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This alarmism is based on an extrapolation of current conditions. Extrapolations 80 years into the future have a long history of looking laughably silly in hindsight.

The snow on Kilimanjaro was predicted to disappear by 2015 or thereabouts.

Of course, it actually didn't.

Science is all about forming hypotheses, then making falsifiable predictions.

What testable predictions do we have for Ethiopian coffee? What year will coffee be untenable as a crop?

Wait a couple of years and see if these predictions are correct - sounds like a valid test of climate change.

What's the problem with doing that?

(If you don't like waiting years, then let's look at previous testable predictions and see how well they held up. Anyone have a list of testable predictions?)

you ain't trying, and Patriots are 'trying hard' http://blog.masslive.com/patri...

As a general rule, people are most liberal when they're young, particularly in college. Those who don't go into academia or some other traditionally liberal profession tend to drift towards the center or become conservative as they age.

I agree that sometimes political correctness can get out of hand. LIke anything else, it's possible to take a good thing too far.

But I'm with the kids on taking on the kinds of issues most of us would shrug our shoulders at, but which are important symbols to their community.

Nobody is stopping people in the US from doing business with mega. Send an international money order. People do it all the time. And if you trust them so much, you can always send cash.

It's not so much trust in the business on the other end that keeps me from sending cash through the mail, it's all the people in the middle that are handling the cash-filled mail. The business has a huge incentive to not rip off their customers since a customer that doesn't get what he paid for will soon be an ex-customer.

http://www.masslive.com/news/i...
http://www.nydailynews.com/new...
http://www.wickedlocal.com/art...

If postal workers knew that every envelope addressed to Mega had cash in it, they'd be a huge theft target.

They just approved a 37% electricity rate increase here in Massachusetts... The utility companies will get their money until people can go off the grid completely: http://www.masslive.com/busine...

Why not a fish elevator? http://videos.masslive.com/rep...

Yup and there was a case of this in m8y state which was hilarious: http://www.masslive.com/news/i...

but a quick google search shows: https://www.google.com/search?...

Just on the first page of google we see similar incidents in Florida, New Jersey, DC.... ROTFL.

This is permission to close down, part of a deal on economic development funds. http://www.masslive.com/news/i...

the notion of protecting people from themselves is fundamentally flawed.

Yet traffic deaths are at a sixty year low despite a quadrupling of the number of cars and drivers. When common sense safeguards, such as seat belts, were first proposed, the auto industry made the same argument you are using here: "Our customers are stupid, and deserve what they get."

Unfortunately it became a legend for all of the wrong reasons. Billions of dollars have been sunk into it over the years and many lawsuits have been filed over it demise by vendors desperate to get out of it or force another vendor to stay in it.

http://www.eweek.com/servers/hp-to-seek-4-billion-in-damages-from-oracle-over-itanium/
http://news.cnet.com/Allies-pledge-10-billion-to-boost-Itanium/2100-1006_3-6031773.html
http://www.masslive.com/news/index.ssf/2013/09/hudson_intel_plant_closing_wil.html

Unfortunately sales never came close to the billions of dollars that have been sunk into it, and it has been that way for years:

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/02/28/itanium_04_sales/
http://www.wired.com/wiredenterprise/2012/02/hpearnings/
http://www.zdnet.com/photos/charts-mining-itanium/21115

I'm sure someone has a comparison of how much money has been invested compared to how much money has been made in sales. I might be mistaken, but from what I've been reading from the beginning Itanium has never come close to breaking even for hardware or software sales. Certainly companies like HP and Oracle spent millions of dollars on their lawsuit trying to get out Itanium.

Itanium has always been nothing more than a desperate multi-billion dollar effort to break free from the chains of x86.

In light of the importance of this project, the thing is cheap at 600 million

Cheap? You can start an entire company for that amount! Here's what $600 million could buy (from the last Powerball drawing):

$600 million.

For those of you who think people should be forced to give up their money to the "poor unfortunates", here's what $600 million can buy.

For those technologically inclined, you could have bought your own fiber optic network provider.

$600 million for a lousy web page is not cheap.

Most robberies are morons who watched too many films and thought it was that easy.

Unfortunately it is in fact pretty easy. Probably easier in the US than in the UK. (small fish, bigger pond). But the take is much smaller.

With 20% chance of getting caught (in the UIK), and only two robberies needed per year to make a living wage, it would seem that anyone taking half a year to plan a job would stand nearly zero percent chance of getting caught, and would be able to time it such that their average take would be substantially higher than 19k. Parlay your experience into one robbery per calendar quarter and you might be able to live fairly well, as long as you move around the country.

In the US, oddly, the take per robbery is much smaller than the 19K mentioned in the British study. The average haul, $7,732 in 2009 and $7,663 in 2010.

Further, the chance of getting caught is much higher in the US. In fact, the clearance rate for bank robbery is among the highest of all crimes—nearly 60 percent.

However, it also appears that in the US only in 22% of cases is there actually any money recovered (see first link). This suggests that every robber they catch "clears" multiple bank robberies, but only after significant amounts of money is spent, which implies the average robber may well get away with it for some time before getting sloppy enough to get caught.

A lot of interesting info is at the Center for Problem Oriented Policing site: http://www.popcenter.org/problems/robbery_banks/print/

There were 243 million CFL's sold in the US in 2009. And there were 34 reports of smoke, and 4 reports of fire in a US consumer product safety database from March 2011 through December of 2011 (see this article for more information). Seems like a pretty safe product to me.

In terms of your supposition that CFL's actually cost more than incandecents? Here is a study that says no, In terms of the ACEEE.org study, I can't find specifics (unless you are talking about the 2006 study, which is hopelessly out of date). But electric cars top the ACEEE.org list of cleanest cars this year.

You know why Apple is winning the tablet and phone market? Here's a hint:

Um, what?

Here's a hint for you. For every iPhone sold, two Android devices are sold.

Tablet sales? iPad is outselling Android tablets. One would hope so, given how new Android tablets are, and given ICS, the first real tablet release of Android literally just came out.

But can you honestly expect such a closed, limited proprietary OS to compete long-term against one that's open source, free, and available to tens or hundreds of manufacturers?

If apple doesn't change their policies on IOS, it will be relegated to the same space as OSX - a nieche market for consumers with lots of money, and very specific tasks.

Don't get me wrong; I hope Apple opens up, if for no other reason than the market needs healthy competition. But to say Apple is winning the battle is laughable.

If you want better cops, you need to pay better salaries to attract more qualified people and pay for more training.

I think police are making enough already. Average earnings of Troop E, Massachusetts State Police: $149,666.61. This doesn't include their health insurance, life insurance, long term disability, and pensions they receive forever, even while working another job. http://www.masslive.com/news/index.ssf/2009/05/mass_pike_detail_seen_as_road.html

There is also this bit:

PopCap Games, the Seattle maker of Bejeweled Blitz, is funding the research with a $10,000 grant.

And not so long ago there has been a similar study into the Brain Age games, which basically showed that playing Brain Age makes you better at playing Brain Age, but doesn't really transfer into other areas.

Looking over the abstracts of some of Dr. Whitbourne's recently published works, it looks like Dr. Whitbourne's group is developing the hypothesis that how a person feels about aging has an impact on their psychological well-being. This might seem obvious, but put in plain language, do old people get depressed because aging causes depression, or do old people get depressed because they have a negative attitude about aging? It's actually not an obvious question. With that in mind, knowing how older adults feel about their cognitive abilities after playing games is of value.

TFA mentions the study is ongoing. A different article about the study indicates the researchers will also have participants take objective tests of cognitive abilities, so the research isn't only looking at subjective self-report.

"He'll win, easily."

Would you care to place a substantial wager on that outcome ?

"Kiss The Shiny, Shiny Boots Of Leather" is a Lou Reed song, not a State mandate for civilian interaction with the police.

"Cops don't get fired for beating and killing peons like you and me."
Well, except when they do.

Jeffrey Asher, the cop who beat him, was in fact fired. For beating Mr. Jones. (Not KILLING him, but what's a little hyperbole when you're outraged?)

This is a cop who was standing by and didn't stop it, who is pursuing charges against the videographer.

In any case, the video is here.
http://videos.masslive.com/republican/2010/01/uncut_video_arrest_of_melvin_j.html

Let me be abundantly clear:
- I think MA's wiretapping law is stupid. That's the problem here.
- I think the police used excessive force in that video (insofar as I can tell what was happening. Mr Jones tried to flee officers, but that doesn't justify the beatdown he got). Asher is clearly a racist (looking at his history), and should lose his retirement pension, if not face prosecution. The police should not be above the law, but I DO believe that they are entitled to the benefit of the doubt.
- I think Mr Jones is a scum-sucking, bottom-feeding, habitual criminal who could be thrown into a wood-chipper and the world wouldn't miss him. Mr. Jones, who was being arrested for selling crack has - since 11/2009 - accumulated 2 shoplifting arrests and a domestic abuse arrest. He's 30, and has been before a judge on criminal matters 18 times since turning 18. He's a worthless human being who will do nothing but cause trouble and make more worthless humans until he's killed in some crime-related incident.

One cop involved, sounds like the one who was hitting him with a flashlight, was fired. The other two had disciplinary action taken against them, suspension without pay. They would be extraordinarily dumb, even for cops, to try it again.

Needless to say, that doesn't make up for it, it's still an injustice, and shouldn't have happened in the first place, they need to stop hiring the scum of the earth to uphold the law, but don't let rampant cynicism get the best of you.

http://www.masslive.com/news/index.ssf/2010/10/jeffrey_asher_fired_as_springf.html Wow.

Instead of allowing them to constantly add new programs and new spending, how about electing some folks on the platform to reduce spending until you have a balanced budget

What, exactly, are you talking about? Is all your "news" from Glenn Beck?

The days of "Taxachusetts" are long gone. They've been gone for a couple of decades now. Indeed, the new Massachusetts budget is not only balanced but includes cuts in everything across the board.

http://www.masslive.com/opinion/index.ssf/2010/07/editorial_massachusetts_budget.html

I have a problem with taxing online purchases, but deficit spending is not one of them.

--
BMO

...and I just shit out a Michelle!

Hey, if we put them both on the floor and stomped on them do you think that we could also make Malia and Sasha from the splatter?

Yep, google confirmed, here's an article on it, complete with screencaps of the burns and the grids (but you'll have to squint to see em).

Why the Eee? I reviewed one for the local alt-monthly newspaper, and even after I was done with the review, I wound up keeping it. In a nutshell: it's nifty to have an inexpensive, super light, teeny wifi laptop with a crisp, bright screen -- I've been using it primarily for a RSS/CBR reader myself. My advice is ditch the standard OS, which is lovely but would never fully satisfy most slashdot readers and install Ubuntu 7.10. It's easy enough to do and works great after a few tweaks. One caveat to keep in mind is that I can't seem to find any place that sells additional power adapters (yet) so the portability is slightly diminished by having to lug around the adapter too. but I'm sure that will be rectified soon, as Asus has done a great job so far responding to customer complaints and suggestions.

To my mind you sacrifice your own rights when you choose to do something like that, and deserve a good beating.

That's all well and good. But do you deserve a beating if you didn't do anything wrong? (I'd post a less inflammatory link, but the mainstream press articles are behind a pay wall - however the article does give the basic facts, and I'll note that one of the officers involved in the incident later resigned over allegations of drug use).

In this war that is being waged with such religous fervour by both sides, nothing seems to be holy anymore. Such bitter irony. And Bush still talks about fighting for freedom... yeah, right...

There is a more in depth Associated Press article on the subject here.

Also, in related news, the ancient and extremely dangerous sedition laws are being expanded and rehabilitated. These are the laws that were used to jail anarchists and communists for their opinions during the McCarthy era.