@Duckman: Sir, I respect your experience, your service, your flight hours, and contribution to this discussion. And that is an awesome handle. But "downforce"? The lift distribution on any airfoil, whether fixed or rotary, shows that the significant majority of lift comes from decreased pressure on the upper surface,…

Landing an FA18 on 3.1 square meters? That's what puts the "aviate" in naval aviator.

@Canon7D-Fanboy: "Not to be insensitive but ya kid looked like a douchebag. I mean, I know he's dead n' all, but I just t'ought, ya know, dat ya oughta know your dead kid's a douche".

@Hello Mister Walrus: A good question, but a false premise of causality. How do you know that the economy of the US would not be twice the size that it is with an improved patent system - size does not equal innovation.

@iansilv: given that the patent system which serves to 'protect the idea of intellectual creativity for the pursuit of profit' exists in many varied forms in many countries around the world, your assertion is logically flawed and a non-sequitur at best.

@Hello Mister Walrus: Pick a country. In New Zealand, Australia, indeed quite a number of countries, you are required to demonstrate innovation, invention and novelty in a patent application - you cannot patent a business process or concept.

I would suggest that the "computer system used to monitor technical problems on the plane" may not actually be a computer on board the aircraft. It could well be a diagnostic computer used by ground engineering to analyse trend and exceedence data downloaded from the aircraft - in which case it could very well be…

@Phillip Sean Fischer: Yeah. As a six year old, I learnt much the same that you can't stop a down hill runaway bike that you are riding by jamming a jandalled foot through the spokes of the front wheel. Sure, the bike stops. But you don't.

@FiddlingWhileJimRomeBurns: Yeah. Almost as stupid as calling what is obviously a high alpha, low speed pass a "cobra". This looks more like a flameout at the worst possible time, during an otherwise well practised manouvre. What I like is the stunned silence from the announcer. Just.... nothing. Then you can hear…