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At the time I thought it would be humorous to do my own IPO calld $2Bob.com*. There would be no business plan save that all of the money invested would be spent.

Somebody already did something like this this, in the South Sea buble of the 1700s. Scroll down for the famous business plan:

"The process of election affords a moral certainty, that the office of President will never fall to the lot of any man who is not in an eminent degree endowed with the requisite qualifications. Talents for low intrigue, and the little arts of popularity, may alone suffice to elevate a man to the first honors in a single State; but it will require other talents, and a different kind of merit, to establish him in the esteem and confidence of the whole Union." cite

Those Burly Finns where are they now?

Upon further review, it seems that the Doolittle raid is actually what prompted the Japanese to begin using the balloon bombs.

Learn something new every day. Thanks, Google!

~Philly

This way, Hamilton argued,

The process of election affords a moral certainty, that the office of President will never fall to the lot of any man who is not in an eminent degree endowed with the requisite qualifications. Talents for low intrigue, and the little arts of popularity, may alone suffice to elevate a man to the first honors in a single State; but it will require other talents, and a different kind of merit, to establish him in the esteem and confidence of the whole Union.

Fat chance, huh? Ever since we lurched into a two-party system, which was pretty much immediately after the Constitutional Convention called it a day, voters stopped voting for somebody's wisdom. Instead, they wound up voting for a political party. The Constitution never really prescribed how electors are supposed to be appointed, so the parties took it upon themselves to select electors with unusual degrees of loyalty.

Of course, the Japanese realized that sometimes you don't even need airplanes to bomb your enemies. (Okay, so the only documented casualties were from a curious family that found an undetonated bomb on the ground, but it's still kind of interesting)

He doesn't know what he's talking about.

1. Jobs did not quit- he was voted out of his own company, many saying he was too hard on his employees until 1997 when he returned to Apple as CEO
2. It is doubtful the tables will turn to Apple again. Ever heard of Linux?
3. Apple made lots of mistakes early on. They did not almost go out of business because Microsoft had a superior product.

Check out this article for further information.

You're forgetting that in the times of Ye Olde English, spelling itself wasn't really standardized yet.

I recently came upon a piece describing English spelling in brief. I don't agree with the sentiment that you should spell your English any way you want, though.

The Japanese did try something similar in World War II. They tried using paper balloons to carry incendiary bombs across the Pacific using the jet stream. Crazy idea, but a few bombs did get through.

Except the US didn't really have a gun culture when the revolution occurred. After the Civil War is when we got our first real taste of guns, because the Union had bought so many and supplied them to its troops (the first arms modern dealers). This is also the first time the US had widespread banditry, from the war veterans with guns and time but no economic opportunity.

Maybe if you read a book instead of American Rifleman once in a while you'd know this. And please don't equate gun ownership with free software. That pisses me off.

It's about who decides what is and is not appropriate. The whole idea of 'too violent' or 'indecent' is a continuum, and having the town hall, or the board of education, or the board of selectmen (who may attend the same church) make that decision becomes a problem. I hope you realize this.

If the line in the sand is drawn within your tolerance then it is a good law, but if that line is a few inches too far to the right, it's suddenly censorship and fascist. If it is too far left, then the law is permissive and lax. If there is a variance in the fairness of the law, depending on your personal view, then that law should be looked at closely.

Imagine a locale where the religiously influenced are the elected officials, and in accordance with their faith, they do not accept the idea of afterlife. Does Pac-Man suddenly become heretical, just because your mayor doesn't want kids to see ghosts on the video screen?

I know this is hyperbolic and extreme, but it is a good way to test the soundness of an ordinance. Walk the law from one extreme to the other, and see if it is continuous in its sensibility. If so, it's a decent law. If not, it's excessive and impinges on the rights of certain non-deviant members of your society. The responsibility of raising children belongs to the parents. If parents fail to do a good job, the Child Protective Services people step in. But who punishes the government for first taking that responsibility away from the parents and then failing to do the job right?

Do red pixels in Street Fighter or Mortal Kombat make the game too violent? If that's the only difference between those games and Clay Fighter, then you need to educate your kids about real vs fantasy, not sanction their access to video games.

Tyrants and deviant freaks come in many shapes and sizes. People throughout history have tried to force their ideals onto an otherwise free society. You would be suprised at the stuff Noah Webster did to the English language.

The fact that people approximately 2000 years ago decided to start a new count does not seem to me to be particularly important

(sigh) sorry to be pedantic, but the Gregorian calender wasn't invented until ~525A.D.

See this for the real skinny.

And incidentally, hen people refer to the next millennium, they are generally speaking of the third millennium, which, in fact, begins 2001. Sheesh, you're being more pedantic about this than I am. See this article by Douglas Adams to find out what happens to pedants.

--GnrcMan--