July 1, 2025 • 30 mins
Summary
In this episode, Jessie Naor and Preston Holland discuss their summer experiences, including a digital detox and a critique of the aviation film 'Plane.' They delve into the implications of the new aviation tax bill, the expansion of Dassault Falcon Jet's manufacturing in India, and the ongoing challenges of social media in aviation. The conversation also touches on the ADS-B privacy concerns, a charter flight lawsuit, and a light-hearted discussion about the B-2 Bomber and its operational costs.
Chapters
00:00 Summer Adventures and Digital Detox
03:39 The Big Beautiful Bill: Tax Implications for Aviation
09:42 Manufacturing Expansion: Dassault Falcon Jet in India
14:46 Social Media Madness: Aviation Memes and Mishaps
17:46 The ADS-B Battle: Privacy vs. Safety
21:21 Legal Troubles in Charter Aviation
22:53 Military Aviation: The B-2 Bomber and Its Legacy
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Good morning and welcome back tothe VIP seat.
Today is July 1st. It's officially summer.
Preston. Have you had any, uh, fun in
your summer this year yet? You know, I have had a fair bit
of fun this summer. I spent a week at the beach.
As viewers of YouTube may recognize, I had a different
background for a week. And then last week I spent a
week off the grid in Montana, completely unplugged.
(00:22):
First time I've done that, maybeever for a full week.
Not not ever, but in a really long time, probably 10 years,
and it was awesome. That's amazing.
Amazing. Those are goals.
I don't know if I could do that,but I'm glad.
That you it was, it was tough. It was tough.
I realized very quickly how addicted to my phone I am.
I was like, ah, OK, I have a problem.
(00:43):
Maybe, maybe we'll start like a LinkedIn group of like cell
phones, anonymous and we'll all like, hi, my name is Preston and
I'm addicted to my phone. You'll be in a lot of good
company, I'm sure. Yeah, absolutely.
Absolutely. So to kick things off this week
before we go into our regularly scheduled news, commentary and
(01:04):
stories, I just have to send APSA out there because on
Netflix, the movie plane is now,you know, available.
This came out two years ago. Apparently I missed it entirely,
which was apparently a great thing at the time because this
is the absolute worst aviation film I've ever seen in my entire
life. So unbelievable and unrealistic.
I was literally screaming at theTV for the 1st 30 minutes.
(01:25):
So just letting you guys know out there that are listening, do
not watch this film. Yes, it's summer.
Maybe you're like running low onwhat movies you want to watch.
You're like, oh, it's got a plane in it.
I love planes. I'll watch it.
Don't. Do not do it.
That's hilarious. There's some really bad pop
culture moments for airplanes. Like I feel like like Taylor
Sheridan, great example. The dude loves planes.
(01:47):
I think we've talked about this before that like you watch Land
Man and like planes show up likeevery other episode.
And I was watching it with some friends and they're like, what
kind of plane is that? I was like, that's a global
7500. What plane's that that's a King
Air, What plane's that that is aclapped out citation Bravo, you
know, and it's like just an obsession, obsession with
(02:09):
private aviation. Taylor Sheridan, I feel like he
does. You know, there's there's a
couple of cutaways where you're like, that was not what you
thought that was. Like, you know, the taxi scene
is like a Gulfstream and then a global pulls up and you're like,
well, OK, technically not. The worst about that is actually
the Kardashians. The Kardashians had this
(02:31):
atrocious one where like the taxi scene was AG 550 and then
it showed the inside of Citation10.
And I was like those are not thesame.
Yeah, the one that always gets me too is like, every single
time, like someone's boarding a private aircraft, they're inside
of a hanker. I'm like, how does this make any
sense? We're not turning the plane on
when you're inside of the hanger, but I guess it's easier
(02:53):
to shoot and controlling for theweather that I can accept.
I will take those little like aviation things that only we
would probably know about in this case.
It was so utterly obvious to anyone who's like had anything
to do like with getting on a plane once in their life.
So just avoid, avoid the troubleI gotta say.
What was what was the worst one?I haven't seen it.
And so like spoiler alert if youdon't, if you don't want us to
(03:14):
spoil it for you, like what was the worst?
Like what was the most atrociouslike mistake?
I mean, the first thing that happens in the movie is that it
crashes because lightning lightning hits it and somehow
they have to get on the ground by gliding even though the
engines are still operable. But there's something wrong with
a battery. So the whole, the whole crash
(03:35):
doesn't make any sense. And then everything else
associated with the whole thing doesn't make any sense.
I've seen people online saying like the interior didn't match
the exterior of the plane. They were two different planes.
The flight attendants do weird and wacky stuff that no flight
attendant would ever do. It's just, it's just bad.
Just don't. Just don't do it.
Say protect yourself. It's not worth it.
That's the PS look, you'll come to the VIP seat for Insights and
(03:57):
our Sassy tanks, and that was that Pretty good one.
Yeah, well, and good news though, we'd looks like we might
be getting our big beautiful bill signed this week.
The biggest and the beautifulestbill you have ever seen in your
life, ever. It does look like we're getting
the big beautiful bill. It has caused a lot of tension
(04:19):
in in politics. There's been, I know that Trump
and Elon had a big falling out over the big beautiful bill.
There's been a lot of other tension points, but it did pass
the Senate back to the House. I am in a slack group with
Daniel Chung, who is from Aviation Tax consultants for
those that are in the transaction world are probably
(04:41):
familiar with Daniel. And he said, yes, it has passed
the Senate, but it still has to go back to the House where
they're going to then beat it upagain.
But in both versions, 1, 100% what we know as bonus
depreciation is coming back. And that is great news for a lot
of people who don't like paying taxes, it's good news.
Looks like it's coming back. Yeah, I mean, not only coming
(05:03):
back, but the current version and again, who knows where this
actually ends up, but it makes it retroactive back to 2022.
No, sorry, 2023 technically because December 31st of 2022
you get 100% depreciation all the way back to then, which is.
Wild. I think so.
Daniel explained it to me like this is that it's there is some
(05:27):
language in there about January 19th, 2025 that's kind of like
another line in the sand. And I think no one's really sure
exactly how that whole retroactive thing is going to
shake out. It's good news for the future
and it's really good news for those people that got delayed to
the end of January and said the beginning of January.
(05:48):
That's terrible news for those that closed on January 4th.
It's, it's, it's not good. So, but yeah, I, I think that
it's, it's definitely going to create a tailwind.
I had, I have created some graphs.
If you want to go look at prestonholland.com, you can see
my most recent newsletter where I talk about the history of most
appreciation, which is, and I made some nice little graphs and
(06:09):
things like that. And one thing is that this is
not the first time and probably,and it will be permanent, right?
So it's not the first time we'vehad 100% most appreciation, but
it is definitely it's proposed to be permanent, so that would
be net positive. KJ Mccarter at Aviation Tax
Consultant said the important part about the 100% being
permanent for airplanes is thereis no 1031 light kind exchange
(06:33):
for airplanes. I didn't know that.
I didn't understand exactly how that worked when you step up in
your basis, I'm going to lose some people here with with this
math, but essentially is your, your remaining cost basis gets
taxed as ordinary income. And so kind of the difference
between your depreciated amount and your sale price gets taxes
ordinary income. Now with 100% you if you're
rolling into the next purchase, it essentially gets wiped out,
(06:56):
right? Assuming that you're stepping up
and not stepping down in purchase price.
But that is, you know, having 100% is huge for people moving
from one aircraft to another aircraft.
So we got no, I mean this for aviation, for the rich people
that buy airplanes that need thetax benefit and the aviation
infrastructure and everybody else, this is great because
there's not a lot of places thatyou can put money into and get
(07:18):
100% depreciation at this level.Unless you're buying yacht that
you're putting into service or you're putting into service,
it's hard to get this much money.
But also there's other pieces inthere.
There's a research and experimental expensing section,
which could help aviation firms that are say researching new
technologies and new airframes and technology, different things
like that. And there's also the business
(07:39):
interest deductibility, which gives you a more favorable
formula for higher interest deductions, which also has, you
know, in your world, the financeand leasing world, some, some
positive impacts. Yeah, we love that provision
because people have often asked me who's your number one
competitor? And it's the balance sheet, it's
cash. And so if interest expense
(08:02):
becomes deductible and you have 100% bonus depreciation, the
formula for financing your aircraft becomes even more
attractive, right, because you're not having to calculate
versus your hurdle rate. Like what is what do I need to
have from an internal rate return standpoint?
I can now deduct that interest as an expense.
So although it's not going to bea one for one, right?
(08:24):
And this is not tax advice. So don't listen to us for tax
advice. But it's not a one for one.
You know, you don't pay a dollarin interest and save a dollar.
It's, you know, pay a dollar in interest.
You save your effective rate, but it's going to blend your
effective cost of capital actually lower, which is great.
It means that you're less sensitive to interest rate
fluctuations. And you know, if Trump has his
(08:45):
way, then he's going to force interest rates to come down.
We'll see. I don't know, I'm not 100% he'll
be able to, but but we shall see.
I know that he is. He is posturing to put pressure
on the Fed to bring interest rates down.
Yeah, Yeah, we'll have to see. If nothing else, there is
nothing negative in this unless maybe you're like one of those
(09:05):
green companies because I think there have been a lot of
provisions pulled out that were incentivizing SAF or other green
technologies. That's obviously not a priority
of the current administration. But for everybody else who's
building traditional aircraft and vehicles, you're in good
hands at the moment. Yep, exactly.
And those that really don't likepaying taxes, you know, we we
(09:27):
have ranted and raved and no onelikes paying taxes, so that's
good news. We shall see how fast it takes.
I mean, look, we're we're knocking on the we're knocking
on the summer holiday right now.You know, nothing like
government to take six weeks offin the middle of things needing
to be done. But we're kind of, you know,
we're on the edge. So maybe maybe they'll pass it
before that. Maybe it'll sit in limbo for for
(09:49):
a period of time. But it will definitely, when the
announcement comes, it will be definitely a boom time for
private aviation, which is great.
Yeah. And I want to put in one caveat
too. I think a lot of people look at
this and go, oh, these are just incentives for the rich, you
know, But at the end of the day,the reason these incentives work
is because instead of the rich, you know, putting their money
somewhere else, they're actuallyputting it in equipment,
(10:11):
especially American manufacturedequipment and production
capability. So the economic concept of this
is we're going to incentivize people with a lot of money to
buy expensive equipment that creates great jobs and great
economies. So for all the haters out there,
they're actually, I do think this is a really effective way
of boosting production and the economy.
(10:32):
But we'll see how it all works out.
Yeah, absolutely. And that might actually, while
we're talking about manufacturing, might bring us
into our next story about Desso.Falcon Jet has decided to open
up some expanded manufacturing in India, which is not a place
that everybody thinks about immediately.
(10:53):
When you know, when you think about airplane manufacturing,
you think of Israel, you think of France, you think of Germany,
you think of a lot of European countries, the United States,
Mexico even, not necessarily India.
So that's. Yeah, I was reading a lot about
this as I find it very fascinating.
This is the first, I mean, real,there is some aerospace
(11:16):
manufacturing in India, but there's no one really doing, you
know, large airframes like this or like some more.
Some Russian aircraft were beingbuilt there, some drones.
But this is required because Dasso just sold the government
around $8 billion worth of Raphael fighter jets.
So part of the investor in that technology means that that
company needs to turn around andactually invest in manufacturing
(11:38):
in India. So apparently the military side
said, okay, we're going to ship off the production of the Falcon
2000 LXS to India and a French airplane.
This will be the first Indian made airplane we've seen.
It's true, you know, the Indianshave a long time history with
the British and now it's time for the French to come in to
(11:58):
come in and and start making andmaking impacts.
I think that my one of my favorite parts of of this whole.
So corporate jet investor has a pretty Alastair wrote a really
solid article on this. And one of my favorite phrases
from this is make in India for the world.
And I'm like in self reli self reliant India.
I get that, but make in India for the world.
(12:19):
I can't help but wonder if that that's a trans that's a little
bit of lost in translation. Like, I bet that sounds a lot
more clever in the native language than it does in
English, but like, make in Indiafor the World just kind of
doesn't exactly roll off the tongue.
Yeah, no, it doesn't have like the same MAGA punch to it, does
it? Yeah, exactly.
(12:41):
They should, they should have called the Trump administration
be like, well, how should we brand this?
Like, you're really good at one liners, right?
Like and nicknames. He's really good at nicknames
too. But yeah, so, but so it's, it's
it's a joint venture. Airbus actually has two large
facilities in, in India. So this is not their first.
This is not India's first, you know, first look at airplane
(13:01):
manufacturing. The, the one thing that this
article points out is the fact that there's not a ton of
confidence that it's going to necessarily spark India's a
growing market for business aviation.
It's not necessarily going to spark like, oh, now there's
going to be a lot of, you know, airplanes in India bought from
Desso. It's just really hard to own
(13:23):
airplanes in India. The Indian registry is not
exactly friendly to outside capital.
Yeah, it's also, I mean, there'sa lot of other challenges in
India, like lack of hangar space.
So you have a lot of aircraft sitting outside and really hot
conditions all the time, amongstother things.
But I mean, I think it's interesting.
I think it's smart of India to, you know, push these companies
(13:44):
like, hey, you going to do business with us?
You know, you need to boost our more sophisticated
manufacturing. We don't just want to make your
T-shirts and your jeans. And also for geopolitical
purposes, it's good to have Europe and India working
together instead of, you know, let's say Europe and China
working together. So I get where it's coming from.
I wonder how is the labor pool going to be.
(14:05):
There's a lot of engineers in India, but a lot of them get
poached from other countries. So I it will be interesting to
see how well they can staff the operation in that area.
There is some aerospace manufacturing, but not nearly,
you know, I think kind of the level, the extent that we're
talking about at this point. Yeah, Yeah, I think that
there's, there was the same question was asked of Mexico
(14:26):
when a lot of near shoring sort of moved in Mexico.
I think that when you look at making these investments, I
think that that so now has a training component that they're
going to have to figure out. And assembling an airplane is a
lot different than assembling a car, right.
Like if you have some sort of, you know, error with a car, like
(14:46):
you kind of roll to a stop and pull off from the side of the
road. If it's an airplane, a little
bit different. And so I, I think that they're
going to definitely, it may slowdown.
Desso has a reputation for beingslow at manufacturing.
It may make it even a little bitslower.
But frankly, I'm not 100% sure Desso cares as much about, I
(15:07):
mean, you get the backlog numbers.
There's 70 at the end of 20/24/79 Falcons on backlog and
220 Raphael's on backlog. So like, which one are you going
to put your priority in? Right?
There's just, you know, it's, it's a, it's a niche.
It's a niche aircraft. There's not a lot of large
fleets buying them or no large, no large fleets buying them.
(15:30):
Not a lot of fleets that operatethem.
They don't charter all that often.
So I think that there's it's, it's going to be interesting.
I had no mention of the 9X. Are we on 9X10X?
Eventually we'll get here, right?
We're on 9X currently, I think. No mention of that.
So that'll stay, that'll stay inFrance, but the 2000 LXS will be
(15:52):
moving to India. Yeah, Well, let's see how it
goes. And who knows, maybe one day
India will be making a whole bunch of business aircraft.
I I, there's been a big train inthe yacht industry.
You know, there's a lot of yachts that are now made in
China that are made in Turkey. You know that.
I think a lot of people are always like, well, who's going
to buy, you know, San Lorenzo made here or there.
But like, it's it does happen sowell, I don't think it'll affect
(16:14):
the customers too much, but I guess there remains to be seen.
All right, well, you were on vacation last week and
completely unplugged, so you don't have anything for social
media madness. I was, I literally didn't, I
didn't log into social media forlike 6 days.
It was awesome. If you haven't done in a while,
can I highly recommend. So yeah, I I was literally
completely removed from social media.
(16:36):
Have no idea what's going on outthere.
All right, well, so my one of the week, which I think everyone
will get a nice kick out of, butso here is an image of a lovely.
I think it's a King Air 90 or some variant similar to that.
I can't even remember what airfield this was on landing on
the roof of a building and FBO memes, which is a great source
(16:58):
of aviation memes, as long as you are not easily offended
because some of their stuff is pretty highly offensive.
But if you like it, unfortunately you're still going
to have to pay your landing fees, they say, even if you
landed on top of a building. We gonna get you those landing
fees gonna get you. They're going to send you a
bill. I know you've got about
(17:20):
$1,000,000 worth of damage to repair, but you owe us your $340
because you didn't buy enough fuel.
I say I am so impressed with this guy though.
I mean no one was hurt, no injuries, obviously the planes
probably totaled, but to land ontop of a building with minimal
impact on human life or limb? It's pretty amazing, honestly.
(17:41):
Yeah, yeah, no kidding. It's a I am, I'm very impressed
with that pilotage. If you find something good, send
it to us. And while while you're there,
while you have your phone out, your browsing social media, go
like us on LinkedIn and go follow us on YouTube.
Hit like subscribe, hit the notification bell.
I don't know. Whatever your favorite
influencers say to grow their channels, go do that while
(18:04):
you're there and and engage withus in social media and we'd love
to talk to you. And Speaking of landing fees,
the ADSB battle is continuing over these landing fees.
This has been going on for a couple months.
I feel like there were some state legislative actions
happening around using ADSB information for nuisance
lawsuits and making money off ofpeople.
(18:24):
It was supposed to be a safety program, but here we are with
Big Brother knowing where your airplane is at every given
moment, and there's possible newlegislation in the House to stop
this. Yeah, I think that this has been
a subject to sensitivity for a while.
We can. I am officially, if this has not
been dubbed yet, I'm going to officially dub this the Jack
(18:45):
Sweeney law for ADSB because Elon Jet and Taylor Swift Jet
and Jeff Bezos jet and all of those, the tracking Twitter
accounts brought a lot of this to to the mainstream media's
forefront, right? We in business aviation have
known that this has existed for a while.
We understand that safety is a big thing.
We need to understand that safety is obviously first and
(19:08):
foremost of our passengers and of everybody involved, and
privacy is tied to safety. We need to not, you know, not
negate that. But ADSB has been abused a bit
by both the government and by private industry to probably
walk outside of the scope of what it was originally intended
(19:30):
for. It was originally intended to
create airspace separation between aircraft and have some
really good safety in place in order to do that.
And so, but a lot of that has just has gotten way out of
control. You have these networks of of
ADSB information. I think the hard part, the the
(19:50):
thing I think people aren't necessarily thinking about what
this is, how long this is going to take like that The Internet
is forever is like a saying. And that data is out there.
And until you change aircraft, like, it's still going to be out
there and it's still going to beaccessible for at least a little
while. Plus the number of FOIA requests
(20:11):
that people can do to actually get to information.
I mean, even Jack Swinney, I interviewed him like a year ago
and even he said, you know, OK, they can come out with this new
program, that new program, I canalways find a way through FOIA
to figure out who it is. And I'm like, yeah, you're not
probably not wrong there. And I think that's that's the
challenge that we're in today. Like, and just like, you know,
getting a ticket with your car from a camera and all these
(20:32):
other things, like there's all these new tools that people can
use to charge you fees and go after you.
How do we deal with that? I don't really know.
I know that. I mean, the reauthorization bill
last that was passed, you know, had provisions to improve the
privacy production of the airplanes.
But how realistic is it? And will we ever get to a point
where Big Brother isn't watchingyou all the time?
(20:54):
I just don't know if it's going to be feasible.
Yeah, I here is my my hot take is using fees for using ADSB to
charge landing fees is like the tip.
You know when you you go and youpay for a coffee and the tip
pops up and it starts at like 30% and like and you're and
there's not really a button thatsays like no like or custom tip,
(21:17):
right? This feels a lot like that.
OK, I rant and rave against against unnecessary tipping for
to go orders and coffee. And this is a heck of a lot like
that. If you're using, if you're using
that information to charge ramp fees for somebody who like look,
if you use, if you utilize a facility, if you walk through a
(21:38):
signature, if you go get you a cup of coffee, you go get your
free water bottle, your pilots go hang out in the pilot lounge,
you know, use the bathroom, all that kind of stuff, you should
pay your landing fees. But if Signature is going to hit
up the general aviation aircraftthat landed and they have the
right to collect fees at the airport, like that's getting a
little bit ridiculous. I don't know, I think it's a
(22:01):
sign the times I think it's justgoing to happen anyway.
And like if you landed somewhere, you landed somewhere.
The thing I have a problem with is like the FAA issued A
citation. They don't know that it was
ADSB, but they assume because how else would they, they know
it. But there was a seaplane that
had been taking off from this area and the FAA issued them a
fine for taking off under or flying around under 500 feet or
(22:22):
something like that. I'm like, well, that's that's
not cool. Like you can't especially the
FAA to issue it. You know, it's a safety program
and you're using it to find someone doing something wrong.
There's a lot of other people doing a lot worse things out
there than that seaplane pilot, and maybe focus your efforts on
that instead of using ADSB data for it.
Exactly. And Martha Lunkin got busted for
(22:43):
this, flipping off her ADSB transmitter and going under a
bridge. I will let the audience decide
on the debate for that, of whether whether she should have
gotten busted or not for that. All right.
Well, let's quickly touch on this story.
We don't need to go into it too much because we already talked
about this a couple months ago. So a charter flight group, the
CEO had sent a text message to one of our favorite reporters
(23:05):
out there in business aviation. He covers the whole industry,
but he was highlighting a new lawsuit that is against Charter
Flight Group. Apparently in this case, this
was a repatriation flight to go back to Israel after October 7th
and the agency paid the group $630,000 and the flight never
(23:25):
took place. And he is being obligated to
return those funds, which seems totally fair.
He can still appeal it. But this is one of four lawsuits
mentioned in the article currently against Charter Flight
Group and kind of reminds you, maybe don't text mean things to
reporters that cover your industry.
Yeah, we have talked about this once before.
(23:46):
Don't create vendettas against people in the industry.
People will say what they're going to say, but you know, just
let them say it sometimes. And don't, don't send really
incriminating text messages to people with a large media
outlet. I feel like a broken record a
little bit on that topic. No, I think again, we talked
about this last time. It's, it's tough to see.
(24:09):
Look, everybody, every business has troubles and every, every
business gets sued. I'm sure if there was equal
reporting on other charter companies that were getting
sued, it would be similar. So I think I, I think that as,
as you, as you, I have a little bit of empathy for Jordan and
for, for those people that are associated with his team.
(24:31):
I think, you know, run a tight business, run a clean ship as
best as you can and don't make an enemy in the media.
I think that's like, that's my, my public service advice and to
Jordan. So yeah, it's, it's tough.
I, I hope that it gets resolved.You know, it kind of seems like
1 gets resolved and another one gets filed the next day and
that's, that's kind of tough. So, but yeah, we'll we'll see
(24:54):
what happens. Yeah, I don't see the lawsuits
are not necessarily a black markets against a company like
we don't know the internal things that happen, especially
for a broker, you know, you've got very, very large funds going
back and forth and you're a middleman for them.
This is kind of the scary part of being stuck in the middle.
It's making two parties agree with you.
And I mean, who knows? I don't know the full story and
(25:17):
but man, that's just just not just not good.
Just keep your keep yourself flying low out there and off the
radar. It's the best policy.
Speaking of off the radar speaking.
Of off the radar, which I just don't plan that it just kind of
came, you know, like. It was just.
There, that was so. Good.
That was too good. My favorite story of the last
week is did you know what the best thing to go with the Turkey
(25:40):
sandwiches? No.
A freedom Dorito is what it is. Is.
Awesome. America's favorite plane this
week, the B2 bomber, which delivered, what was it like 16
mops or something like that in Iran.
You know, like we're not political, but we can shout out
(26:01):
to the Air Force and the Navy and everybody else who did a
pretty insane job with their mission over the last week.
But I cannot believe the B2 onlyhas 2 pilots in it and they flew
a 36 hour mission. That is brutal.
That is a long way for two people to fly.
I wonder is here's something that I would like to Google.
Is the B2 bomber single pilot certified?
(26:24):
It must be right. They have to sleep if you're
going to fly for 40 hours. I don't think, I don't think, I
mean I don't know what it is. Maybe they allow like controlled
mapping. You know, the great thing about
being the military is you can kind of do whatever you want to
do if you need to. It's true like Far's, but I mean
they have a chemical toilet. There's only 2 pilots in there.
I had to look up the cockpit. It is incredibly small.
(26:45):
I mean they don't have a lot of space in there, but they train
themselves on the best foods to eat so they have minimal
digestion. So Turkey sandwiches with no
cheese is one of the pilots favorite go to.
Is the B2 bomber more awkward togo to the bathroom than the PC
12? That's the question.
Probably. I'm going to go with probably.
Yeah, probably close second though.
(27:06):
Close second. True.
What is it with Americans and loving Turkey?
Another PSA Turkey sucks. OK, I said it.
I don't like Turkey at Thanksgiving.
I don't. But I tolerate it.
I really don't like it at Christmas.
Easter. It's like you eat Turkey all the
freaking time. It's like Americans love Turkey.
(27:30):
Well, it's incredibly cheap and apparently at the blandest food
out there because these pilots like to eat them so that they
have enough calories, but nothing really happens
otherwise. They're just they're good to go
for 36 hours straight. I will agree that it is the
blandest food ever. I think, I think all Americans
can agree on that point. Yeah, that's that's pretty
(27:51):
crazy. I am super thankful for our
military. And if you listen to this and
you served, I want to say thank you.
With July 4th coming up, it's America's birthday.
We got one more year and then it'll be 250 and, you know,
another 750 to go. So, yeah.
So thank you. Thank you for all those that
(28:13):
that have served out there, especially the B2 bomber pilots.
You are the most BA of the group.
Well, and unfortunately, the theFreedom Dorito will not be
operational for too much longer because the military does have
plans to replace it with 100 B 21 Raiders.
What nickname will we come up with then for our bombers?
Because I don't think anything tops Freedom Dorito.
It's just so much fun. It's so American.
(28:36):
That's exactly right. I mean, yeah, exactly.
It's like, yeah, something boomerang.
But that's Australian, right? Like there's just, there's
nothing more Dorito. There's nothing more American
than a Dorito. But apparently, compared to the
$65,000 an hour operating cost of the B2, the B1 only cost
60,000 an hour after spending. 2.
(28:58):
Billion each to build. 2 billionitself, unfathomable number.
Honestly, if you think about operating cost to manufacturing
cost, I feel like that's not that bad to be honest.
Maybe could be worse like 60 as a percentage, as a percentage.
I mean, you think about a $75 million Gulfstream like if you,
(29:21):
if you like, if you took percentage ratios like 60,000
hours, not that bad. Yeah, well, as an American, I'm
just very proud of our air power.
And that was kind of fun to see over the last week.
I mean, you know, I don't want anyone to get hurt or anything
in the world, but pretty cool tosee jet fuel in use, yeah.
Absolutely. Well, I think that brings us to
(29:41):
the end. I hope everybody has a excellent
July 4th weekend. If you're in a state that allows
fireworks, I hope that you shootthem off.
And if you're in a state that doesn't allow fireworks, I hope
you drive somewhere that lets you buy some more so.
And safety first folks, no kids laying those things off and back
away as soon as you light it, please.
Back it up Terry, if you know that reference.
(30:02):
If you know that reference, you are of my age or similar.
So don't forget to back it up Terry and we will see you next
week after the 4th of July. Hopefully nothing crazy happens
during this next week, but if itdoes, you can rely on the VIPC
to be here with the spicy takes on those.
So we will see you next week.
Good morning and welcome back tothe VIP seat.
Today is July 1st. It's officially summer.
Preston. Have you had any, uh, fun in
your summer this year yet? You know, I have had a fair bit
of fun this summer. I spent a week at the beach.
As viewers of YouTube may recognize, I had a different
background for a week. And then last week I spent a
week off the grid in Montana, completely unplugged.
(00:22):
First time I've done that, maybeever for a full week.
Not not ever, but in a really long time, probably 10 years,
and it was awesome. That's amazing.
Amazing. Those are goals.
I don't know if I could do that,but I'm glad.
That you it was, it was tough. It was tough.
I realized very quickly how addicted to my phone I am.
I was like, ah, OK, I have a problem.
(00:43):
Maybe, maybe we'll start like a LinkedIn group of like cell
phones, anonymous and we'll all like, hi, my name is Preston and
I'm addicted to my phone. You'll be in a lot of good
company, I'm sure. Yeah, absolutely.
Absolutely. So to kick things off this week
before we go into our regularly scheduled news, commentary and
(01:04):
stories, I just have to send APSA out there because on
Netflix, the movie plane is now,you know, available.
This came out two years ago. Apparently I missed it entirely,
which was apparently a great thing at the time because this
is the absolute worst aviation film I've ever seen in my entire
life. So unbelievable and unrealistic.
I was literally screaming at theTV for the 1st 30 minutes.
(01:25):
So just letting you guys know out there that are listening, do
not watch this film. Yes, it's summer.
Maybe you're like running low onwhat movies you want to watch.
You're like, oh, it's got a plane in it.
I love planes. I'll watch it.
Don't. Do not do it.
That's hilarious. There's some really bad pop
culture moments for airplanes. Like I feel like like Taylor
Sheridan, great example. The dude loves planes.
(01:47):
I think we've talked about this before that like you watch Land
Man and like planes show up likeevery other episode.
And I was watching it with some friends and they're like, what
kind of plane is that? I was like, that's a global
7500. What plane's that that's a King
Air, What plane's that that is aclapped out citation Bravo, you
know, and it's like just an obsession, obsession with
(02:09):
private aviation. Taylor Sheridan, I feel like he
does. You know, there's there's a
couple of cutaways where you're like, that was not what you
thought that was. Like, you know, the taxi scene
is like a Gulfstream and then a global pulls up and you're like,
well, OK, technically not. The worst about that is actually
the Kardashians. The Kardashians had this
(02:31):
atrocious one where like the taxi scene was AG 550 and then
it showed the inside of Citation10.
And I was like those are not thesame.
Yeah, the one that always gets me too is like, every single
time, like someone's boarding a private aircraft, they're inside
of a hanker. I'm like, how does this make any
sense? We're not turning the plane on
when you're inside of the hanger, but I guess it's easier
(02:53):
to shoot and controlling for theweather that I can accept.
I will take those little like aviation things that only we
would probably know about in this case.
It was so utterly obvious to anyone who's like had anything
to do like with getting on a plane once in their life.
So just avoid, avoid the troubleI gotta say.
What was what was the worst one?I haven't seen it.
And so like spoiler alert if youdon't, if you don't want us to
(03:14):
spoil it for you, like what was the worst?
Like what was the most atrociouslike mistake?
I mean, the first thing that happens in the movie is that it
crashes because lightning lightning hits it and somehow
they have to get on the ground by gliding even though the
engines are still operable. But there's something wrong with
a battery. So the whole, the whole crash
(03:35):
doesn't make any sense. And then everything else
associated with the whole thing doesn't make any sense.
I've seen people online saying like the interior didn't match
the exterior of the plane. They were two different planes.
The flight attendants do weird and wacky stuff that no flight
attendant would ever do. It's just, it's just bad.
Just don't. Just don't do it.
Say protect yourself. It's not worth it.
That's the PS look, you'll come to the VIP seat for Insights and
(03:57):
our Sassy tanks, and that was that Pretty good one.
Yeah, well, and good news though, we'd looks like we might
be getting our big beautiful bill signed this week.
The biggest and the beautifulestbill you have ever seen in your
life, ever. It does look like we're getting
the big beautiful bill. It has caused a lot of tension
(04:19):
in in politics. There's been, I know that Trump
and Elon had a big falling out over the big beautiful bill.
There's been a lot of other tension points, but it did pass
the Senate back to the House. I am in a slack group with
Daniel Chung, who is from Aviation Tax consultants for
those that are in the transaction world are probably
(04:41):
familiar with Daniel. And he said, yes, it has passed
the Senate, but it still has to go back to the House where
they're going to then beat it upagain.
But in both versions, 1, 100% what we know as bonus
depreciation is coming back. And that is great news for a lot
of people who don't like paying taxes, it's good news.
Looks like it's coming back. Yeah, I mean, not only coming
(05:03):
back, but the current version and again, who knows where this
actually ends up, but it makes it retroactive back to 2022.
No, sorry, 2023 technically because December 31st of 2022
you get 100% depreciation all the way back to then, which is.
Wild. I think so.
Daniel explained it to me like this is that it's there is some
(05:27):
language in there about January 19th, 2025 that's kind of like
another line in the sand. And I think no one's really sure
exactly how that whole retroactive thing is going to
shake out. It's good news for the future
and it's really good news for those people that got delayed to
the end of January and said the beginning of January.
(05:48):
That's terrible news for those that closed on January 4th.
It's, it's, it's not good. So, but yeah, I, I think that
it's, it's definitely going to create a tailwind.
I had, I have created some graphs.
If you want to go look at prestonholland.com, you can see
my most recent newsletter where I talk about the history of most
appreciation, which is, and I made some nice little graphs and
(06:09):
things like that. And one thing is that this is
not the first time and probably,and it will be permanent, right?
So it's not the first time we'vehad 100% most appreciation, but
it is definitely it's proposed to be permanent, so that would
be net positive. KJ Mccarter at Aviation Tax
Consultant said the important part about the 100% being
permanent for airplanes is thereis no 1031 light kind exchange
(06:33):
for airplanes. I didn't know that.
I didn't understand exactly how that worked when you step up in
your basis, I'm going to lose some people here with with this
math, but essentially is your, your remaining cost basis gets
taxed as ordinary income. And so kind of the difference
between your depreciated amount and your sale price gets taxes
ordinary income. Now with 100% you if you're
rolling into the next purchase, it essentially gets wiped out,
(06:56):
right? Assuming that you're stepping up
and not stepping down in purchase price.
But that is, you know, having 100% is huge for people moving
from one aircraft to another aircraft.
So we got no, I mean this for aviation, for the rich people
that buy airplanes that need thetax benefit and the aviation
infrastructure and everybody else, this is great because
there's not a lot of places thatyou can put money into and get
(07:18):
100% depreciation at this level.Unless you're buying yacht that
you're putting into service or you're putting into service,
it's hard to get this much money.
But also there's other pieces inthere.
There's a research and experimental expensing section,
which could help aviation firms that are say researching new
technologies and new airframes and technology, different things
like that. And there's also the business
(07:39):
interest deductibility, which gives you a more favorable
formula for higher interest deductions, which also has, you
know, in your world, the financeand leasing world, some, some
positive impacts. Yeah, we love that provision
because people have often asked me who's your number one
competitor? And it's the balance sheet, it's
cash. And so if interest expense
(08:02):
becomes deductible and you have 100% bonus depreciation, the
formula for financing your aircraft becomes even more
attractive, right, because you're not having to calculate
versus your hurdle rate. Like what is what do I need to
have from an internal rate return standpoint?
I can now deduct that interest as an expense.
So although it's not going to bea one for one, right?
(08:24):
And this is not tax advice. So don't listen to us for tax
advice. But it's not a one for one.
You know, you don't pay a dollarin interest and save a dollar.
It's, you know, pay a dollar in interest.
You save your effective rate, but it's going to blend your
effective cost of capital actually lower, which is great.
It means that you're less sensitive to interest rate
fluctuations. And you know, if Trump has his
(08:45):
way, then he's going to force interest rates to come down.
We'll see. I don't know, I'm not 100% he'll
be able to, but but we shall see.
I know that he is. He is posturing to put pressure
on the Fed to bring interest rates down.
Yeah, Yeah, we'll have to see. If nothing else, there is
nothing negative in this unless maybe you're like one of those
(09:05):
green companies because I think there have been a lot of
provisions pulled out that were incentivizing SAF or other green
technologies. That's obviously not a priority
of the current administration. But for everybody else who's
building traditional aircraft and vehicles, you're in good
hands at the moment. Yep, exactly.
And those that really don't likepaying taxes, you know, we we
(09:27):
have ranted and raved and no onelikes paying taxes, so that's
good news. We shall see how fast it takes.
I mean, look, we're we're knocking on the we're knocking
on the summer holiday right now.You know, nothing like
government to take six weeks offin the middle of things needing
to be done. But we're kind of, you know,
we're on the edge. So maybe maybe they'll pass it
before that. Maybe it'll sit in limbo for for
(09:49):
a period of time. But it will definitely, when the
announcement comes, it will be definitely a boom time for
private aviation, which is great.
Yeah. And I want to put in one caveat
too. I think a lot of people look at
this and go, oh, these are just incentives for the rich, you
know, But at the end of the day,the reason these incentives work
is because instead of the rich, you know, putting their money
somewhere else, they're actuallyputting it in equipment,
(10:11):
especially American manufacturedequipment and production
capability. So the economic concept of this
is we're going to incentivize people with a lot of money to
buy expensive equipment that creates great jobs and great
economies. So for all the haters out there,
they're actually, I do think this is a really effective way
of boosting production and the economy.
(10:32):
But we'll see how it all works out.
Yeah, absolutely. And that might actually, while
we're talking about manufacturing, might bring us
into our next story about Desso.Falcon Jet has decided to open
up some expanded manufacturing in India, which is not a place
that everybody thinks about immediately.
(10:53):
When you know, when you think about airplane manufacturing,
you think of Israel, you think of France, you think of Germany,
you think of a lot of European countries, the United States,
Mexico even, not necessarily India.
So that's. Yeah, I was reading a lot about
this as I find it very fascinating.
This is the first, I mean, real,there is some aerospace
(11:16):
manufacturing in India, but there's no one really doing, you
know, large airframes like this or like some more.
Some Russian aircraft were beingbuilt there, some drones.
But this is required because Dasso just sold the government
around $8 billion worth of Raphael fighter jets.
So part of the investor in that technology means that that
company needs to turn around andactually invest in manufacturing
(11:38):
in India. So apparently the military side
said, okay, we're going to ship off the production of the Falcon
2000 LXS to India and a French airplane.
This will be the first Indian made airplane we've seen.
It's true, you know, the Indianshave a long time history with
the British and now it's time for the French to come in to
(11:58):
come in and and start making andmaking impacts.
I think that my one of my favorite parts of of this whole.
So corporate jet investor has a pretty Alastair wrote a really
solid article on this. And one of my favorite phrases
from this is make in India for the world.
And I'm like in self reli self reliant India.
I get that, but make in India for the world.
(12:19):
I can't help but wonder if that that's a trans that's a little
bit of lost in translation. Like, I bet that sounds a lot
more clever in the native language than it does in
English, but like, make in Indiafor the World just kind of
doesn't exactly roll off the tongue.
Yeah, no, it doesn't have like the same MAGA punch to it, does
it? Yeah, exactly.
(12:41):
They should, they should have called the Trump administration
be like, well, how should we brand this?
Like, you're really good at one liners, right?
Like and nicknames. He's really good at nicknames
too. But yeah, so, but so it's, it's
it's a joint venture. Airbus actually has two large
facilities in, in India. So this is not their first.
This is not India's first, you know, first look at airplane
(13:01):
manufacturing. The, the one thing that this
article points out is the fact that there's not a ton of
confidence that it's going to necessarily spark India's a
growing market for business aviation.
It's not necessarily going to spark like, oh, now there's
going to be a lot of, you know, airplanes in India bought from
Desso. It's just really hard to own
(13:23):
airplanes in India. The Indian registry is not
exactly friendly to outside capital.
Yeah, it's also, I mean, there'sa lot of other challenges in
India, like lack of hangar space.
So you have a lot of aircraft sitting outside and really hot
conditions all the time, amongstother things.
But I mean, I think it's interesting.
I think it's smart of India to, you know, push these companies
(13:44):
like, hey, you going to do business with us?
You know, you need to boost our more sophisticated
manufacturing. We don't just want to make your
T-shirts and your jeans. And also for geopolitical
purposes, it's good to have Europe and India working
together instead of, you know, let's say Europe and China
working together. So I get where it's coming from.
I wonder how is the labor pool going to be.
(14:05):
There's a lot of engineers in India, but a lot of them get
poached from other countries. So I it will be interesting to
see how well they can staff the operation in that area.
There is some aerospace manufacturing, but not nearly,
you know, I think kind of the level, the extent that we're
talking about at this point. Yeah, Yeah, I think that
there's, there was the same question was asked of Mexico
(14:26):
when a lot of near shoring sort of moved in Mexico.
I think that when you look at making these investments, I
think that that so now has a training component that they're
going to have to figure out. And assembling an airplane is a
lot different than assembling a car, right.
Like if you have some sort of, you know, error with a car, like
(14:46):
you kind of roll to a stop and pull off from the side of the
road. If it's an airplane, a little
bit different. And so I, I think that they're
going to definitely, it may slowdown.
Desso has a reputation for beingslow at manufacturing.
It may make it even a little bitslower.
But frankly, I'm not 100% sure Desso cares as much about, I
(15:07):
mean, you get the backlog numbers.
There's 70 at the end of 20/24/79 Falcons on backlog and
220 Raphael's on backlog. So like, which one are you going
to put your priority in? Right?
There's just, you know, it's, it's a, it's a niche.
It's a niche aircraft. There's not a lot of large
fleets buying them or no large, no large fleets buying them.
(15:30):
Not a lot of fleets that operatethem.
They don't charter all that often.
So I think that there's it's, it's going to be interesting.
I had no mention of the 9X. Are we on 9X10X?
Eventually we'll get here, right?
We're on 9X currently, I think. No mention of that.
So that'll stay, that'll stay inFrance, but the 2000 LXS will be
(15:52):
moving to India. Yeah, Well, let's see how it
goes. And who knows, maybe one day
India will be making a whole bunch of business aircraft.
I I, there's been a big train inthe yacht industry.
You know, there's a lot of yachts that are now made in
China that are made in Turkey. You know that.
I think a lot of people are always like, well, who's going
to buy, you know, San Lorenzo made here or there.
But like, it's it does happen sowell, I don't think it'll affect
(16:14):
the customers too much, but I guess there remains to be seen.
All right, well, you were on vacation last week and
completely unplugged, so you don't have anything for social
media madness. I was, I literally didn't, I
didn't log into social media forlike 6 days.
It was awesome. If you haven't done in a while,
can I highly recommend. So yeah, I I was literally
completely removed from social media.
(16:36):
Have no idea what's going on outthere.
All right, well, so my one of the week, which I think everyone
will get a nice kick out of, butso here is an image of a lovely.
I think it's a King Air 90 or some variant similar to that.
I can't even remember what airfield this was on landing on
the roof of a building and FBO memes, which is a great source
(16:58):
of aviation memes, as long as you are not easily offended
because some of their stuff is pretty highly offensive.
But if you like it, unfortunately you're still going
to have to pay your landing fees, they say, even if you
landed on top of a building. We gonna get you those landing
fees gonna get you. They're going to send you a
bill. I know you've got about
(17:20):
$1,000,000 worth of damage to repair, but you owe us your $340
because you didn't buy enough fuel.
I say I am so impressed with this guy though.
I mean no one was hurt, no injuries, obviously the planes
probably totaled, but to land ontop of a building with minimal
impact on human life or limb? It's pretty amazing, honestly.
(17:41):
Yeah, yeah, no kidding. It's a I am, I'm very impressed
with that pilotage. If you find something good, send
it to us. And while while you're there,
while you have your phone out, your browsing social media, go
like us on LinkedIn and go follow us on YouTube.
Hit like subscribe, hit the notification bell.
I don't know. Whatever your favorite
influencers say to grow their channels, go do that while
(18:04):
you're there and and engage withus in social media and we'd love
to talk to you. And Speaking of landing fees,
the ADSB battle is continuing over these landing fees.
This has been going on for a couple months.
I feel like there were some state legislative actions
happening around using ADSB information for nuisance
lawsuits and making money off ofpeople.
(18:24):
It was supposed to be a safety program, but here we are with
Big Brother knowing where your airplane is at every given
moment, and there's possible newlegislation in the House to stop
this. Yeah, I think that this has been
a subject to sensitivity for a while.
We can. I am officially, if this has not
been dubbed yet, I'm going to officially dub this the Jack
(18:45):
Sweeney law for ADSB because Elon Jet and Taylor Swift Jet
and Jeff Bezos jet and all of those, the tracking Twitter
accounts brought a lot of this to to the mainstream media's
forefront, right? We in business aviation have
known that this has existed for a while.
We understand that safety is a big thing.
We need to understand that safety is obviously first and
(19:08):
foremost of our passengers and of everybody involved, and
privacy is tied to safety. We need to not, you know, not
negate that. But ADSB has been abused a bit
by both the government and by private industry to probably
walk outside of the scope of what it was originally intended
(19:30):
for. It was originally intended to
create airspace separation between aircraft and have some
really good safety in place in order to do that.
And so, but a lot of that has just has gotten way out of
control. You have these networks of of
ADSB information. I think the hard part, the the
(19:50):
thing I think people aren't necessarily thinking about what
this is, how long this is going to take like that The Internet
is forever is like a saying. And that data is out there.
And until you change aircraft, like, it's still going to be out
there and it's still going to beaccessible for at least a little
while. Plus the number of FOIA requests
(20:11):
that people can do to actually get to information.
I mean, even Jack Swinney, I interviewed him like a year ago
and even he said, you know, OK, they can come out with this new
program, that new program, I canalways find a way through FOIA
to figure out who it is. And I'm like, yeah, you're not
probably not wrong there. And I think that's that's the
challenge that we're in today. Like, and just like, you know,
getting a ticket with your car from a camera and all these
(20:32):
other things, like there's all these new tools that people can
use to charge you fees and go after you.
How do we deal with that? I don't really know.
I know that. I mean, the reauthorization bill
last that was passed, you know, had provisions to improve the
privacy production of the airplanes.
But how realistic is it? And will we ever get to a point
where Big Brother isn't watchingyou all the time?
(20:54):
I just don't know if it's going to be feasible.
Yeah, I here is my my hot take is using fees for using ADSB to
charge landing fees is like the tip.
You know when you you go and youpay for a coffee and the tip
pops up and it starts at like 30% and like and you're and
there's not really a button thatsays like no like or custom tip,
(21:17):
right? This feels a lot like that.
OK, I rant and rave against against unnecessary tipping for
to go orders and coffee. And this is a heck of a lot like
that. If you're using, if you're using
that information to charge ramp fees for somebody who like look,
if you use, if you utilize a facility, if you walk through a
(21:38):
signature, if you go get you a cup of coffee, you go get your
free water bottle, your pilots go hang out in the pilot lounge,
you know, use the bathroom, all that kind of stuff, you should
pay your landing fees. But if Signature is going to hit
up the general aviation aircraftthat landed and they have the
right to collect fees at the airport, like that's getting a
little bit ridiculous. I don't know, I think it's a
(22:01):
sign the times I think it's justgoing to happen anyway.
And like if you landed somewhere, you landed somewhere.
The thing I have a problem with is like the FAA issued A
citation. They don't know that it was
ADSB, but they assume because how else would they, they know
it. But there was a seaplane that
had been taking off from this area and the FAA issued them a
fine for taking off under or flying around under 500 feet or
(22:22):
something like that. I'm like, well, that's that's
not cool. Like you can't especially the
FAA to issue it. You know, it's a safety program
and you're using it to find someone doing something wrong.
There's a lot of other people doing a lot worse things out
there than that seaplane pilot, and maybe focus your efforts on
that instead of using ADSB data for it.
Exactly. And Martha Lunkin got busted for
(22:43):
this, flipping off her ADSB transmitter and going under a
bridge. I will let the audience decide
on the debate for that, of whether whether she should have
gotten busted or not for that. All right.
Well, let's quickly touch on this story.
We don't need to go into it too much because we already talked
about this a couple months ago. So a charter flight group, the
CEO had sent a text message to one of our favorite reporters
(23:05):
out there in business aviation. He covers the whole industry,
but he was highlighting a new lawsuit that is against Charter
Flight Group. Apparently in this case, this
was a repatriation flight to go back to Israel after October 7th
and the agency paid the group $630,000 and the flight never
(23:25):
took place. And he is being obligated to
return those funds, which seems totally fair.
He can still appeal it. But this is one of four lawsuits
mentioned in the article currently against Charter Flight
Group and kind of reminds you, maybe don't text mean things to
reporters that cover your industry.
Yeah, we have talked about this once before.
(23:46):
Don't create vendettas against people in the industry.
People will say what they're going to say, but you know, just
let them say it sometimes. And don't, don't send really
incriminating text messages to people with a large media
outlet. I feel like a broken record a
little bit on that topic. No, I think again, we talked
about this last time. It's, it's tough to see.
(24:09):
Look, everybody, every business has troubles and every, every
business gets sued. I'm sure if there was equal
reporting on other charter companies that were getting
sued, it would be similar. So I think I, I think that as,
as you, as you, I have a little bit of empathy for Jordan and
for, for those people that are associated with his team.
(24:31):
I think, you know, run a tight business, run a clean ship as
best as you can and don't make an enemy in the media.
I think that's like, that's my, my public service advice and to
Jordan. So yeah, it's, it's tough.
I, I hope that it gets resolved.You know, it kind of seems like
1 gets resolved and another one gets filed the next day and
that's, that's kind of tough. So, but yeah, we'll we'll see
(24:54):
what happens. Yeah, I don't see the lawsuits
are not necessarily a black markets against a company like
we don't know the internal things that happen, especially
for a broker, you know, you've got very, very large funds going
back and forth and you're a middleman for them.
This is kind of the scary part of being stuck in the middle.
It's making two parties agree with you.
And I mean, who knows? I don't know the full story and
(25:17):
but man, that's just just not just not good.
Just keep your keep yourself flying low out there and off the
radar. It's the best policy.
Speaking of off the radar speaking.
Of off the radar, which I just don't plan that it just kind of
came, you know, like. It was just.
There, that was so. Good.
That was too good. My favorite story of the last
week is did you know what the best thing to go with the Turkey
(25:40):
sandwiches? No.
A freedom Dorito is what it is. Is.
Awesome. America's favorite plane this
week, the B2 bomber, which delivered, what was it like 16
mops or something like that in Iran.
You know, like we're not political, but we can shout out
(26:01):
to the Air Force and the Navy and everybody else who did a
pretty insane job with their mission over the last week.
But I cannot believe the B2 onlyhas 2 pilots in it and they flew
a 36 hour mission. That is brutal.
That is a long way for two people to fly.
I wonder is here's something that I would like to Google.
Is the B2 bomber single pilot certified?
(26:24):
It must be right. They have to sleep if you're
going to fly for 40 hours. I don't think, I don't think, I
mean I don't know what it is. Maybe they allow like controlled
mapping. You know, the great thing about
being the military is you can kind of do whatever you want to
do if you need to. It's true like Far's, but I mean
they have a chemical toilet. There's only 2 pilots in there.
I had to look up the cockpit. It is incredibly small.
(26:45):
I mean they don't have a lot of space in there, but they train
themselves on the best foods to eat so they have minimal
digestion. So Turkey sandwiches with no
cheese is one of the pilots favorite go to.
Is the B2 bomber more awkward togo to the bathroom than the PC
12? That's the question.
Probably. I'm going to go with probably.
Yeah, probably close second though.
(27:06):
Close second. True.
What is it with Americans and loving Turkey?
Another PSA Turkey sucks. OK, I said it.
I don't like Turkey at Thanksgiving.
I don't. But I tolerate it.
I really don't like it at Christmas.
Easter. It's like you eat Turkey all the
freaking time. It's like Americans love Turkey.
(27:30):
Well, it's incredibly cheap and apparently at the blandest food
out there because these pilots like to eat them so that they
have enough calories, but nothing really happens
otherwise. They're just they're good to go
for 36 hours straight. I will agree that it is the
blandest food ever. I think, I think all Americans
can agree on that point. Yeah, that's that's pretty
(27:51):
crazy. I am super thankful for our
military. And if you listen to this and
you served, I want to say thank you.
With July 4th coming up, it's America's birthday.
We got one more year and then it'll be 250 and, you know,
another 750 to go. So, yeah.
So thank you. Thank you for all those that
(28:13):
that have served out there, especially the B2 bomber pilots.
You are the most BA of the group.
Well, and unfortunately, the theFreedom Dorito will not be
operational for too much longer because the military does have
plans to replace it with 100 B 21 Raiders.
What nickname will we come up with then for our bombers?
Because I don't think anything tops Freedom Dorito.
It's just so much fun. It's so American.
(28:36):
That's exactly right. I mean, yeah, exactly.
It's like, yeah, something boomerang.
But that's Australian, right? Like there's just, there's
nothing more Dorito. There's nothing more American
than a Dorito. But apparently, compared to the
$65,000 an hour operating cost of the B2, the B1 only cost
60,000 an hour after spending. 2.
(28:58):
Billion each to build. 2 billionitself, unfathomable number.
Honestly, if you think about operating cost to manufacturing
cost, I feel like that's not that bad to be honest.
Maybe could be worse like 60 as a percentage, as a percentage.
I mean, you think about a $75 million Gulfstream like if you,
(29:21):
if you like, if you took percentage ratios like 60,000
hours, not that bad. Yeah, well, as an American, I'm
just very proud of our air power.
And that was kind of fun to see over the last week.
I mean, you know, I don't want anyone to get hurt or anything
in the world, but pretty cool tosee jet fuel in use, yeah.
Absolutely. Well, I think that brings us to
(29:41):
the end. I hope everybody has a excellent
July 4th weekend. If you're in a state that allows
fireworks, I hope that you shootthem off.
And if you're in a state that doesn't allow fireworks, I hope
you drive somewhere that lets you buy some more so.
And safety first folks, no kids laying those things off and back
away as soon as you light it, please.
Back it up Terry, if you know that reference.
(30:02):
If you know that reference, you are of my age or similar.
So don't forget to back it up Terry and we will see you next
week after the 4th of July. Hopefully nothing crazy happens
during this next week, but if itdoes, you can rely on the VIPC
to be here with the spicy takes on those.
So we will see you next week.
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