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It is the law still. And apparently, if you're not registered, you might want to post as AC.

You mean like filing a lawsuit because the words "under God" exist in the Pledge of Allegiance?
http://atheism.about.com/b/2007/11/08/new-hampshire-lawsuit-filed-against-pledge-of-allegiance.htm

How about lawsuits against the Bush adminstration and the Patriot Act?
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/04/29/terror/main614638.shtml

How about lawsuits filed against Bush's "No Child Left Behind" legislation?
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/04/20/education/20cnd-child.html?hp&ex=1114056000&en=fcbac357dd9bb745&ei=5094&partner=homepage

These lawsuits are no more or less credible than the one suggesting (rightfully) that the Federal govt has no authority to force any private citizen to purchase any good or service from the private sector.

The fact is that there's no shortage of "flaming crazies" on either side of the isle. And as the previous poster suggested, that's a good thing in keeping the flaming crazies who are actually in power, in check.

If that were true, we would still be using armies of laborers instead of tractors. Automation has already displaced the vast majority of labor in agriculture. In 1850 farmers were 64% of the US labor force; now they're just a couple percent, even though the US is still a net exporter of food. Why would that process stop now?

• vandals could not flood the distributed webserver with bogus data.
• cloud-webserver would be available as a storage media, files would be stored on (almost) 'randomly chosen' users computers
• Because the distributed fileserver would fetch the files using an encrypted onion-router like structure privacy of users would be improved
• Storing the files in encrypted form would allow even companies to use that as data distribution, storage server.

So, how could that used as a prior art, well lets assume lets say in 10 years time a company X would start patent trolling companies who use that kind of distributed storage. And if that patent was really a problem then EFFI of some other instance could challenge that patent and request prior art to that patent... and there is a high probability I would also see that request. And I would check my submit mini-prior art to the one needing it.

I believe these kinds of submarine-prior- art patent-busters could be very effective against submarine- patent trolls. If this type of action was popular among independent coders, it would take away much of the problem with stupid software patent. Companies would not dare to start costly process of suing everybody for something obvious, as there would be a BIG probability that someone in the world might just show up and invalidate the whole patent in the middle of an expensive legal process.

For me it was easy to cast that technology to public domain, as I have no use for it self and I'd like that being used. Ok, it is likely that the writing of that patent-buster was 15 minutes of wasted time, but there is also a small chance it wasn't. I consider that being a small service to the community.

Funny enough, your links don't say what you think they say. For example, the "iraq wtc1993" search's number 2 hit (which was Wikipedia) said "Kenneth Pollack of the State Department stated that there was no CIA information tying Iraq into the 1993 WTC bombing."

Shit, there are hundreds of conspiracy theories. I believe they're still looking for anything more relevant than old-ass mustard gas to "prove" that we were justified in invading Iraq for any reason other than our own selfish interests. That doesn't mean that your wanton desire to link terrorism with the country of Iraq is justified -- you'd have a better time proving a link to Saudi Arabia or Libya.

http://terrorism.about.com/od/wariniraq/a/IraqWarOnTerror.htm shows the list of "justifications" we have been going through, in case you're interested in a retrospective.

It's not the first electric car, unless they are talking about this http://inventors.about.com/library/weekly/aacarselectrica.htm or one of these http://inventors.about.com/library/weekly/aacarselectric2a.htm. I believe that GM made a car at one point that few were on the road that were electric back in the 1990 called the EV1. Why is this called the 'first' instead of the return of electric cars.

It's not the first electric car, unless they are talking about this http://inventors.about.com/library/weekly/aacarselectrica.htm or one of these http://inventors.about.com/library/weekly/aacarselectric2a.htm. I believe that GM made a car at one point that few were on the road that were electric back in the 1990 called the EV1. Why is this called the 'first' instead of the return of electric cars.

Funny, About.com disagrees:

Residents and nonresidents that earn income in Arizona will pay state income tax.

Which is also backed up by The Arizona Department of Revenue.

Arizona does actually have an income tax.

Yes, it's hilarious. Can you provide a third reference please?

Anyway, thanks for the correction.

Funny, About.com disagrees:

Residents and nonresidents that earn income in Arizona will pay state income tax.

Which is also backed up by The Arizona Department of Revenue.

Arizona does actually have an income tax.

Why are we deluding ourselves into believing only massive multinational companies can control the web, or that the government can control the internet, etc.? They are granted power because we give it to them.

This is a myth. If it were true, the actions of the government would reflect the wishes of the majority. But it isn't true:

it is not in fact true that the idea that groups will act in their self-interest follows logically from the premise of rational and self-interested behavior. It does not follow, because all of the individuals in a group would gain if they achieved their group objective, that they would act to achieve that objective, even if they were all rational and self-interested. Indeed unless the number of individuals in a group is quite small, or unless there is coercion or some other special device to make individuals act in their common interest, rational, self-interested individuals will not act to achieve their common or group interests.- Mancur Olson, The Logic of Collective Action

A single actor or small number of actors will always have an advantage if it requires coordination of a large number of people to oppose them. There are a number of reasons for this, among them:

• In a large group individuals will attempt to free-ride, not contributing to the collective effort.
• While the collective benefit may be very large, the benefit to individuals is very small. They may lack sufficient incentive to act. In other words, transaction costs are high. This is why we have firms - organizations that operate in the market but are not organized like a market internally.
• When all or most members of a group are required to cooperate in order to act effectively, each member of the group knows that his or her individual action is unlikely to make the difference between success or failure. The larger the group, the less significant the individual action. So, for example, many people don't vote: they know it is highly unlikely that their vote will make any difference to the outcome.

Researchers say every time a man orgasm it reduces the chances of getting prostate cancer. Let's try to eradicate this dreaded disease. I can't do this alone. Hmmmm... let me rephrase that.

See, I liked the color system! You could combine it with other color codes--like, if Code Puce (puce is a reddish-brown) was declared, it meant that terrorists flinging poo was an imminent threat. ;)

Remember that US patents are given to the first to file for a patent and not the first to invent, as can be demonstrated by the US patent for the incandescent lightbulb: http://www.coolquiz.com/trivia/explain/docs/edison.asp or the telephone: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Invention_of_the_telephone

Of course, the first one shows that the US patent office can issue a patent for something already patented elsewhere in the world.

This is blatantly WRONG. Unlike most of the world, the US is a first to INVENT system. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_to_file_and_first_to_invent http://inventors.about.com/od/firsttoinvent/First_to_Invent_Rule.htm and I could keep going with google results 3, 4, and 5.

And this: http://atheism.about.com/b/2007/08/06/authoritarian-or-libertarian-ron-paul-on-churchstate-separation-secularism.htm

Digital Archaeology Show Reveals 'Lost' Web Sites

Yeah, they're not hard to find...

Current laws in some states certainly do differentiate between the former and latter.

Georgia for one considers consensual sex for two people underage to be at most a misdemeanor with no need for registration as a sex offender. The ages for sexual consent range from 16 to 18 without parental consent and from 14 to 18 with parental consent across different US states. You should check your jurisdiction more specifically than just checking that website, but the laws of your jurisdiction are probably on the web somewhere.

In Florida, there's what is often called a "Romeo and Juliet" law. Sex with an underage person is still considered a crime, but there's wide berth for prosecutors and judges. If the "victim" is between 14 and 17 and the "perpetrator" is within four years of the "victim's" age, then a judge can bar the sex offender status even if the defendant is convicted.

In Missouri, it is a lesser crime if the two are close in age, even if only one is a minor.

Arkansas, Florida, and some other states have a close-in-age exception for whether or not it is even a crime to have sex with a minor at all.

Lots of states in the US have outright exceptions or diminished crimes assigned to different age brackets. Anything not linked as a citation above and a whole lot more can be found at Wikipedia's "Ages of Consent in North America page, among other places.

Current laws in some states certainly do differentiate between the former and latter.

Georgia for one considers consensual sex for two people underage to be at most a misdemeanor with no need for registration as a sex offender. The ages for sexual consent range from 16 to 18 without parental consent and from 14 to 18 with parental consent across different US states. You should check your jurisdiction more specifically than just checking that website, but the laws of your jurisdiction are probably on the web somewhere.

In Florida, there's what is often called a "Romeo and Juliet" law. Sex with an underage person is still considered a crime, but there's wide berth for prosecutors and judges. If the "victim" is between 14 and 17 and the "perpetrator" is within four years of the "victim's" age, then a judge can bar the sex offender status even if the defendant is convicted.

In Missouri, it is a lesser crime if the two are close in age, even if only one is a minor.

Arkansas, Florida, and some other states have a close-in-age exception for whether or not it is even a crime to have sex with a minor at all.

Lots of states in the US have outright exceptions or diminished crimes assigned to different age brackets. Anything not linked as a citation above and a whole lot more can be found at Wikipedia's "Ages of Consent in North America page, among other places.

In no case have you ever seen "C#" written as "see sharp".

"In no case..."??

Of course I have. Thousands of times. Did you even look to see if what you are writing is true? Look at pretty much any musical discussion anywhere on the internet...

http://www.list-of-chords.com/

http://musiced.about.com/od/lessonsandtips/qt/minosclaes.htm

http://www.guitar-chords.org.uk/chords-key-b-flat-minor.html

http://www.ehow.com/how_5496374_play-adopted-cyclopedia-music-theory.html

http://www.8notes.com/guitar_chord_chart/ax.asp

Seriously, there is a _huge_ difference in symbolism.

And yet musicians the world over have accepted it as a suitable convenient ascii substitute for sharps to the point that # and b are accepted conventions when discussing music on the web.

Intentions only take you so far when you make an epic screw-up.

The only epic screw up here is insisting that it be called C-pound.

Cost of living, and therefore salary, varies WIDELY based upon location. In some areas in this country you would be very hard pressed to scrape by a living off of 40k while others you could live in a comfortable apartment and still be saving up enough to buy a house in a few years.

But across the board the cost of education has risen 4-6% versus 2% for inflation (Understanding Rising Costs of Education), and with skilled/degreed workers like any product, when the cost of production increases that cost is passed on to the consumer, in this case, employers.

From your numbers given a 2% inflation rate I assume you started work 15 years ago at $30,000 a year to come up with an adjusted salary of 40k. However, if you use the rate of inflation of 6% for the cost of education you get around 72k. Since education is a one time cost (unless you need to get further degrees to continue advancing) then a reasonable salary would be somewhere between those figures so 60K isn't unreasonable at all depending upon location and the supply/demand for graduates with the specific degree in question.

I had a motion sensing flight stick for my PC back in the mid 90s and this is even older. The Wii controller didn't introduce anything all that groundbreaking.

If the stuff you're pushing worked the way you say it would, the doctor would be recommending it.

However, as it turns out, the research on whether or not magnesium helps with high blood pressure is inconclusive; this article seems to have a reasonable layman's summary of what's going on. Therefore, the doctor cannot in good conscience recommend that the guy take magnesium pills, as they may or may not work (for the same reason why doctors can't prescribe placebos, despite their occasional effectiveness).

Furthermore, look at the "Should I take oral magnesium supplements" and "What are good dietary sources of magnesium" sections - dietary magnesium supplements just don't work, you need to get it as part of your food. What food contains magnesium? Healthy food. What part of the doctor's recommendation are you leaving out? A diet change. No doctor would just prescribe blood pressure pills without also including a dietary intervention, that's only treating the symptoms without treating the underlying problem. This is actually something alt-med people love to accuse doctors of, probably because everyone just hears "pills" but doesn't pay attention to the "and here's how you should improve your diet, and some exercises you can do" bit. Either you or your friend didn't pay attention to the part where the doctor recommended lifestyle changes, because he certainly did (and if he didn't, he is being remiss in his care).

So why recommend blood pressure pills in the first place, if the real treatment is going to be a change in diet and exercise? Because high blood pressure is a danger now, while diet and exercise will cure the problem later (if at all - to be quite honest, few people manage to make permanent healthy lifestyle changes. It's really sad, but that's the way it is). Ideally, your friend would start taking the blood pressure pills immediately, then start in on changing his diet and getting more exercise and eventually wean himself off the pills once his blood pressure gets to a normal level.

As for potassium bicarbonate, the Cigna page on it says that you should tell your doctor if you have high blood pressure and intend to take it, as there may be side effects. The only study on its effects that I could find was this one, which had positive results but was little more than a pilot study (14 people). Further research is needed before a doctor can really recommend supplementation with potassium bicarbonate (especially when just eating more fruits and vegetables already has a significant effect, which is probably why there's been little research in this area - there's no need to recommend expensive supplements when the patient can just eat better).

There is something I don't understand in your post, though: you say that taking these alternative supplements is good, because it deprives the pharmaceutical complex of years of income (despite the fact that ideally you'd stop taking the blood pressure pills at some point) - but as your alternative, you recommend taking magnesium and potassium bicarbonate supplements. Do those poof into existence from thin air? No, they're sold by the "supplemental" complex - and you're recommending giving them years of income for treating high blood pressure, despite (again) the fact that the real treatment lies in a lifestyle change. You're basically saying "don't buy stuff that we know works from those guys, buy stuff that may or may not work from these other guys".

I wonder who is treating the symptoms here, and not addressing the causes?

He's referring to this. You missed the memo...er, meme?

http://linux.about.com/od/commands/l/blcmdl1_curl.htm

Is your wife Spanish, by chance? Morcilla and Nocilla, typical Spanish cuisine :)

Not to mention Jeremy Bentham. Someone should bring this up at one of University College London's council meetings.

W

I found this history of hearing aids. http://deafness.about.com/gi/o.htm?zi=1/XJ&zTi=1&sdn=deafness&cdn=health&tm=8&f=00&su=p736.9.336.ip_&tt=2&bt=1&bts=1&zu=http%3A//beckerexhibits.wustl.edu/did/ The device in her hand is quite possible the "Electric Camera"

Um, there are a lot of quite successful selling breakfast cereals that are just fine as far as "healthy" goes. For example, Wheat Chex.

Sure, it's not uber-whole-grain-all-natural-extra-fiber, but there's nothing wrong with it. And, you can get store-brand equivalents that are cheaper and pretty much exactly the same.

one could even argue that fiscal responsibility is, itself, liberal by definition.

Which is why when liberals are in power deficits get smaller and when conservatives are in power they get much larger very fast.

http://uspolitics.about.com/od/thefederalbudget/ig/Political-Economic-Measures/Debt-GDP-by-President.htm

Making a promise to keep serious illegal and/or immoral information confidential is wrong. Breaking that promise is by far the "lessor of two evils".

In an case, the promise made to keep these classes of information confidential does not include a statement like "I promise to keep any war crimes committed by my country or its agents confidential".

The UCoMJ only requires you to obey lawful orders. Contrary to the thinking of many who don't like or don't know about the military, you can get in trouble for carrying out unlawful orders, like keeping war crimes secret. In fact, if you think there was a war crime committed, the moral and legal thing to do would be to report it to your superiors.

The problem in this case is that apparently Manning decided that an entire war was unlawful and gave to an outside entity all the classified documents pertaining to it on a network he had access to. Not just documents pertaining to a specific war crime. The "collateral murder" video in particular was in the folder of a JAG member, indicating it had already been reported as a possible war crime and the military was already in the process of investigating it. This is the procedure the military followed before deciding that the events in the Abu Ghraib prison constituted illegal abuse, reported it to the public, and court martialed almost a score of soldiers.

Manning (if it was him who released it) stepped way beyond his level of authority, and arguably moral responsibility, in releasing it. He had a role in the system, and it wasn't to act as judge and jury in deciding which information could/should be released. There was no moral quandary over war crimes since the most hotly debated incident to come forth from the leak was already under investigation as a war crime. If he felt the system was corrupt, then the proper avenue to change it would have been to work his way up high enough in the system so that he had the authority to implement those changes. Or failing that, to run for Congress and help pass laws to change it. Or as a risky and last recourse, releasing information specific to that war crime to the public. Not a whole-scale and unreviewed release of every classified document he could get his hands on.

Another problem is the overuse (even abuse) of the confidential classification system. A ton of stuff which clearly isn't and doesn't need to be classified, is, just to be on the safe side. A court needs to set some boundaries on what can and can't be classified. That way, requiring military personnel to classify stuff which clearly doesn't need it becomes an unlawful order, and service members further down the chain of command can legally refuse to overclassify documents.

> Only poor people pay taxes.

Back in 2000, Dick Cheney sold $35-million in Haliburton stock, and paid over *FOURTEEN MILLION DOLLARS* in taxes. In one year!

( Citation, MF: http://usgovinfo.about.com/library/weekly/aa041301a.htm )

Start a family tree at my generation. Count me, my wife, my three brothers and sisters-in-law, her sister and brother-in-law, my five cousins and their spouses, her seven cousins and their spouses, and all our parents and grandparents. Total all the income taxes we pay over the whole of our lives and it won't be $14-million.

First: Your comment demonstrates your character.

Second: People who actually know something about biology suspect a link between lacking certain bacteria in your gut and having some food allergies.

Some people are so allergic to peanuts that just smelling them can put them in anaphylactic shock.

It's not the smell.

Thanks,

It looks like the focus of the dispute is on his use of choke collars for aggressive dogs. There is a nice writeup here: http://vetmedicine.about.com/b/2009/07/07/veterinary-behaviorists-take-a-stand-against-cesar-millan.htm

Reading around the web, I see a lot of comments that his methods are outdated. On the other hand, I've used some of his methods with my dogs and there was a huge almost magical improvement. I think when he uses insight into the breed's needs that he is not doing bad things.

It does look like AHA and he patched things up this year.

Per wiki, In February 2010 the American Humane Association announced that, despite "sharp differences of view in the past" and some lingering areas of disagreement, it still shared a surprising number of areas of interest with Millan and invited him to participate in a symposium on humane dog training.[33]

I'll have to check out Dog Down.

Along with software rotation

http://compreviews.about.com/od/multimedia/ss/Dell2005FPWTour_7.htm

I live near to (formerly right next to) The Geysers, the most geothermally active spot on the planet.

You probably also still believe that the pizza around the corner really is the WORLDS BEST PIZZA!!! sure.

Once you travel outside your county, come visit the "Blue Lagoon Spa" in Iceland.
http://goscandinavia.about.com/od/thebluelagooniniceland/ss/bluelagoonphoto.htm

Last time i was there, we spent an amazingly relaxing afternoon soaking in - effectively - the runn-off of a geo-thermal power plant.
It's built out as a spa resort.
They sell the sludge as "skin care product" to visitors, and i'm sure you'll find some or it in a high end spa of your choice.

I guess it just depends on who's propaganda you listen to this morning.

The trouble is we now have to have a super majority in the senate to make any progress. That is an unreasonable demand.

Blame the Democrats for that one. They are the ones who created the current Senate rules, which allow for any Senator to place an "anonymous hold" on any bill and allowed for "painless filibustering" in which nobody has to actually stand and talk in order to sustain a filibuster.

When the Republicans were talking about undoing this rule - remember a few years back? - the Democrats screamed holy hell and so the Republicans caved. Which kind of seems to be a theme when the Republicans are in power...

The conservatives are blocking every bill (even tax cuts) in an effort to reinforce their campaign motto that government can't and shouldn't do anything.

The reason is simple: there is no compromise from the Democrats. "Compromise" requires that each side give somewhat to meet somewhere in the middle. Pelosi, controlling the floor of the house, hasn't allowed any contributions from the Republican side whatsoever. For one example, the famous "meeting" when Obama - after bills were already in committee - "met with" Republican leaders to "ask for their ideas" on health care? Not one thing from that meeting was even considered as an amendment to the bill that Pelosi put up for a vote.

You don't hand someone multiple thousands of pages that you wrote without their input, demand that they vote on it without even time to read and examine it, and then claim that they didn't "compromise" with you. It simply doesn't work that way.

The only real opposition is coming from right of center democrats because they're actually willing to eventually vote and can extract demands as a result. When you have no vote to offer then you don't have a bargaining position.

You have it backwards. Pelosi and her cronies are the ones who aren't compromising. Why should the Republicans vote for any bill that has a dozen poison pill attachments to it? Why, for that matter, should someone vote for it when their proffered amendments were either shot down or not even allowed a full floor vote?

Again - compromise has to come from both sides. The current House leadership, especially, doesn't compromise for shit, so it's no wonder that the Republicans are simply saying "why should we bother?"

In case that direct link redirects to the main page (it did for me), the html page that has a link to the PDF is here.

No, but it could be made to create indestructible ballet dancers.

Think of it. No more sprained ankles...no more broken toes...it would revolutionize the culture!

Yeah, but people will still be unable to agree which way her silhouette is spinning!

Found this location. No logins or accounts required.

Here: The Golden Book of Chemistry Experiments

When I was in the military it was not uncommon for airmen to be in limbo for months waiting for their TOP SECRET background investigations. That extra time was spent doing mandatory details, chores like buffing floors and polishing doorknobs, in addition to being the phase program's bitch. Think about that next time your swordfish fantasies get the best of you.

The GUI was actually invented by Dag Engelbart: http://inventors.about.com/library/weekly/aa081898.htm

Wasting a mod point to reply... Yes.

I have no issue giving the corporation the right to vote as an individual... One vote...
With the same limitations as to contributions an individual has. (one person) and prohibition of lobbying expenses over some trivial amount.

Corporations have "owned" politicians for ages. Thats what must end.

Here's what a "person" can contribute... Lobbying expenses perhaps should fall under these caps.
http://usgovinfo.about.com/od/thepoliticalsystem/a/contriblaws.htm

how much is "35 bullion"

Probably more than three Brazilian. (If you thought it was a typo for billion, see bulk precious metal.)

Actually, as either, you -can- make hundreds of dollars per hour. Most don't, though. Discussing what you can make is pointless. Find some statistics about how much the average person makes and that's a lot more meaningful.

it makes a lot of sense to look at the statistics. Like College Degree Nearly Doubles Annual Earnings Deciding something based on a few anecdotes is stupid. I know a couple of people who are very successful in spite of dropping out, but they did so because they saw an opportunity, not because they thought college was a mistake.

Are you that blind that you haven't heard of Gitmo? http://civilliberty.about.com/od/lawenforcementterrorism/tp/Boumediene-v-Bush.htm Yeah, the supreme court struck it down fairly quickly but note that a single vote in the opposite direction would have kept it.

Have you watched more than a couple episodes?

About 4 years running.

I think you're gonna need some serious evidence to back that up.

Sadly, most of Stewart's interviews don't make it to "transcript" and I don't own a copy of the Daily Show DVDs, or I would get plenty of examples for you (especially leading up to the presidential election last year). But I can at least give you an idea of what I'm talking about. Look here: http://therebeller.blogspot.com/2009/03/jon-stewart-pummels-jim-cramer.html

You'll see Cramer making a comment "We have 17 hours of live TV a day to do. But I--" and then Jon comes in and interrupts him with a gag "STEWART: Maybe you could cut down on that." followed by audience laughter and a Stewart segway into a particularly damning video where Cramer is then forced to backpedal to defend himself. Stewart only does it once in this particular interview, but with other guests I've seen this persist throughout the _entire_ dialogue. They're not allowed to get a coherent thought out and are instead constantly put on the defensive by being forced to address things that _Jon_ wants to speak about. For instance, when the guest brings up government spending and then Jon brings up the Iraq War and _aggressively_ pushes the subject to force the guest to talk about the war instead of the budget. Yet if a Dem is on and brings up spending, does Jon bring up the runaway Social Security budget? Or Medicare? Never.

Compare the tone and topic choice of the Cramer interview to...say the Kerry interview: http://politicalhumor.about.com/library/blkerrydailyshow.htm where Stewart <sarcasm>beats up on him</sarcasm> with such tough questions/issues as "Now how-- how are you holding up?" and "is it hard not to take it personally?" and "Are you the number one most liberal senator in the Senate? JOHN KERRY: No. JON STEWART: Okay." When he asks him if he's ever flip-flopped, where's the prepared video ready to embarrass him? Instead Jon plays the whole issue off as some kind of joke. Then he launches into attacking the Republicans again: " I don't know what compassionate conservative means. Does it mean cutting kids out of after-school programs? Does it mean drilling in the Arctic Wildlife Refuge? Does it mean sending kids to Iraq without body armor that's state of the art?"
etc etc
I hope you see my point -- guests he doesn't agree with he grills, ambushes, cuts off, and throws under the bus -- others that share his viewpoints he merrily converses with, tossing in anti-Republican jibes wherever he gets a chance.

With all the unadulterated crazy we see from the Tea Party people, and from Republicans trying to harness them, it's obviously going to be a prime target.

And that's the exact argument _always_ used to describe the imbalance of jibes in the Daily Show. And frankly, I think it's complete bullshit. BOTH sides have nutty individuals. For instance, where's all the unadultered crazy from the Green Party? During the "Gore fad" when global warming was a hot button issue, NONE of the loudmouthed loons from that movement got put on TV (it is _just_ as "cult like/extreme" as the Tea Party). And there's plenty of them. Heck, where's the Gore mockery? That guy is damn close to a total fruitcake -- even South Park mocks him.

In other examples, McCain shooting a buddy by accident in the woods gets a hell of alot more screentime and constant replay value than Obama's nutty childhood pastor (which is just as gag worthy), which got maybe 5 minutes of screen time and never mentioned again -- Edward's affair might get a few minutes of on-time gags before getting back to the usual staple ridicules of McCain's age or Bush's laugh or some other BS that. Democrat jabs

I don't think your ambulatory computers will ever be clever enough to figure out those situations.

Never say never. It's just a matter of time. Even if some situations are hard to automate, a large percentage of all driving hours (freeway driving, I would think) could be automated much more easily.

The motivation to reclaim driving time is huge. People spend / waste a fantastic amount of time driving. I couldn't find global figures, but apparently Americans spend over 100 hours per year commuting (not driving in total - just commuting); the total driving figure in Israel is 577 hours per year; and about 40% of mothers in the US spend over 2 hours per day driving. Then there are truck drivers and delivery workers whose annual total must be closer to a couple thousand hours per year (i.e. basically their whole life).

Dishwashing machines are very popular, and how much time do they actually save, 20 minutes per day? I can't think of anything the average person more, that could be automated as easily, as driving.

> Thomas Edison submits (his) last patent

You know better than to throw gauntlets down around here!

Just a side note, for other armchair historians: Between Edison's first patent (in 1868) and his last (1933), the number of patents handled by the US Patent Office increased by a full order of magnitude (x10). (ref)

Density is relative in the US.

Coasts are much higher density than fly-over. And there is a sparsity in Alaska that is almost mind boggling.

Hell, even here in California, we vary between Dense (LA, SF) to very rural (central farmland, mountain). Additionally the US is geographically the size of most of Europe

http://goeurope.about.com/od/europeanmaps/l/bl-country-size-comparison-map.htm

So, suffice it to say that comparing Europe to the US on many things is like comparing Apples to Pumpkins, we're not the same league.