according to his ability, to each according to his need, with the phrasing updated to suit 21^st century Leftist sensibilities (including updating the pronouns, which I didn’t do).