Speeding through the Loop

I can barely keep up with all the news coming out of Washington. It seems like every day there’s a new release or story that come the morrow, dissolves into thin air. The news cycle has gotten inside my OODA loop.

Short for Observe-Orient-Decide-Act, John Boyd—military strategist and famed creator of the F-16—developed the idea. According to Boyd, the only way to defeat an enemy was to get through your loop faster than him. Starting in 2015, writers and political commentators began using it frequently to describe Trump's unique genius for besting the media at every turn.

Lately, you might have heard how Trump’s executive order to shrink the federal workforce has led to mass firings across departments. After the mid-air collision in Washington D.C., this order was cited by many stammering journalists who couldn’t properly orient themselves as the root cause of the accident.

“President Trump offered unprecedented buyouts to ALL federal employees at a time when studies show the FAA does NOT have enough air traffic controllers to keep us safe,” wrote our very own Footman Phil Williams over at NewsChannel 5 on Twitter in the immediate aftermath of the accident. “More people will likely die.”

Phil deleted the tweet after getting barraged with insults, but it’s a great example of what happens to someone who accurately observes an event, but cannot properly orient themselves to then decide how to act in accord with the demands of the moment.

Boyd preached that the most crucial component of the cycle is the orient stage:

The second O, orientation—as the repository of our genetic heritage, cultural tradition, and previous experiences—is the most important part of the O-O-D-A loop since it shapes the way we observe, the way we decide, the way we act.

What’s increasingly true of the besotted critics of the current administration—even more so than in 2016 and 2020—is their inability to orient. They are profoundly lost on how to respond to the onslaught of actions the Trump administration has rolled out.

Similar to our Footman’s valiant efforts to pin the accident on the freshly minted Trump administration, Mayor Pete, the former secretary of transportation, wondered Monday about FAA staffing after a plane crash in Toronto over the long weekend.

“The flying public needs answers,” wrote the Mayor. “How many FAA personnel were just fired? What positions? And why?”

Sean Duffy, the current secretary of transportation, fired off a response that evening. After a barb at the Mayor, he clarified:

The FAA alone has a staggering 45,000 employees. Less than 400 were let go, and they were all probationary, meaning they had been hired less than a year ago. Zero air traffic controllers and critical safety personnel were let go. 

Guess that settles that. The Mayor joins the Footman, stuck observing as their faculties for orientation have shattered against the cold clarity of actions taken from a different orientation. You’ll see this phenomenon all over the place once you start looking for it.