I've been criticized for blaming the pilots for the accidents because they perished and should be respected for that. I guess there is truth in that, and I don't mean to put the blame on them specifically but what about the passengers and their families? Don't they get respect too? Did they not deserve to be flown safely to their destinations? Is there not an implied contract between the passengers and the crew, and of course also between the airline company and the passengers that they will be given at least the minimum standard of professionalism to ensure that this happens? Sure Boeing has made errors but the airline that employed these pilots and did not give them the required training/checking to handle a trim runaway was the start of the problem, not the MCAS/Boeing input. A runaway trim can happen from many causes/failures and MCAS is only one. The problem presented was the trim moving without pilot command. The fix was to trim against it (which was always possible in this case) and retain control. The QRH required that the airplane be trimmed using the trim switch, then if the runaway persisted, turning off the trim switches and proceeding with manual trim. Another way to stop the runaway was to hold the manual trim wheel while turning off the trim switches. All low key stuff with no drama and for this to degenerate into a situation that caused the loss of two aircraft and 300 people is incomprehensible to me. Sure there were distractions caused by the failure of the angle of attack sensor mucking up the stall warning system, but the real problem, screaming out to the pilots, was the way the nose was going down. Simple self-preservation would force them to deal with this first. The ground was coming up fast; nobody could ignore that and there is no indication that these pilots were not aware of that or that they were not trying to stop it from happening. There is further evidence that they were successful, at first, but also evidence that they were not aware of the correct procedures to be used and evidence that they did not follow those procedures, except sporadically and piece-meal. Not professionally or correctly, as a trained flight crew would be expected to do. So what is the answer? Go down the rabbit hole of the MCAS/What did Boeing Do or Not Do, or fight for better pilot training and checking? As we lose the experience of the current airline pilots who are reaching mandatory retirement (they were trained in these procedures and have the cunning necessary to recognize a problem and have a way to handle it) and replace them with pilots who have a far more superficial training experience (CBT is the best you can get now, forget hands on) it is vital that we do more than just V1 cuts, steep turns and approach to stalls during initial and recurrent training. We must identify and train for those loss of control accidents that seem to be increasing, and I am not singling out any country/airline because failures such as this can happen to anybody. Are you ready? Would you know what to do?