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Your definition of government duties seems a little limited to me. Hmm, very traditionally, public health types have a lot of power to do "evil" by taking your liberty away if you have a dangerous contagious disease. I imagine they really just outsource to the cops and courts, but still. The phrase that comes to mind is "typhoid Mary". Ahh, but I really know little about the case, so I will go off and get a link, Here we go: http://history1900s.about.com/od/1900s/a/typhoidmary.htm. There seems to be a lot of google hits. It seems that the public health people were literally "after her" once she went on the run. So they did not do a complete outsource to the cops. But before we get silly defenses of your position, let us note from the cite information it is hard to call her "evil". So it is hard to be talking simple about a "choice of the lesser evil" in a personification basis.

Perhaps I am just stupid, What is your base definition of "evil" again? Perhaps it is not really very defensible, and a little ad hominem would make your definition of the duties of government suspect.

Except your wrong.
They are needed and have a use. Yes the courts have gone too far from time to time, but overall the are necessary.

You don't think there is IP issues in fashion? You're really clueless.

There are patent on making weave, making colors, copy right on names and brands, trademarks.

yeah, the end physical dress doesn't have Copyright or IP, be everything to get that dress made is.

If you bother to look it up, some cloths do get patent, like utility patents. You do know there is more then one kind of patent? and that different thing may apply differently? If not, STFU.

here si a link to get you started. They use small words so you should only have to look up a few of them:
http://inventors.about.com/b/2009/09/30/can-an-article-of-clothing-be-patented.htm

After that, you can go to http://www.uspto.gov/ to confirm the article I linked to. I know, not immediate and 100% trusting something you read is a new concept for you, but it's important you try to learn.

Why would a woman want a snake robot as a sex toy?

Perhaps it has something to do with gerbils?

I also noticed this: Always when I enter search terms in Google, I always get Google search results. Not a single time did I get results from Bing or Altavista. :-)

There have been tymes I googled something and got results from another search engine. For instance googling Monte Verde archaeology returns About's webpage on Monte Verde in 4th place. It used to be first place.

Falcon

Also, I have to comment on your link to Ian Welsh. Ian doesn't show that Obama is "conservative". He does show that Ian Welsh is an idiot to an amazing degree. At one point, he fantasizes about nationalizing the entire banking system. Aside from a remarkably callous disregard for the US and its people who would lose most of their wealth in the process, he completely, and I do mean completely, ignores the fact that Obama won't be the president for the rest of eternity. If we actually did this, that would mean someone else, maybe someone with funny ears, would have the tools to epically fuck up on a scale unrivaled in US history and they would proceed to do so. That's how bad the idea is.

Each episode is HEAVILY weighted to make fun of conservatives.

Give Comedy Central a break, conservatives write their own jokes. They have rallies where people show up with signs like "We don't want socialism you arrogant Kenyan." You don't even need to add anything to that for it to be funny.

http://politicalhumor.about.com/library/bl-tea-party-signs.htm

If liberals held rallies where people were acting like that then they would get made fun of also. They're getting made fun of not because they're conservative, but because they're stupid. It just happens to be conservatives doing most of the publicly stupid things these days.

Like any religion Buddhism has countless sects. I'm sure there are some sects, especially the sort that seem to be popular in Hollywood, that are more secular in nature. Just like there are sects of Christianity that are drastically different from the more common forms.

Exactly, so believing in gods is not one of the basic things that makes Buddhism Buddhism.

I wasn't going by Hollywood, while I was checking what I was saying about Buddhism and Atheism I was using this link: http://buddhism.about.com/od/basicbuddhistteachings/a/buddhaatheism.htm

It does say:

The many mythological creatures and beings that populate Mahayana Buddhism art and literature are often called "gods" or "deities." But, again, just believing in them is not the point.

Finding items around by date (especially when you only know the approximate date)

That's easy, in the search box type: "from:abc@example.com after:YYYY/MM/DD before:YYYY/MM/DD" (quotes not included) you can also use it with a whole bunch of other search options: http://email.about.com/od/gmailtips/qt/et_find_mail.htm - you certainly shouldn't 'lose' an email from gmail's archive if you know anything at all about it - Google is good at search.

FOUR at least. (Shoe-bomber, nigerian via dutch airline, car on times-sqaure, fort hood shooting)

Terrorism targets civilians. If all you kill are soldiers, it's an act of war, not an act of terrorism.
citation

(2) the term "terrorism" means premeditated, politically motivated violence perpetrated against noncombatant targets by subnational groups or clandestine agents

The people in the fourth plane tried that.

They succeeded. The plane didn't hit any buildings, now did it? The passengers that kept the plane from killing anyone not on the plane alive were heros.

Really? It sure doesn't look that way:

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

And this map doesn't even include Alaska...which is almost half the size of the US mainland.

Regardless, Europe (the continent) and USA (the country) are both approximately 3.8 million miles, or roughly the same.

Practice, hmm, 1500's, renegade jesuits?, pacific coast of south america, nice little totalitarian theocracy, sort of a God says this is what you do, not really a money economy, highly communal, worked pretty good until the Pope or someone noticed. Then the Spanish put some military in and hung the priests. Interesting economic experiment though.

Did not look real hard, but this seems to provide some context. Jesuits, but not always renegade, but too successful.

http://gosouthamerica.about.com/od/history/a/JesuitMissions.htm

You've obviously never worked tech support. Trying to walk a totally clueless user by phone through installing software can be a fricking nightmare! So yeah, while we can see in hindsight it was a bad idea, at least on CDs I could see why they did it. BTW for those that have to deal with clueless users by phone? Let you old pal Hairyfeet hook up up with Ninite which is a fricking Godsend. More than 90 of the most common apps, including Chrome, Firefox, Flash, Java, .NET, even free AV, and all you have to do is tell them which boxes to check and then run. That's it! Oh and for those working corp they have a pay version that sets those and any other apps you want on an on site server to save bandwidth.

And for those that still have XP boxes on their networks (which I would be switching to Windows 7 right about now, its better on security and really stable) allow me to give you the reg fix for disabling autorun. Ironically you can point an autorun.inf on a flash at it and use it to disable autorun on any PC it is plugged in to. But ultimately I'd say the problem with Windows, or any other OS for that matter, is still PEBKAC by far. Just look at how many clueless users would pick up a flash drive out of the parking lot and plug it into a PC in the office? Hell I still get one or two a week that fall for that fake Windows dialog box on websites. To quote the Gump "Stupid is as stupid does" and anyone that hasn't killed autorun at this point is nuts.

Or you could just, oh I don't know, copypasta this into a reg file and pas it around? Guys here like to bitch about Windows, but it is a hell of a lot easier just to cook up a reg file to do whatever you need than the 50 ways you have to deal with the same kinds of actions in Linux. For all the bitching about the reg it really is an easy way to manage multiple PCs, especially with being able to deal out changes with Group Policy.

Yes because Linux and Unix have never had any possible way to manage multiple workstations. Why, *nix admins were so stupid that they hand-configured hundreds of machines, sometimes staying up day and night for weeks until the job is done. Thank God that Microsoft came along and invented the registry, leading the masses of admins out of a profound Dark Age and into a realm of light and understanding. Before Microsoft did this there was simply no way at all, ever, not ever ever ever, nope not even possible, not nearly, nobody ever could have done it, no way at all whatsofreakin'ever to remotely manage multiple machines in Unix. True Microsoft innovation, I tell ya.

Look, please stop spreading FUD. You like Windows and think it's great? Good for you. Not my place to talk you out of something that works well for you. Show me the same respect by not commenting on Linux/Unix until you have the first clue about how they work. Honestly it just makes you look like an idiot.

Or you could just, oh I don't know, copypasta this into a reg file and pas it around? Guys here like to bitch about Windows, but it is a hell of a lot easier just to cook up a reg file to do whatever you need than the 50 ways you have to deal with the same kinds of actions in Linux. For all the bitching about the reg it really is an easy way to manage multiple PCs, especially with being able to deal out changes with Group Policy.

http://worldfilm.about.com/od/independentfilm/fr/wristcutters.htm are you talking about that one? It was actually a very good movie I enjoyed as well! or a older American one.... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boys_Don't_Cry_(film)

Absolutely fantastic movie to watch. Not like this no soul drivel we get from Hollywood.

I don't know why I'm bothering to argue with a AC Troll, but here it goes, just in case someone else has the same wrong-thinking.

"No, the materials already exist, they aren't being created. They are being manufactured or otherwise processed, they don't just pop into existence. "

From where, the drywall fairy? If you and 10,000 of your friends build new houses, that's 10,000 orders of drywall for an entire house some manufacture is going to get. Along with 10,000 toilets, 10,000 garage doors, 10,000... you get the idea.

"And the land isn't being "Used Up", it's being occupied. The former word indicates that it will be consumed- it won't, it'll just have a house sitting on it."

LOL that's too stupid to argue... yes, it's being "used up", the 100 acre park is now a subdivision, it's used up, while existing homes sit vacant. Maybe not in the "used up" sense in that energy is only converted, but that forest no longer exists, same as if I drank all the beer my girlfriend would say "You used up all the beer" (not really, this is /., girlfriends are a myth)

"No, not at all. Tearing down an old home and re-using the materials in a new one is like recycling. Buying a home is like having someone give you something, as opposed to destroying it and re-manufacturing the product."

Tear down and re-use what, the roof? The drywall? The floors? You just tore all that down, it's not being reused, it goes in a 30 yard dumpster and is hauled away to a landfill.

"Since the only thing that an old toilet will do in a landfill is sit there, it would be "worse" to continue to waste the extra 2 gallons of fresh water per flush."

Didn't you just contradict yourself? Yes, the toilet is sitting in a landfill, yours and the other 10,000 that people tossed because the new one uses 2 gallons less of water, water that can be completely reclaimed and turned into drinking water. That toilet just sits there forever.

You're thinking of Gridlock

That show (in general, and that episode in particular) are about as much proof of that assertion as something your cousin's friend's older brother said. Penn and Teller don't give you evidence, they insult things instead. (Check out their argument about subsidies. There are many pros and cons to be stated for such things, but they don't really do either. They give Teller a gun to rob Penn and then throw the cash around. Logic in action, Bullshit style!)

Seriously, I wanted to like this show, but it's total crap. It's entertainment rather than education. It's bullshit itself.

On the other hand, a quick Google search yielded this: http://environment.about.com/od/recycling/a/benefit_vs_cost.htm (and many other links). A balanced view. Recycling isn't always the answer and it's certainly not the only answer, but it's not bullshit, either.

Have you ever seen the pay scale for enlisted soldiers and sailors? Profiteering?

http://usmilitary.about.com/od/fy2010paycharts/a/basicpayenl.htm

Alright - I'll be honest - the pay is a little higher than I thought it was. But, bear in mind that you are looking at before taxes. When Uncle takes his bite, those figures will drop some. Still - profiteering?

If Ricky Recruit only eats on base, never parties, and doesn't go on any dates, he can save up enough money to pay for a new car at the end of his enlistment. If that is profiteering, well - I'm all for profiteers. Now, we need a new name for those people and corporations that make millions, billions, and trillions off of bloodshed.

Yep. Also important to consider is that many cars have knock sensors and don't need higher octane fuel. Here's a good article that talks more about it.

Yeah

5)Interest rates -- Up to 90 days, same as cash (use your imagination)

4)Insurance Coverage -- Up to $100,000 coverage in case of an accident, Variable-rate deductible as low as $1000.

3)Cell phone data -- Up to 2GB of data per month included (some months, you only get 100K and have to pay 0.1 cents per Kilobyte (= $0.10/Kilobyte ) for more

2)Gas Stations -- fuel additive concentrations -- Up to 90% unleaded fuel (some days, the gas will be 100% additives, but you'll never find out anyways)

1)State lottery jackpots -- "Jackpot: up to $1,000,000" -- (Some jackpot winners who got the numbers right may found they have only one $1.)

There are a lot more cars consuming more fuel than the whisky industry will be able to service.

Even a couple percentage delta in demand for fuel might impact the price dramatically due to inelastic demand: "That is, a 10% hike in the price of gasoline lowers quantity demanded by 2.6%. In the long-run (defined as longer than 1 year), the price elasticity of demand is -0.58; a 10% hike in gasoline causes quantity demanded to decline by 5.8% in the long run." I suppose whether the reverse is true - a 5.8% decrease in demand is necessary to decrease prices by 10% in the long run - depends on how efficient you believe the market for gasoline to be. But there's no good reason to believe decreasing demand by 1% would equal only 1% reduction in price.

"So, what kind of rock should I get? Granite? Sandstone? And which quarry should I get it from? I was thinking that granite would last longer but sandstone would ride nicer and would be easier to lob at a dinosaur in case of attack."

Wheels made from rocks are quite a demanding application. Most rocks are very strong under compression (e.g., in a building or wall), but many are relatively weak under tension with low elastic strength, and therefore they will break relatively easily when a wheel is sheared laterally, such as when rounding a turn (due to forces acting perpendicular to the direction of travel). A way to mitigate this is to make the wheel rather thick, but the disadvantages (weight) are obvious.

Granite is probably a better choice than sandstone because most sandstones have individual grains that are in contact only over a small part of their area, with the spaces in between cemented together by other minerals that are often quite soft (e.g., calcite). Worse, many sandstones don't have those spaces fully infilled (i.e. the sandstones are porous), which does increase their elastic modulus, but makes the material more prone to surface wear (it's easier to rub the mineral grains off the surface -- and it's even worse if water freezes in your neighborhood). Cracks tend to propagate easily in sandstones. By contrast granite and other intrusive igneous rocks are comprised of mineral grains that grew together as the molten rock crystallized and therefore the grains interlock quite tightly with virtually no open spaces between them (i.e. they are holocrystalline and often equigranular). A downside, however, is that some of the more common minerals in many granites (e.g., feldspars and micas) have good mineral cleavage (it's not what you think, it's planes of weakness in the crystal structure), and the more coarse-grained granites therefore tend to break more easily (because the cracks propagate along the relatively large, weaker cleavage planes in the large grains). One way around this is to look for a granite with less of the minerals that have cleavage (i.e. less feldspar and mica) and more of the minerals that don't (e.g., quartz), and to choose a granite that is as fine-grained as possible (then the random orientation of the cleavage planes from grain to grain will mean the cracks can't propagate as far along them before bumping into a grain boundary). As a bonus, quartz has a greater hardness than feldspar or mica, so frictional wear will be reduced too. Therefore, a nice, fine-grained quartz-rich granite (ideally a quartzolite, but they are quite rare) is probably your best granite option. A fine-grained, non-vesicular mafic igneous rock, such as a basalt or diabase/dolerite, might work well too, although they have higher density and don't have significant quartz (but the very small grainsize partly offsets this).

But why limit yourself to granite or sandstone? You can get

The Prius has a 8 year/100,000 mile warranty on the battery and hybrid systems and the replacement cost of the batteries is $3000.

Actually, teledildonic products have continously been brought to market. Of course Fuck-U-Fuck-Me, will always have a place in my heart, just because of the punny name.

It did. Which is a big reason why it could only apply "within any State or designated part of a State, the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States". Even confederate territory Union forces occupied on and after 1/1/1863 were at first exempt from the proclamation.

The legal theory that government can dictate in all ways how you use your property simply because the government provides permission allowing you to engage in commerce should cause concern for any libertarian.

Check out cnn, fox, msnbc, boing, consumerist, the times, etc. Now check out the BBC, slayradio, or other english sites outside of the US. SINGLE_FUCKEN_SPACED after all punctuation.

I can forgive bad grammar, crappy spelling, 3133 $p34k, u/r/ur/yer/lol and other chat speak, but double spacing makes me want to slap someones fro and scream "SINGLE SPACE YOU FUCKEN NOOB".

http://desktoppub.about.com/cs/typespacing/a/onetwospaces.htm

The pro's use single space, and you should too.

As I understand it when you clean the coins it removes most of the collector value. If you do clean them, there is a certain way to do it. I just used the eraser on a number 2 pencil and rubbed until it was shiny. Who knows, maybe I'm still mistaken and I didn't do all that bad a thing.
http://coins.about.com/od/caringforcoins/ht/cleancoins.htm

Nope, I don't think you're imagining things. I didn't realize it myself until this article appeared and I came across your comment.

I've done some web design, and so here's my basic <theory> below, typed as a stream of consciousness. As for making something look "Japanese", I think it's a result of various things:

Rounded Corners:
I don't these are strictly Japanese (see Slashdot's header, Southwest Airlines, Expedia, BBC (UK), Virgin Group (UK)). Though, rounded corners have made websites nicer to look at (not rigid - don't round/curvy things make people generally happy? Interpret as you wish.)

Pastel color scheme presence:
This may be a Japanese thing - all the non-Japanese sites I mentioned above generally employ primary colors. Two interesting US-based website examples are: Sprinkles Cupcakes and Pinkberry Frozen Yogurt. Both sites use lighter, non-primary colors and those color shades and combinations give me a sense of "fun" instead of "corporate". Note, though, that the different color shades aren't necessarily pastel-like in my opinion. One US-based website that uses something very close to pastel colors is Martha Stewart Omnimedia. We'll have to bring in a color expert to state whether Martha's colors are truly pastel.

At any rate, I think that only certain companies can satisfactorily use pastels in the US, and that would be companies dealing with fun food (cupcakes, frozen yogurt, etc) and hobbyist home decor arts/crafts. I think this is part to how I (and maybe you) without a Japanese background/surrounding/etc interpret colors and, as part of our respective cultures, have an understanding of what those colors represent. See this Visual Color Symbolism Chart by Culture and Color Symbolism Chart by Culture for a basic review. As noted in these two charts, "Green" in the US can mean money and trees and other things, but in China green hats mean a man's wife is cheating on him. One color, vastly different meanings! More information on "green" as a color: http://desktoppub.about.com/cs/colorselection/p/green.htm.

High-Context (Japanese) v. Low-Context (N. American, German-Speaking, etc) Cultures:
I came across this article while looking up cultureal color perception in Japan: Elizabeth Würtz's 2005 analysis titled: "A Cross-Cultural Analysis of Websites from High-Context Cultures and Low-Context Cultures". In this study, she noted that Japan is a high-context (HC) culture, whereas North America (and German-speaking countries even moreso) are low-context (LC) cultures:

Face-to-face communication in HC cultures is thus characterized by an extensive use of non-verbal strategies for conveying meanings. These strategies usually take the shape of behavioral language, such as gestures, body language, silence, proximity and symbolic behavior, while conversation in LC cultures tends to be less physically animated, with the meaning depending on content and the spoken word.

What was interesting to read were two of her conclusions regarding animation and presentation of individuals+products on websites:

Animation:
Tendency in HC Cultures: High use of animation, especially in connection with images of moving people.
Tendency in LC Cultures: Lower use of

Nope, I don't think you're imagining things. I didn't realize it myself until this article appeared and I came across your comment.

I've done some web design, and so here's my basic <theory> below, typed as a stream of consciousness. As for making something look "Japanese", I think it's a result of various things:

Rounded Corners:
I don't these are strictly Japanese (see Slashdot's header, Southwest Airlines, Expedia, BBC (UK), Virgin Group (UK)). Though, rounded corners have made websites nicer to look at (not rigid - don't round/curvy things make people generally happy? Interpret as you wish.)

Pastel color scheme presence:
This may be a Japanese thing - all the non-Japanese sites I mentioned above generally employ primary colors. Two interesting US-based website examples are: Sprinkles Cupcakes and Pinkberry Frozen Yogurt. Both sites use lighter, non-primary colors and those color shades and combinations give me a sense of "fun" instead of "corporate". Note, though, that the different color shades aren't necessarily pastel-like in my opinion. One US-based website that uses something very close to pastel colors is Martha Stewart Omnimedia. We'll have to bring in a color expert to state whether Martha's colors are truly pastel.

At any rate, I think that only certain companies can satisfactorily use pastels in the US, and that would be companies dealing with fun food (cupcakes, frozen yogurt, etc) and hobbyist home decor arts/crafts. I think this is part to how I (and maybe you) without a Japanese background/surrounding/etc interpret colors and, as part of our respective cultures, have an understanding of what those colors represent. See this Visual Color Symbolism Chart by Culture and Color Symbolism Chart by Culture for a basic review. As noted in these two charts, "Green" in the US can mean money and trees and other things, but in China green hats mean a man's wife is cheating on him. One color, vastly different meanings! More information on "green" as a color: http://desktoppub.about.com/cs/colorselection/p/green.htm.

High-Context (Japanese) v. Low-Context (N. American, German-Speaking, etc) Cultures:
I came across this article while looking up cultureal color perception in Japan: Elizabeth Würtz's 2005 analysis titled: "A Cross-Cultural Analysis of Websites from High-Context Cultures and Low-Context Cultures". In this study, she noted that Japan is a high-context (HC) culture, whereas North America (and German-speaking countries even moreso) are low-context (LC) cultures:

Face-to-face communication in HC cultures is thus characterized by an extensive use of non-verbal strategies for conveying meanings. These strategies usually take the shape of behavioral language, such as gestures, body language, silence, proximity and symbolic behavior, while conversation in LC cultures tends to be less physically animated, with the meaning depending on content and the spoken word.

What was interesting to read were two of her conclusions regarding animation and presentation of individuals+products on websites:

Animation:
Tendency in HC Cultures: High use of animation, especially in connection with images of moving people.
Tendency in LC Cultures: Lower use of

Nope, I don't think you're imagining things. I didn't realize it myself until this article appeared and I came across your comment.

I've done some web design, and so here's my basic <theory> below, typed as a stream of consciousness. As for making something look "Japanese", I think it's a result of various things:

Rounded Corners:
I don't these are strictly Japanese (see Slashdot's header, Southwest Airlines, Expedia, BBC (UK), Virgin Group (UK)). Though, rounded corners have made websites nicer to look at (not rigid - don't round/curvy things make people generally happy? Interpret as you wish.)

Pastel color scheme presence:
This may be a Japanese thing - all the non-Japanese sites I mentioned above generally employ primary colors. Two interesting US-based website examples are: Sprinkles Cupcakes and Pinkberry Frozen Yogurt. Both sites use lighter, non-primary colors and those color shades and combinations give me a sense of "fun" instead of "corporate". Note, though, that the different color shades aren't necessarily pastel-like in my opinion. One US-based website that uses something very close to pastel colors is Martha Stewart Omnimedia. We'll have to bring in a color expert to state whether Martha's colors are truly pastel.

At any rate, I think that only certain companies can satisfactorily use pastels in the US, and that would be companies dealing with fun food (cupcakes, frozen yogurt, etc) and hobbyist home decor arts/crafts. I think this is part to how I (and maybe you) without a Japanese background/surrounding/etc interpret colors and, as part of our respective cultures, have an understanding of what those colors represent. See this Visual Color Symbolism Chart by Culture and Color Symbolism Chart by Culture for a basic review. As noted in these two charts, "Green" in the US can mean money and trees and other things, but in China green hats mean a man's wife is cheating on him. One color, vastly different meanings! More information on "green" as a color: http://desktoppub.about.com/cs/colorselection/p/green.htm.

High-Context (Japanese) v. Low-Context (N. American, German-Speaking, etc) Cultures:
I came across this article while looking up cultureal color perception in Japan: Elizabeth Würtz's 2005 analysis titled: "A Cross-Cultural Analysis of Websites from High-Context Cultures and Low-Context Cultures". In this study, she noted that Japan is a high-context (HC) culture, whereas North America (and German-speaking countries even moreso) are low-context (LC) cultures:

Face-to-face communication in HC cultures is thus characterized by an extensive use of non-verbal strategies for conveying meanings. These strategies usually take the shape of behavioral language, such as gestures, body language, silence, proximity and symbolic behavior, while conversation in LC cultures tends to be less physically animated, with the meaning depending on content and the spoken word.

What was interesting to read were two of her conclusions regarding animation and presentation of individuals+products on websites:

Animation:
Tendency in HC Cultures: High use of animation, especially in connection with images of moving people.
Tendency in LC Cultures: Lower use of

And the toilet has a dozen buttons and two knows to adjust seat and water temperature.

YMMV depending on where you go, but I only saw toilets with washlets in hotels and in the restrooms of few restaurants. Most that I saw were as simple as the standard U.S. model, expect for having "small" and "large" flush options -- a brilliant, simple idea that we should all adopt. And you will still find the simple squat type in many places. (Learn how to use 'em, and learn the kanji for "man" and "woman", and you'll be much better equipped for a trip to smaller towns or the countryside, where you won't find Western toilets or the standard international graphics at the restrooms.)

"Alpha children wear grey. They work much harder than we do, because they're so frightfully clever. I'm awfully glad I'm a Beta, because I don't work so hard. And then we are much better than the Gammas and Deltas. Gammas are stupid. They all wear green, and Delta children wear khaki. Oh no, I don't want to play with Delta children. And Epsilons are still worse. They're too stupid to be able to read or write. Besides they wear black, which is such a beastly color. I'm so glad I'm a Beta."

- Aldous Huxley, Brave New World, Ch. 2 (quotes)

Google gave out Nexus Ones to their employees. http://gps.about.com/b/2009/12/12/prototype-google-phone-released-to-employees-gps-features.htm

Things never change at Slashdot. The summary is needlessly incendiary and posters just jump the shark on the strawman without regards to reality. Or maybe it's karma whoring for mod points, but it usually works on here.

Apple supplies iPhones to employees and Google did the same with Nexus one:

http://googlemobile.blogspot.com/2009/12/android-dogfood-diet-for-holidays.html
http://gps.about.com/b/2009/12/12/prototype-google-phone-released-to-employees-gps-features.htm

And who the hell talked about "success" in giving phones to employees and where did you get the news about job reviews and employees being forced to give up iPhones?

Wikipedia is hardly a citation, you could have added before linking! The other is an anti-drug site making unsupported assertions. Hardly an unbiased source.

Here is a study:

http://www.springerlink.com/content/n645363732641104/

Summary, users with no previous usage experience did experience reduced reaction time on the first experience. Afterward they showed no reduction in reaction time. Users with previous experience showed no difference in reaction time whether using marijuana or not.

"(1 bong can intoxicate an individual as much as 100 ml of hard liquor in one go, plus marijuana intoxication is much faster)"

Yeah, but a bong isn't a single dose it is more like 5-10 (sizes aren't standardized). That is why they have one hitters. In an experienced smoker with tolerance a single hitter of even the most potent material isn't enough to feel a buzz.

Even so, I agree there is a smaller 'safe zone.' But the increased intoxication speed (near instant) allows for more easily controlled dosing. You can tell before the next puff how the last puff impacted you. In contrast, if you are doing shots you won't feel shot one until after drinking shot three!

Some more studies:

http://www.nature.com/npp/journal/v25/n5/full/1395716a.html

"Although marijuana significantly increased the number of premature responses and the time participants required to complete several tasks, it had no effect on accuracy on measures of cognitive flexibility, mental calculation, and reasoning. Additionally, heart rate and several subjective-effect ratings (e.g., "Good Drug Effect," "High," "Mellow") were significantly increased in a Delta9-THC concentration-dependent manner. These data demonstrate that acute marijuana smoking produced minimal effects on complex cognitive task performance in experienced marijuana users."

http://www.druglibrary.org/schaffer/misc/driving/s1p2.htm

Increased doses cause drivers to sit more upright and caused slightly decreased car following ability. However, in actual road test in a dense urban environment alcohol caused impairment relative to placebo, marijuana cause no impairment... but subjects thought it had.

http://alcoholism.about.com/cs/pot/a/blucsd030628.htm

This article refers to a peer reviewed long term study (sorry don't have the study itself) which finds there is NO permanent brain damage caused by marijuana use.

I don't have a handy study with regard to motor skill, only extensive anecdotal evidence. I've yet to see anyone significantly impaired with alcohol who didn't stumble and sway. I've never seen anyone on any dose of marijuana either sway or stumble. Believe me, I've seen and experienced VERY heavy doses of marijuana.

The only bright side to all this is that Irish babies are, in fact, delicious.

Psst! Secret is to marinate them in Guinness. ...follow the link, I'm not entirely kidding, either.

You can marry your first cousin in several states . Genetically speaking, it doesn't seem to be a problem.

Age of consent in NC is 18, 16 with parental permission . Younger than that can be licensed for reasons of pregnancy. This looks fairly standard amongst most states.

At least we respect freedom of religion in this country

But not freedom from religion.

Oh, and let's also ignore the Fort Hood shootings

Violence against military personnel is not terrorism, it is an act of war. If you're afraid of being shot at, don't join the military, wimp (yes, I am a veteran). Had those shootings been against civilians they would have been. U.S. Department of Defense Definition of Terrorism:

The calculated use of unlawful violence or threat of unlawful violence to inculcate fear; intended to coerce or to intimidate governments or societies in the pursuit of goals that are generally political, religious, or ideological.

United States Law Code - the law that governs the entire country - contains a definition of terrorism embedded in its requirement that Annual Country reports on Terrorism be submitted by the Secretary of State to Congress every year. (From U.S. Code Title 22, Ch.38, Para. 2656f(d)

(d) Definitions
As used in this section--
(1) the term "international terrorism" means terrorism involving citizens or the territory of more than 1 country;
(2) the term "terrorism" means premeditated, politically motivated violence perpetrated against noncombatant targets by subnational groups or clandestine agents;
(3) the term "terrorist group" means any group, or which has significant subgroups which practice, international terrorism;
(4) the terms "territory" and "territory of the country" mean the land, waters, and airspace of the country; and
(5) the terms "terrorist sanctuary" and "sanctuary" mean an area in the territory of the country--
(A) that is used by a terrorist or terrorist organization--
(i) to carry out terrorist activities, including training, fundraising, financing, and recruitment; or
(ii) as a transit point; and
(B) the government of which expressly consents to, or with knowledge, allows, tolerates, or disregards such use of its territory and is not subject to a determination under--
(i) section 2405(j)(1)(A) of the Appendix to title 50;
(ii) section 2371 (a) of this title; or
(iii) section 2780 (d) of this title.

The Fort Hood shootings were a single nutcase, not unlike the Columbine shootings, or your garden variety USPS shootings. Webster's says "The systematic use of terror especially as a means of coercion". The Ft Hood shooter wasn't trying to coerce anyone into doing anything.

Wikipedia says "At present, the International community has been unable to formulate a universally agreed, legally binding, criminal law definition of terrorism.[2][3] Common definitions of terrorism refer only to those violent acts which are intended to create fear (terror), are perpetrated for an ideological goal, and deliberately target or disregard the safety of non-combatants (civilians)."

Princeton University says "the calculated use of violence (or the threat of violence) against civilians in order to attain goals that are political or religious or ideological in nature; this is done through intimidation or coercion or instilling fear"

So yes, we can discount the Ft Hood shootings. Oh, and by the way, drug use and copyright infringement aren't terrorism either, despite the fat that drug use and copyright infringement scare the hell out of some people.

does anyone have numbers about safe roaming distance ? my guess is it's ever-increasing, as is parental hysteria over danger.

from : http://pediatrics.about.com/od/childabuse/a/05_abuse_stats.htm

"Although the incidence of child abuse and neglect has been decreasing in recent years, more than 1.25 million, or 1 in every 58 children in the United States, were abused in 2006."

Designers win, because they use one design (compliant, too!), for all browsers. Users win, because everyone sees the same design/version/look.

Best yet, when you pile on a library that fixes CSS3 (this article), and one to fix the CSS box model ( http://webdesign.about.com/od/css/a/aaboxmodelhack.htm ), and then another to fix the png transparency issue ( http://code.google.com/p/ie7-js/ ), and another to add canvas support ( http://excanvas.sourceforge.net/ ), and another ...

Then you explain that everyone will see the same design (yay!), and people using older browsers will experience a VERY SLOW page load. That is why they should upgrade to a more up to date browser.

This reminds me of that story from a couple years ago where news media reported that kids were getting high on human feces. Jenkem

No, you're exactly wrong. He has never said this. He did destroy CNN's Crossfire by http://politicalhumor.about.com/library/bljonstewartcrossfire.htmblasting them for partisan hackery and shrugging off any bias he may have with, "You're on CNN. The show that leads into me is puppets making crank phone calls."

He is sometimes taken as a serious journalist because he asks questions that others are afraid to ask. He doesn't care about getting these people back; they think they can go in and handle the clown. He is whip smart. But he never, ever says, "I'm just being objective here." Unless, of course, he is being clearly biased and mocking someone else who is being clearly biased and lying about facts. Is he partisan? I think he'd say he is, a bit, but he doesn't let liberals off scott free. It's just that the conservative hate machine has an entire network devoted to bullshit and the liberals have "mainstream media," which can't do a story about the Earth being a globe without digging up a flat-earther somewhere. (Two sides to every story is a double-edged sword.) So that gives Stewart and crew a lot to work with.

Someone else pointed out that waste water isn't evenly distributed throughout the waters so it could still be a localized problem, but another problem is that Fluoxetine isn't the only drug that increases serotonin. See http://panicdisorder.about.com/od/treatments/a/ssmeds.htm . If the problem is serotonin level increases, then it's not unreasonable to assume that many of the other drugs listed also would cause problems for shrimpkind. A more general point too is that we don't really understand the effects of the stuff we dump into the ecosystem, which is an issue b/c you don't necessarily need to take down X number of species to seriously hurt an ecosystem. Disrupting a few key bottom of the food chain animals could cause huge shake ups all the way up on the chain.

Educate yourself with something like http://musicians.about.com/od/musiccontracts/bb/producercontract.htm

Then get a lawyer to go over the contract. They only "still own the royalties" if you assigned them all rights. Keep your rights but assign them one time plus compilation rights but keep others and specify your desired pay-off rate. If they don't go for it, take the contact as you want it worded to other producers until you find one that will take it.

Or do it yourself. There are not only self-producing musicians online, there are self-producing bands that are also online collaborations. They can live on different continents and never meet. Music production has left the building and gone to everyone's homes. The MafIAA was the first against the wall when the revolution came, but they were too brain dead to realize it.

Sigh. Do I have to explain this in small words?

It says it right there in the bit you quoted: marriage is an institution designed to build families. Just because a couple doesn't plan on building a family doesn't mean that they shouldn't be encouraged to do so.

Now I already know where this is going to go. You're going to suggest that gay couples can have children via adoption or other means.

So any heterosexual person that is unable to have children (say the man had testicular cancer and now can't get her pregnant) should not be allow to marry? Same level of reproduction as a homosexual couple.

Well, that's nice, but studies have conclusively proven that children do best in stable, nuclear families. We shouldn't be encouraging people to bring children up in bad situations.

Total hate mongering bullshit.

Which is why marriage, as an institution, is designed to help create stable family units that bring children up in the best manner possible.

Is it perfect? Of course not. But just because it isn't perfect doesn't mean we should make it demonstrably worse.

And yet for many families, marriage is an 'institution', just like a prison institution due to abusive parents that people demand must stay together 'for the children' which only makes it a horrible place to be for the children.

Sorry, you do not seem to know the first thing about homeschooling/unschooling based on any research or first hand experience. On what do you base such harsh opinions of two million or so homeschoolers in the USA? No doubt you could find some examples of what you say, same as I could find endless examples of school bullying (which is much more common), but are you suggesting the vast majority of homeschooled kids are suffering socialization problems? Are you suggesting that learning only to socialize with same age peers of roughly the same age and social class and one authoritarian teacher, trapped with no option but to return day after day, is your ideal of social skills learning, as opposed to learning to interact with people of all different ages in all different situations? If so, why are homeschoolers getting preferred admission to many colleges these days?

Just one of many starting points if you wish to break out of your schooling rut and really learn:
http://homeschooling.about.com/od/socialization/Socialization_How_to_deal_with_it.htm

Another place to start:
http://www.holtgws.com/teachyourown.html
"...I have used the words "homeschooling" to describe the process by which children grow and learn in the world without going, or going very much, to schools, because those words are familiar and quickly understood. But in one very important sense they are misleading. What is most important and valuable about the home as a base for children's growth into the world is not that it is a better school than the schools but that it isn't a school at all. It is not an artificial place, set up to make "learning" happen and in which nothing except "learning" ever happens. It is a natural, organic, central, fundamental human institution, one might easily and rightly say the foundation of all other institutions. We can imagine and indeed we have had human societies without schools, without factories, without libraries, museums, hospitals, roads, legislatures, courts, or any of the institutions which seem so indispensable and permanent a part of modern life. We might someday even choose, or be obliged, to live once again without some or all of these. But we cannot even imagine a society without homes, even if these should be no more than tents, or mud huts, or holes in the ground. What I am trying to say, in short, is that our chief educational problem is not to find a way to make homes more like schools. If anything, it is to make schools less like schools."

As to public school indoctrination, that is well documented here by NYS Teacher of the Year John Taylor Gatto:
"Underground History of American Education"
http://www.johntaylorgatto.com/underground/toc1.htm
Or here, also by Gatto:
http://www.worldtrans.org/whole/schoolteacher.txt

Are you too a prime example of schooling to lash out so fast with no research behind your points, convinced you are right because you were told by authorities in school that school was best for you?

Still, the fact is, up until recently I used to believe much of what you are saying here. So, don't feel too bad. But please at least try to learn a little more about educational alternatives and why the current schooling system we have is essentially broken beyond repair. Is this is the kind of socialization you are saying is better than children being around people who truly care for their emotional and intellectual growth and have the time to help with it?
"The War on Kids - Trailer"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nlnwm11d6II
Note the great socialization experience during the SWAT raid... Is that what

Alternatively, they could just claim to be catering to their stated directive about "reaching out to Muslims" and tell the not-so-honorable Senator from Utah "We don't do pork anymore as it might offend Muslims."

Well said

Yeah, but "75mT"? It's nice to see US Senators trying to get to grips with this new fangled metric system when they specify their pork, but 75 milli-Tonnes would be 75KG. Perhaps NASA should fax their designated rocket motor supplier in Utah some of its own blueprints for a surface to air missile and just get on with whatever it is that NASA actually wants to do, which might actually be something useful.

Alternatively, they could just claim to be catering to their stated directive about "reaching out to Muslims" and tell the not-so-honorable Senator from Utah "We don't do pork anymore as it might offend Muslims."