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And already defeated using signal boosters.

All you need is a little box and maybe a can of Pringles to defeat bluetooth present security from up to about half a mile away.

It's already being done with cars that unlock themselves when you are near. All you need to do is change the frequency on the booster and it will work with bluetooth.

In fact, if you have two people and are willing to do a bit of hacking, you can probably do it across a cellular link for virtually infinite range.

it isn't the total, it is which legislation it involved. ;) Nice try though.

First of all that is not what you posted in your other thread.

Why didn't the reporters do the same thing with a Jr Senator from Illinois? Remember, he was just a couple years into his first term as Senator, voting "present" more often than anything else.

Second, your complaint is that he voted "present" still implies that this was more important than the thousands of "yes" or "no" votes he cast. I would argue that was an important part of job was to cast votes.

Having exposed your lie, now you want to switch it that so that he proposed no meaningful legislation. Seriously, can you use the internet?

Washington Post says you're lying. The New York Times says it as well. Do you live in an alternate world where you just believe things which are not only untrue but easily verified to be untrue but believe them anyway?

I'd beg to differ, as there was a long and fruitful conversation on quora about exactly this.
I read through at least the first 20 replies, and they're quite good.*

http://www.quora.com/Why-do-sc...

Not to mention that the idea that scientists are strongly liberal is supported by ample statistical evidence (one example at http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.c... - Paul Krugman is hardly the mouthpiece of the GOP).

*let me be clear, I love science and hard science fiction, I think creationism is mythological poppycock, and yet I am a *staunch* conservative. So go figure.

I cannot recall if there were dead though.

http://www.nytimes.com/1988/10...

PARIS, Oct. 24-Government officials, religious leaders and film directors condemned today an apparent arson attack against a Paris theater that was showing Martin Scorsese's film ''The Last Temptation of Christ.''
The fire Saturday night left 13 people hospitalized, 1 of them in serious condition.

...
Before the film opened, the Archbishop of Paris, Jean-Marie Cardinal Lustiger, condemned it without having seen it. He said, ''One doesn't have the the right to shock the sensibilities of millions of people for whom Jesus is more important than their father or mother.''

After the fire, Cardinal Lustiger condemned those responsible for what the police suspect was arson. ''You don't behave as Christians but as enemies of Christ,'' the prelate said. ''From the Christian point of view, one doesn't defend Christ with arms. Christ himself forbade it.''

There have also been attacks against a new Claude Chabrol film, ''Une Affaire de Femmes,'' which is about a Frenchwoman who was executed for performing abortions. A viewer died of a heart attack after seeking to flee one theater after a teargas bomb was set off.

Even the "arguments" from the pulpit, both before and after, are the same.
It's almost as if they are coming from the same Abrahamic sources and same cognitive delusions.

Yes, because fire bombing a theater for Jesus is so much better. http://www.nytimes.com/1988/10...

Organize a movie about possibly unflattering views of Jesus and maybe you'll get your movie theater burned. http://www.nytimes.com/1988/10...

throwing 30 billion dollars at the auto industry... for them to go bankrupt ANYWAY

What the fuck are you talking about? Are you referring to the GM bailout?

THIS auto bailout?

http://op-talk.blogs.nytimes.c...

What stealing, he took copies of Open Source he had incorporated into the app while he was employed at Goldman Sachs. By rights Goldman Sachs should be charged with possible GPL Violations.

"Serge quickly discovered, to his surprise, that Goldman had a one-way relationship with open source. They took huge amounts of free software off the Web, but they did not return it after he had modified it, even when his modifications were very slight and of general rather than financial use." ref

Lawyer for Ex-Goldman Programmer Criticizes Prosecutors and Firm

Isn't there a law that forbids being trialed more than once for the same events ?

Yes, there is. In fact, his lawyer is going to appeal invoking double jeopardy.

That being said, it looks like that law may not favor him because:

Once again, however, the law is not as simple as it first appears because the statute has an important exception if the earlier case was “terminated by a court order expressly founded upon insufficiency of evidence to establish some element of such offense which is not an element of the other offense, defined by the laws of this state.” Roughly translated, that means Mr. Aleynikov probably can be prosecuted again because the federal case focused on tangible property, while the New York charges cover computer programs.

There is a good chance the latest charges will move forward, which makes Mr. Aleynikov’s demand that Goldman pay his legal fees all the more important because the earlier case essentially bankrupted him. According to a complaint filed in the United States District Court in New Jersey, he claims that the legal fees for the federal case were approximately $2.4 million, and the state case is likely to run up a similar bill.

source

By the way, here is another weird tidbit about the case:

It seems a bit odd that someone accused of stealing from his employer can demand that it pay for his lawyer, but that is how the law operates for public companies like Goldman that agree to indemnify their employees for legal fees and make advance payments of those costs.

Goldman’s bylaws require it to indemnify an officer for all costs in any proceeding, including a criminal prosecution. As a vice president at Goldman, Mr. Aleynikov appears to come within the scope of the bylaws that entitle him to seek payment of his fees.

The bylaws commit Goldman to pay Mr. Aleynikov’s fees in advance of a resolution of the case as long as he agrees to repay the money if it is determined he is not entitled to it, which he has done.

Fabrice Tourre, who is on leave as a vice president, is having many of his legal expenses covered by Goldman as he faces a securities fraud lawsuit by the Securities and Exchange Commission. Goldman also paid a portion of the legal fees of its former director, Rajat Gupta, to defend him against insider trading charges, even though he was accused (and later convicted) of passing confidential information received from the firm.

Even better for Mr. Aleynikov is a provision of Delaware law, the state in which Goldman is incorporated, that requires a company to pay the legal fees of an officer who “has been successful on the merits or otherwise in defense of any action, suit or proceeding.”

When the appeals court reversed the conviction and ordered a dismissal of the charges, he was successful, even though the court also noted at one point that “Aleynikov stole purely intangible property embodied in a purely intangible format.”

That does not mean Goldman will pay the $2.4 million or advance additional money anytime soon, however. Companies loathe this type of claim because it makes them responsible for costs when they consider themselves the victim of a crime, and so there is an incentive to litigate the claim. Given Mr. Aleynikov’s dire financial condition, the firm could try to stall the case in the hope that he will settle for a smaller payment.

source

Isn't there a law that forbids being trialed more than once for the same events ?

Yes, there is. In fact, his lawyer is going to appeal invoking double jeopardy.

That being said, it looks like that law may not favor him because:

Once again, however, the law is not as simple as it first appears because the statute has an important exception if the earlier case was “terminated by a court order expressly founded upon insufficiency of evidence to establish some element of such offense which is not an element of the other offense, defined by the laws of this state.” Roughly translated, that means Mr. Aleynikov probably can be prosecuted again because the federal case focused on tangible property, while the New York charges cover computer programs.

There is a good chance the latest charges will move forward, which makes Mr. Aleynikov’s demand that Goldman pay his legal fees all the more important because the earlier case essentially bankrupted him. According to a complaint filed in the United States District Court in New Jersey, he claims that the legal fees for the federal case were approximately $2.4 million, and the state case is likely to run up a similar bill.

source

By the way, here is another weird tidbit about the case:

It seems a bit odd that someone accused of stealing from his employer can demand that it pay for his lawyer, but that is how the law operates for public companies like Goldman that agree to indemnify their employees for legal fees and make advance payments of those costs.

Goldman’s bylaws require it to indemnify an officer for all costs in any proceeding, including a criminal prosecution. As a vice president at Goldman, Mr. Aleynikov appears to come within the scope of the bylaws that entitle him to seek payment of his fees.

The bylaws commit Goldman to pay Mr. Aleynikov’s fees in advance of a resolution of the case as long as he agrees to repay the money if it is determined he is not entitled to it, which he has done.

Fabrice Tourre, who is on leave as a vice president, is having many of his legal expenses covered by Goldman as he faces a securities fraud lawsuit by the Securities and Exchange Commission. Goldman also paid a portion of the legal fees of its former director, Rajat Gupta, to defend him against insider trading charges, even though he was accused (and later convicted) of passing confidential information received from the firm.

Even better for Mr. Aleynikov is a provision of Delaware law, the state in which Goldman is incorporated, that requires a company to pay the legal fees of an officer who “has been successful on the merits or otherwise in defense of any action, suit or proceeding.”

When the appeals court reversed the conviction and ordered a dismissal of the charges, he was successful, even though the court also noted at one point that “Aleynikov stole purely intangible property embodied in a purely intangible format.”

That does not mean Goldman will pay the $2.4 million or advance additional money anytime soon, however. Companies loathe this type of claim because it makes them responsible for costs when they consider themselves the victim of a crime, and so there is an incentive to litigate the claim. Given Mr. Aleynikov’s dire financial condition, the firm could try to stall the case in the hope that he will settle for a smaller payment.

source

Here we go again. The deficit from Clinton's years was due to Republican Congress setting the budget.

Then explain why it is that the first year Bush is elected, with that SAME republican controlled congress, they pissed away a projected 5.7 trillion dollar 10 year projected surplus? The last 4 years of Clinton budgets resulted in: 1998 - $69.3 billion budget surplus, 1999 - $125.6 billion budget surplus, 2000 - $236.2 billion budget surplus, and 2001 - $128.2 billion budget surplus; the first four years of Bush's budgets...with that same republican controlled congress... netted us this: 2002 - $157.8 billion budget deficit, 2003 - $377.6 billion budget deficit, 2004 - $412.7 billion budget deficit, 2005 - $319 billion budget deficit.... and it only got worse from there.

A 5.7 trillion dollar surplus over the next 10 years would have come very close to eliminating ALL US debt... instead, Bush and the rest of his party of fiscal irresponsibility chose to ignore the debt, and give (most of) that money to the wealthiest.

Bush did a lot wrong, but the economy wasn't one of them.

Bullshit. Pure and utter bullshit. Two wars paid for by deficit spending, tax cuts that wiped out our surplus and transferred even more deficit spending directly to the wealthiest, and a massive unfunded (yes, MORE deficit spending) give-away to big pharma. There wasn't a thing Bush touched involving the economy that he did fuck up like a 5 dollar whore.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

http://economix.blogs.nytimes....

http://www.nytimes.com/2000/10...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

You guys are so transparent. The same old mistaken arguments every time, yet you ignore any bad news from 'your team'.

Perhaps you should be looking in the mirror when you say that. It would take a fucking idiot to not see the damage Bush did to this country.

Here we go again. The deficit from Clinton's years was due to Republican Congress setting the budget.

Then explain why it is that the first year Bush is elected, with that SAME republican controlled congress, they pissed away a projected 5.7 trillion dollar 10 year projected surplus? The last 4 years of Clinton budgets resulted in: 1998 - $69.3 billion budget surplus, 1999 - $125.6 billion budget surplus, 2000 - $236.2 billion budget surplus, and 2001 - $128.2 billion budget surplus; the first four years of Bush's budgets...with that same republican controlled congress... netted us this: 2002 - $157.8 billion budget deficit, 2003 - $377.6 billion budget deficit, 2004 - $412.7 billion budget deficit, 2005 - $319 billion budget deficit.... and it only got worse from there.

A 5.7 trillion dollar surplus over the next 10 years would have come very close to eliminating ALL US debt... instead, Bush and the rest of his party of fiscal irresponsibility chose to ignore the debt, and give (most of) that money to the wealthiest.

Bush did a lot wrong, but the economy wasn't one of them.

Bullshit. Pure and utter bullshit. Two wars paid for by deficit spending, tax cuts that wiped out our surplus and transferred even more deficit spending directly to the wealthiest, and a massive unfunded (yes, MORE deficit spending) give-away to big pharma. There wasn't a thing Bush touched involving the economy that he did fuck up like a 5 dollar whore.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

http://economix.blogs.nytimes....

http://www.nytimes.com/2000/10...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

You guys are so transparent. The same old mistaken arguments every time, yet you ignore any bad news from 'your team'.

Perhaps you should be looking in the mirror when you say that. It would take a fucking idiot to not see the damage Bush did to this country.

If that is acceptable, what about my claim that science is my religion, and the native Hawaiins are desecrating what I declare as holy land?

Did they steal the land from you?
No?
Then who are you to talk?

Russia is one of the clear winners from global warming

Except for things like the 2010 drought. http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08...

Every Corporation is a giant Ponzi/Pyramid scam in Globalization;
http://www.businessinsider.in/...
http://www.businessinsider.com...
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/12...
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/...

"The bill ends bulk collection, it ends secret law," says Rep. Jim Sensenbrenner, the original author of the Patriot Act who has now helped author the Freedom Act.

Well, according to New York Times:

Under the bipartisan bills in the House and Senate, the Patriot Act would be changed to prohibit bulk collection, and sweeps that had operated under the guise of so-called National Security Letters issued by the F.B.I. would end. The data would instead be stored by the phone companies themselves [emphasis mine -mi], and could be accessed by intelligence agencies only after approval of the secret Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act court.

I'm not sure, we gained all that much here...

Should have had the teachers in Atlanta grade the results... http://www.nytimes.com/2015/05...

Since when has traveling by car and plane been comparable? For long distances, I suppose. I'm not going to drive between NYC and LA. But on a daily basis it is not.

The issue, I imagine, mostly has to do with environmentalists' concern about the inefficiency of plane travel in general. Environmentalists tend to criticize speakers who jet around the world frequently for example. For another example, I've seen a number of conferences in recent years that have tried to encourage "remote participation" via Skype or some other video conferencing tools to avoid perceived waste for travel.

For many such people, traveling medium-length distances by car has traditionally seemed the more "environmental" choice. They may not drive from NYC to LA, but they might drive between cities in the Northeast rather than fly if driving were "better for the environment." I think the common perception for decades among environmentalists is that "flying is always bad." TFA suggests that is probably an inaccurate generalization, though it's not a new observation.

It's from a while ago but here's the first one I found (less than 5 seconds, too): bounty hunters kill couple in case of mistaken identity

You do realize that the EPA would already regulate fracking if there were danger to ground water. Funny thing, but if the oil they are fracking for was anywhere near the water

You do realize that a simple google search would have confirmed that fracking fluids are already appearing in groundwater and posing a threat to health.

http://www.scientificamerican....

https://www.propublica.org/art...

http://usatoday30.usatoday.com...

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08...

http://www.sourcewatch.org/ind...

It's also time to hit the fools with some hard facts:

The Last Time Oceans Got This Acidic This Fast, 96% of Marine Life Went Extinct | Motherboard

Acid Test: Rising CO2 Levels Killing Ocean Life | Conservation Climate

Air Pollution Linked to 1.2 Million Deaths in China - NYTimes.com

Full Cost of Coal $500 Billion/Year in U.S., Harvard Study Finds | CleanTechnica

Coal's hidden costs top $345 billion in U.S.-study | Reuters

I don't care if people believe in global warming or climate change, fossil fuels are still killing us and this planet regardless.

It was corporate interests that sold Americans on the idea that Capitalism went hand in hand with Christianity. I love the irony of Christianity arguing back. (It isn't just the pope, there have been some fundamentalist groups making the same basic argument recently).

So Turkish nationalists are buying Google adwords. What's the problem with that? It's an exercise of free speech (for a position that I disagree with).

I have Armenian (and Greek) friends, so I know the basics. Armenians tell me about losing grandparents, aunts and uncles in 1915. This is of course the 100th anniversary. The personal tragedies are overwhelming, and if that wasn't enough, there is the further tragedy of destroying the Armenian and Greek communities and culture in Turkey, and the end of Ottoman tolerance.

I realize there's a debate over the word "genocide." The official Turkish position is, "Let the historians decide." I'm not sure what good that does them. The New York Times leans towards "genocide." http://www.nytimes.com/ref/tim... There is some symbolism here that I can't follow too well.

There is also a small, slowly growing movement among Turks to acknowledge the Armenian position. I don't know how long it will take. I'm not as optimistic as I used to be about world peace and reconciliation.

But Google isn't doing anything wrong.

Two takes from this:

Free speech, first and foremost, especially to the folks who disagree with me.

Eyes wide open, a very close second, get your important information from as many sources as possible.

So Turkish nationalists are buying Google adwords. What's the problem with that? It's an exercise of free speech (for a position that I disagree with).

I have Armenian (and Greek) friends, so I know the basics. Armenians tell me about losing grandparents, aunts and uncles in 1915. This is of course the 100th anniversary. The personal tragedies are overwhelming, and if that wasn't enough, there is the further tragedy of destroying the Armenian and Greek communities and culture in Turkey, and the end of Ottoman tolerance.

I realize there's a debate over the word "genocide." The official Turkish position is, "Let the historians decide." I'm not sure what good that does them. The New York Times leans towards "genocide." http://www.nytimes.com/ref/tim... There is some symbolism here that I can't follow too well.

There is also a small, slowly growing movement among Turks to acknowledge the Armenian position. I don't know how long it will take. I'm not as optimistic as I used to be about world peace and reconciliation.

But Google isn't doing anything wrong.

The death of investigative journalism aside, I think the reason that the "first line" media companies (those that had direct contact with her) did not check up on her story is same reason that Rolling Stone didn't check up on their fraternity rape story: They had a good narrative that would get attention and felt that checking up on the story could be harmful to the victim/claimed cancer patient. Then, all the other media companies just piggy-backed off that as word-of-god to share in the click-throughs.

Any inconsistencies brought to light are rejected as being nitpicking by "haters", something that also fits the narrative of the story.

You thought this last economic downturn was bad, just wait until California runs out of ways to juggle its debts and declares bankruptcy. While this article is a bit dated, this article seems to cover it nicely (and there are many more like it).

A bit dated? With the republican governator and responsible leadership in place, the budget was balanced in 2013 and California is currently running a 1-4 (depending who you ask) billion surplus. There are still the state's obligations to citizen's pensions/retirement that will have to be paid, but the debt is being addressed, unemployment is significantly down, the economy is noticeably improved to anyone who lives here, and there is a substantial rainy-day fund in place as well.

I think you need to re-examine your 2006-era impression of California's economy.

Just to make it clear - we ARE just shooting the breeze here.
       

To be clear, we're not talking about a completely equal income, or anything so communistic.

It doesn't have to be.

We eliminate cost of living by paying people's basic needs (food, water, clothing, living quarters, heating, hygiene, health, communication) - those things we pay for instantly become free.
Correct the list anyway you want - things that we end up providing ALL of the people with, will no longer be marketable (as everyone can have them for free) AND if we're employing robots to provide those things that scales up until the cost is no longer existent.

First batch of "free stuff" might carry a cost. Second will be cheaper. Third even more...
Until it disappears somewhere far behind the decimal point - because robots.
And not only free... The fact that we can save both items and money - we won't be able to give them away.

Aaaannd... There goes economy.
If we give EVERYONE free money AND we replace them with robots that are effective enough to provide the raw material or the finished products everyone needs - supply and demand kills the economy.

A fad diet where enough people stop eating bread for a few days would suddenly cause huge stockpiling of wheat.
If we are still using money for that resource, i.e. we still run it like an economy and not a government provided service, market dies at that point.
And brings down with it anything related to it. Stuff like money and government and stuff like that.

Cause we're talking about BILLIONS of people.
We can't have a partial basic income only in some countries and not in others - unless we want to promote inequality while ruining people's lives on both sides of the in-equation.
Cause instead of equality we would create a miserable privileged class, and a slave class. Like what Qatar and Kuwait have done.
And they don't even have a full basic income per se... just a crapload of free stuff and privileges.

Robots aren't going to completely replace skilled human labor, at least not until they can replace us completely

Robots don't have to completely replace humans as long as they replace ENOUGH humans.

If at that point we are still trying to pretend that it's an economy and not a government subsidy - economy dies.
Make it an outright government subsidy... it either ends up as Qatar or as USSR. Neither of which is a good thing.
One doubles (or balloons it up even more) the population of the country by importing personal slaves - other makes everyone stand in bread lines.
Both would destroy a country from inside. Bread lines probably less - it's easier on one's morale to be hungry than to be a slave owner.

Which brings us to the crux of the problem - we can't have both the basic income AND robots making everything at the same time.
It is one or the other.

Both of those at the same time kill economy, money, moral values...

It's just that people who previously were able to work and get by on jobs that did not require particular knowledge or talent are going to be increasingly scarce,

Actually... There might be a surge in people actively looking FOR that kind of work.

We ARE still the same old hunter gatherers.
Our bodies like the outdoors and physical work. Our brains love it when we work with our hands.

Make it no longer an issue of economic status and you might just end up with highly educated garbage collectors, short order cooks, cleaners, gardeners, janitors, couriers...
Heck... You got that now to some extent with people organizing themselves to clean up parks or riverbeds.
And let's not even go into all those hobbies.

We NEED to have stuff to do.
We get sick if just sit around on our asses the whole day. Or we start doing stupid and dangerous things.
Idle hands and all that jazz...

And as we run up that population ladder we'll need even more stuff to do just to keep us from doing stupid things like killing each other.

Google for 'smoking obesity costs'. Notice that smokers and fatties actually cost less than healthy people, in terms of healthcare costs.

But what's the cost of your self-righteousness?

She (Diane Ravitch) believed in testing and charter schools and getting rid of unions.

You must have her confused with her former self. Diane Ravitch advocates AGAINST standardized federal testing and has stated that she believes charter schools are an attempt to privatize public schools. She also did an about face on the prospect that so-called Super Teachers and their sidekick techie assistants could replace the public schools.

I am glad of this. I worked for a period of time at the University of Washington, helping to facilitate research into the use of VR in public schools. The research was biased in favor of a positive outcome, and I learned to be quite skeptical of the promotion of 'technology' in education. Apparently, the LAUSD (LA Unified School District) has learned this lesson the hard way, after investing over a billion dollars in a ,failed project to hand kiddies iPads from Apple with the promise that their techie partner, Pearson, would deliver super-teachers-in-a-box.

Ravitch is also a staunch critic of charter schools, like the one Jeb Bush backed in Miami. Liberty City Charter School should be a bell whether for anyone interested in what management focused on the bottom line in education may create... In this case they created a smoking hole in an already underserved neighborhood.

Not directly - one of Obama's best fundraisers was a Comcast EVP - but by throwing the WH behind net neutrality in the strongest possible way, and showing the FCC he wanted active, pro-consumer regulation of the cable and ISP industries, according to a NY Times post-mortem.

Here on Slashdot there's a tendency to say that there's not a dime's worth of difference between the two political parties, those curmudgeonly posts generally get modded up. But there *is* a difference. Sometimes.

Microsoft, though, also includes revenue from different online applications into that figure. Its revenue from a cloud business called Azure, which is more directly comparable to Amazon’s cloud services, was recently estimated by Deutsche Bank to be as little as one-tenth of that from AWS.

Source:

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04...

Microsoft's numbers include Office 365 and other service revenue, not just straight Azure services. Where are you getting the $1.57 billion number for Google?

As a central florida resident who has Bright House for cable, whom I've been happy with up until now, now wait to see if Charter continues to court Bright House for a possible merger or even if they think the merger will be approved. Here is one of the stories about that potential merger.

I personally don't think we need any more cable companies merging.

The trend is to attempt to censor "damaging" or "distressing" (read: conservative / libertarian / right-leaning) speakers and provide "safe spaces" free of any opposing view points, literally in a room supplied with with cookies, coloring books, bubbles, Play-Doh, calming music, pillows, blankets, a video of frolicking puppies, etc. And unfortunately, I'm not exaggerating in the least bit. The NY Times had a great profile on this last month (and from the comment section, its readership, to their credit, was generally appalled by this phenomenon). It's truly frightening when you think that the people advocating this type of crap are supposed to become America's next leaders. How on earth will they deal with difficult situations in the real world, where they can't run away or simply ban those who disagree with them?

If kidnapping Westerners and keeping them within 50 feet of you grants you immunity from airstrikes, that increases the incentive to kidnap westerners.

There's no winning the hostage game -- if you ignore the hostages you lose the PR war, if you play to the hostages then you encourage future kidnappings. It's a lose-lose game. The same is seen for the millions of Euro paid by various European nations as ransom -- some of that money goes right back into funding more hostage-taking missions.

There is no way to time-consistent way reconcile the interests of the current hostage in not getting bombed/beheaded with the interests of future hostages in not being kidnapped in the first instance. It's a repeating game, we cannot evaluate each iteration separately but at the same time we cannot evaluate them all together.

Whether all the pictures are also retained is a completely different story. 10 years ago, I'd have said, "No; too expensive." But storage costs have plummeted, so nowadays, maybe so.

They've been doing it for well over 10 years:

cite:
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08...

Relevant quote:

Last month, The New York Times reported on the practice, which is called the Mail Isolation and Tracking system. The program was created by the Postal Service after the anthrax attacks in late 2001 killed five people, including two postal workers.

No matter what age you are, if you're at all tech-savvy and security-conscious, Snowden is owed your thanks for this reason alone. (Or from Wikipedia, if you prefer).

Related: There's a widely-circulated conspiracy theory that the NSA has solved P vs. NP and broken RSA (and most other forms of) encryption. The fact that Snowden hasn't leaked any documents confirming this seems to be to be pretty strong evidence that the theory is false.

Because he's not a favored person nor is he working or doing it for the favored companies/organizations.

If he's a favored person/company he can get away with it: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07...

Or even get away with something that many would call theft: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

Paul Krugman has just two questions about Comcast's deal to buy Time Warner. "First, why would we even think about letting it go through?" he asks in the New York Times. "Second, when and why did we stop worrying about monopoly power?" The broadband industry is already so non-competitive that once upon a time regulators would have been trying to break up Comcast. "Letting it expand would have been unthinkable," Krugman writes. But the bipartisan antitrust consensus has been eroding for decades—and that's a big problem. There's ample evidence that "monopoly power has become a significant drag on the US economy as a whole," Krugman explains. Economists have wondered throughout the recovery why corporations weren't reinvesting their record profits. But "this is exactly what you’d expect to see if a lot of those record profits represent monopoly rents." That's because monopolies suppress innovation, as the cable companies aptly demonstrate. "Why upgrade your network when your customers have nowhere to go?" For more on why the Comcast deal specifically is so bad, click here. http://www.newser.com/story/18... Or click for Krugman's full column. http://www.nytimes.com/2014/02...

No, anti-Semitic fools as you seem to be are a big part of the problem. But you are in "good" company.

The European Left and Its Trouble With Jews

Whoosh?

They didn't stop telecoms from merging either.

U.S. Moves to Block Merger Between AT&T and T-Mobile
T-Mobile Antitrust Challenge Gives AT&T Little Recourse

They didn't stop any of the airline or bank mergers that we have seen since 2009.

US government seeks to block American-US Airways merger
U.S., Filing Suit, Moves to Block Airline Merger

They didn't reign in the massive control that the insurance industry has over the consumer (indeed they gave the industry more power)

BLUE CROSS BLUE SHIELD OF MICHIGAN AND PHYSICIANS HEALTH PLAN OF MID-MICHIGAN ABANDON MERGER PLANS: Decision to Abandon Deal Follows Justice Department's Decision to Challenge the Acquisition
The Minimum Standards all Health Insurance Plans Sold on and Off the Exchange
Federal Insurance Office Act"
the 2010 Consumer Financial Protection Bureau

This seems highly unlikely given the pro-monopoly stance that...

U.S. Moves to Block Merger of 2 Theater Ad Companies
FTC Sues To Block Sysco-US Foods Merger
U.S. Sues to Block Big Beer Merger
3M Drops Avery Dennison Unit Buyout Amid Antitrust Worry

etc

Whoosh?

They didn't stop telecoms from merging either.

U.S. Moves to Block Merger Between AT&T and T-Mobile
T-Mobile Antitrust Challenge Gives AT&T Little Recourse

They didn't stop any of the airline or bank mergers that we have seen since 2009.

US government seeks to block American-US Airways merger
U.S., Filing Suit, Moves to Block Airline Merger

They didn't reign in the massive control that the insurance industry has over the consumer (indeed they gave the industry more power)

BLUE CROSS BLUE SHIELD OF MICHIGAN AND PHYSICIANS HEALTH PLAN OF MID-MICHIGAN ABANDON MERGER PLANS: Decision to Abandon Deal Follows Justice Department's Decision to Challenge the Acquisition
The Minimum Standards all Health Insurance Plans Sold on and Off the Exchange
Federal Insurance Office Act"
the 2010 Consumer Financial Protection Bureau

This seems highly unlikely given the pro-monopoly stance that...

U.S. Moves to Block Merger of 2 Theater Ad Companies
FTC Sues To Block Sysco-US Foods Merger
U.S. Sues to Block Big Beer Merger
3M Drops Avery Dennison Unit Buyout Amid Antitrust Worry

etc

Whoosh?

They didn't stop telecoms from merging either.

U.S. Moves to Block Merger Between AT&T and T-Mobile
T-Mobile Antitrust Challenge Gives AT&T Little Recourse

They didn't stop any of the airline or bank mergers that we have seen since 2009.

US government seeks to block American-US Airways merger
U.S., Filing Suit, Moves to Block Airline Merger

They didn't reign in the massive control that the insurance industry has over the consumer (indeed they gave the industry more power)

BLUE CROSS BLUE SHIELD OF MICHIGAN AND PHYSICIANS HEALTH PLAN OF MID-MICHIGAN ABANDON MERGER PLANS: Decision to Abandon Deal Follows Justice Department's Decision to Challenge the Acquisition
The Minimum Standards all Health Insurance Plans Sold on and Off the Exchange
Federal Insurance Office Act"
the 2010 Consumer Financial Protection Bureau

This seems highly unlikely given the pro-monopoly stance that...

U.S. Moves to Block Merger of 2 Theater Ad Companies
FTC Sues To Block Sysco-US Foods Merger
U.S. Sues to Block Big Beer Merger
3M Drops Avery Dennison Unit Buyout Amid Antitrust Worry

etc

That reporter clearly just lost her temper and was trying to say whatever seemed like it would be most hurtful.

In other words, she's an asshole.

It's not clear at all that she is any more elitist than most people in positions of prestige.

Being in a position of prestige is no excuse for acting like an asshole. To the contrary, if your "prestige" depends on your reputation, you'd better watch what comes out of your mouth. Look what happened to (now former) Clippers basketball team owner David Sterling after he went on a racist rant.

create a pipeline from the PNW down to southern CA. done.

of course it'd be expensive, but this is either an emergency, or it isn't. at least there aren't (as many) environmental concerns as there are for oil pipelines. if it leaks / breaks you get a ... water spill?

Anyone think to ask the PNW if this was okay?

http://green.blogs.nytimes.com...

http://www.livescience.com/469...

Seeing what the southwestern states have done to the Colorado river, you might not find the Pacific Northwest all that cooperative with that plan.

An interesting study just came out about dogs and eye contact... http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/... (the-look-of-love-is-in-the-dogs-eyes/)

There are of course many factors for Argentina's decline. Protectionism is one but political instability was more fundamental. Found this in depth analysis that also points to lack of investment in education as the primary predictor: http://economix.blogs.nytimes....

Right, every poor person is poor due to back luck, not personal decisions and life choices.

I never said that, and no reasonably intelligent person could possibly believe that. That is just as ridiculous as your original statement that "all those assembly line/Taco Bell/Walmart people saying they want a "living wage" and $15/hr, maybe you shouldn't have fucked your life up."

The reality, of course, is that some people do make appallingly bad decisions and life choices. But there are also many, many impoverished people who are stuck in circumstances that are largely beyond their control. See unimacs reply for additional thoughts on this, and here are some more references.

The vast majority of unsuccessful people career-wise are that way because they didn't do what they needed to do to get a better job.

That is a comforting sentiment for rich people, so it is no surprise that it remains such a persistent cultural myth. How about sharing some evidence with us that substantiates your belief?

Right, every poor person is poor due to back luck, not personal decisions and life choices.

I never said that, and no reasonably intelligent person could possibly believe that. That is just as ridiculous as your original statement that "all those assembly line/Taco Bell/Walmart people saying they want a "living wage" and $15/hr, maybe you shouldn't have fucked your life up."

The reality, of course, is that some people do make appallingly bad decisions and life choices. But there are also many, many impoverished people who are stuck in circumstances that are largely beyond their control. See unimacs reply for additional thoughts on this, and here are some more references.

The vast majority of unsuccessful people career-wise are that way because they didn't do what they needed to do to get a better job.

That is a comforting sentiment for rich people, so it is no surprise that it remains such a persistent cultural myth. How about sharing some evidence with us that substantiates your belief?

Car companies are incredibly cheap so any extra complexity adds to the unreliability faster than the convenience.

Which explains why today's wildly more complex cars are also wildly more reliable than the much simpler cars of yesteryear.

Oh, wait, it doesn't.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03...

Yeah, I'm sure he's cutting his salary by over $900k so that he can save the 20% long term capital gains rate. All he has to do is cash out $4.5 million in investments every year and he'll be breaking even. Then, with all that money, can you imagine what he'll do with it all? He currently drives a 12 year old Audi. I'm sure he needs all that cash so he can finally trade it in.

Seriously, people. Why do you have to be so cynical over every fucking thing?