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I seem to recall a or (the) winning plot was an airliner crash that was solved because one of the investigators noticed a particular type of butterfly - not often seen - was quite plentiful fluttering around one window of the airliner. It turned out the butterfly was attracted to a certain chemical (sodium something sticks in my mind) and that lead them to swab the surfaces which then lead to the eyeglass frames of the passenger in the seat by the window.

Oh - google is your friend:

https://www.schneier.com/blog/...

and

http://www.slate.com/articles/...

You're welcome!

F.

http://www.slate.com/articles/...
I think it's less straightforward. I think population will level out at some unnacceptably high point, and we will grind the biosphere down to waste until influenza or some coronavirus wipes a third of us out. And then repeat!

Looks like we have a "everything except Fox News is biased" idiot. Please note the lack of facts refuting the objective data I presented him. Or maybe this guy's just a troll.

Anyway, if gottabeme actually looked at the links he gave, he would see that people who watch Fox News are more ignorant of politics, and that red states have fewer educated people than blue states.

But, I know I'm not going to convince someone who doesn't have the intellectual ability to understand why fractional values exist when averaging.

No, no one can be that dumb. It's a Republican psychotic troll

Looks like we have a "everything except Fox News is biased" idiot. Please note the lack of facts refuting the objective data I presented him. Or maybe this guy's just a troll.

Anyway, if gottabeme actually looked at the links he gave, he would see that people who watch Fox News are more ignorant of politics, and that red states have fewer educated people than blue states.

But, I know I'm not going to convince someone who doesn't have the intellectual ability to understand why fractional values exist when averaging.

No, no one can be that dumb. It's a Republican psychotic troll

I couldn't find the "exact" phrasing of the question asked. It would be a trivial mistake to confuse astrology with astronomy.

MORE IMPORTANTLY....

Also, "astrology" could be seen as a proxy for this question, "Why do so many pro baseball players have August birthdays?"

It has to do with cutoff dates for youth leagues (e.g., Little League). If you are older than your peers, you get more attention, more training, and are more likely to go pro. Astrology? Not exactly. Does it relate to when in the year you are born? Hell yes.

There are a great many things exactly like that which is why I would want more specifics.

only shes eat it?

"'When someone eats Amanita phalloides, she typically won't experience symptoms...Eventually she'll suffer from abdominal cramps..."
Easily transformed into gender-neutral style:
"A person who eats Amanita phalloides typically won't experience symptoms...Eventually the victim will suffer from abdominal cramps..."
Sloppy writing, writer has some sort of gender-agenda, lousy editing (the quote is from a Slate article)--take your pick.

Deanna Fei, mother to one of the "Distressed Babies" responds in the following article.

It shows how terribly insesitive Armstong's comments were!

http://www.slate.com/articles/...

BS. What government program has ever ended?

Mobilization for the Civil War
Reconstruction in the South after the Civil War
Mobilization for WW1
Prohibition
Federal poisoning of alcohol
CCC - Civilian Conservation Corps
CWA - Civil Works Administration
FSA - Federal Security Agency
PWA - Public Works Administration
WPA - Works Progress Administration
Mobilization for WW2
The Marshall Plan
Mobilization for Korea
The draft
Mobilization for Desert Storm
Cash for clunkers

There are more.

It is beyond ironic that in a thread about poor broadband governance you recommend running Colin Powell for President.

His son Michael ran the FCC during G.W. Bush's term and had the chance to make the internet common carrier and guarantee us net neutrality. He did not do that. He sold out to the corporate interests.

What makes you think his father would be any different?

The highly liberal publication Slate says FCC Chairman Michael Powell is a maverick who says what he thinks and set up rule changes designed to force the monopoly corporations to innovate or die. http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/hey_wait_a_minute/2003/02/the_real_michael_powell.html

It is important to know the context in which historical decisions were made: sometimes the bad result that shows up in the long run was a trade off against an even worse result (like imposing municipal and state taxes on Internet connections, in the case of the ruling you're objecting to) that would have happened years earlier.

Well, the posting system stripped off my carefully inserted links. WTF, slashdot? I'd post the code to illustrate, but it just gets stripped out. Here are some URLS to go with my post:

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01... Jane Brody on the hygiene hypothesis
http://www.slate.com/articles/... Broussard article on slate.com

If so, it pretty much guarantees that Facebook keeps a copy of your stuff forever, even if you "delete" it.

Facebook keeps a copy of your stuff forever, even if you "delete it". So does gmail/google. Even stuff you type into a textbox but never submit.

http://www.slate.com/articles/...

Come to think of it, "deleted data" is probably exactly what this cold storage is for. They never have to worry about overwriting it when users change the data because it's data the users have already "deleted".

The map is misleading. LA's schools simply MAY teach creationism - the law allows it, but not all necessarily do. Those charter schools? They ALL do: http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/science/2014/01/creationism_in_texas_public_schools_undermining_the_charter_movement.single.html http://www.salon.com/2013/10/25/christian_textbooks_darwin_inspired_hitler/

Like it or not, and despite rationalizations and protests to the contrary, the criminal justice system probably exists primarily to serve the emotional need for fairness. http://www.slate.com/articles/...

ianal but last time I looked up the laws there wasn't any penalty for non-cooperation

IANAL but I know how to use google. http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/recycled/2010/03/count_me_out.html

"In 2012, National Science Board member James Lawrence Powell investigated peer-reviewed literature published about climate change and found that out of 13,950 articles, 13,926 supported the reality of global warming. Despite a lot of sound and fury from the denial machine, deniers have not really been able to come up with a coherent argument against a consensus."

http://www.slate.com/blogs/bad...

Dinosaurs in F16s!

Actually, it was tyrannosaurs in F-14s. Yes, those are recognizable as F-14s, too. Watterson was an excellent draftsman with a good eye for detail.

This "study" is mostly bullshit. This article sums it up nicely:

http://www.slate.com/articles/...

Good morning:

http://www.slate.com/blogs/bad...

Hello world:

http://www.independent.co.uk/n...

"Always work"
Tell that to Salinas.

http://www.slate.com/articles/...

Now, to be fair, the decision hinges on the fact that he WILLINGLY went with the police, so legally, he was not detained.
I think this is a dangerous grey area, and weaking of the 5th. But, it's not quite as simple as some people have been making it out.

That said, this decision only further reinforces that "dont talk to the cops" is too simplistic.
Instead your nubmers should like this:

1: Ask "Am I being detained?"
2a: If "yes" then say "I wish to see a lawyer", and nothing else.
2b: If "no", then ask "Am I free to go?"
3a: If "yes" then walk away
3b: If "no" then you are being detained and you say "I wish to see a lawyer", and nothing else.
4: Volunteer no more information than required (check your local laws; some states require presentation of ID upon request, some don't).
5: Above all remain calm and respectful. Period. Failure to do so only hurts your situation and weakens your position; there is nothing to be gained from it.

http://www.slate.com/blogs/xx_factor/2009/05/13/dolphins_are_violent_predators_that_kill_their_own_babies.html
http://wiki.answers.com/Q/How_many_people_have_been_killed_in_dolphin_attacks
http://feww.wordpress.com/2009/10/20/us-woman-killed-swimming-with-dolphins-in-nz/
http://www.aardvarknyc.com/about/dolphins-rape-people/

That don't seem coherent with the fact that the NSA sharing raw intelligence information with Israel, you know, before analizing it and determining if they can or not conduct some activities on them. Then the allies don't have that limitation, of course. But, you know, if they can lie even to the congress without consequences, why they would tell you the truth?

No, some people are actually against private schools even without any public funding:

http://debatewise.org/debates/134-the-private-education-system-should-be-abolished/

http://www.slate.com/articles/double_x/doublex/2013/08/private_school_vs_public_school_only_bad_people_send_their_kids_to_private.html

And these people are psychopaths in my humble opinion.

Depressingly, Pakistani muslims are correct in thinking that vaccination programs may be controlled by western governments. The CIA used a fake vaccination program (not polio) to aid in the hunt for Bin Laden.

So by that reckoning if a con man pretends to be a meter reader then I would be justified in killing someone working for the electric company!

India will still be at constant risk. This modern secular country is right next to a muzzy hell-hole where attacks on polio workers are frequent.

Depressingly, Pakistani muslims are correct in thinking that vaccination programs may be controlled by western governments. The CIA used a fake vaccination program (not polio) to aid in the hunt for Bin Laden.

Among the many other things that Islam forbids they have now decided that polio vaccines are unislamic.

Islam does not forbid vaccination.

Look for modern fiction to adjust to fit the parameters of the application, degrading to a common level and uniform format. The literature cannot be observed without being altered. It will be lot like the mandatory movie formula. The content itself is irrelevant.

Perhaps they can explain why Fifty Shades did well despite being badly written.

There is a danger in this process that we end up with a "Save the cat" problem where everything has to follow a formula
http://www.slate.com/articles/arts/culturebox/2013/07/hollywood_and_blake_snyder_s_screenwriting_book_save_the_cat.html

I suggest you look at the evidence.

Your rude words, insults, and insults, suggest strongly that you don't know what you are talking about.

For a meaningful discussion, give examples - seems like that you don't actually like to think, being rude is so much easier for you.

Your statements seems to much more appropriately applied to the global warming denialists:
http://www.slate.com/blogs/bad_astronomy/2014/01/08/climate_change_the_north_polar_vortex_and_global_warming.html

Not only is ID de-facto required to travel around this country by air, you can't ride Amtrak without an ID either.

The poor being targeted by these laws generally don't travel much.

the very good other reason — already cited — of preventing voting fraud, which you dismiss as "miniscule" problem without citing any evidence

Sorry, here you go: Snopes wrecked at least one lie-filled list that was going around.

Or maybe some more: Very little as a whole, keeping in mind those are cases and not confirmed fraud.

We are told repeatedly by the ruling classes not to worry our pretty little heads about it, but the only evidence ever offered is the low rate of fraud-prosecutions... That's a rather bizarre logic — I wonder, if GLAAD would've accepted the argument claiming there being no gays in America based on absence of applications of anti-sodomy laws.

So not only do you refuse to accept actual journalism on the matter (why bother asking for evidence, them?) but you pop off that completely nutty bit at the end there that is rather apples to oranges.

Why would you be willing to accept such claims without skepticism, is beyond me.

I do, but compared to the largely minimal hazard of vote fraud we have a far greater threat of gerrymandering and disenfranchisement being pursued aggressively by the GOP.

There have been hominids for 5m years, proper humans for only 200k years, civilization for just 20k years, and in 100 years we invented a lot of things (from nukes to biological agents) that could end mankind any day, while going rampant sabotaging the earth ecosystem... and things keeps accelerating. What make you think that will be humans around in not in 1 billon nor 1 millon, but only 10k years in the future being very generous?

Yes, laying eggs somewhere else could improve the chances, self-sustaining space colonies is the way to try it more than generation ships, if any of them is ever possible. But that don't have a chance to happen with current culture where profit in the present is more important than having a future.

To put an example, an asteroid impacted earth 2 days ago that wasn't detected till that moment, how much you think is "invested" on mapping any potential space threats compared with, i.e. spying on ourselves, bailing out banks or even denying climate change? When the federal government had budget problems one of the first victims was the NASA program to detect space debris (a good example of a surveillance system that worth it), while the pentagon wasted 5.5billons the night before the shutdown (if we are talking about our survival, that was a waste), And always will be an "emergency" that will divert efforts and attention to something else, even if we have to create it. Unless we figure out a practical, safe way to travel (far) into the future (yes, we could done it doing a relativistic speed trip, or some suspended animation process could be developed, but nothing practical and for masses yet) we should not worry about what will happen in a millon years, is just too out of the reach of mankind.

The stuff from this year is nothing. The media has been running a hoax that Ronald Reagan called someone a "welfare queen" when he never used the term. Even better, Jet did a two page feature on the woman in question two years before Reagan mentioned the welfare fraudster, and they called her a "Welfare Queen!" BTW, the woman was white in the 1930 and 1940 census.

Foreign surveillance ops have never been hidden from view. The embassies are filled with antennas, the satellites and spy ships can be tracked. Any regional effort by other nations can be understood by their lack of global scale. Only the NSA, GCHQ have the ability to reach down into South America, surround Africa, Russia, Asia and the Pacific with vast help in the EU. Aircraft, satellite or a vast network of optical tap needs regional support - very few nations have that.
The US "domestic context" is unique given the 1970's Church Committee reforms, the Fourth amendment and constant political and legal reassurance about role of the rule of law. Thats the interesting aspect of "one way or another" - can the surveillance program data collected be used in an open US court without the need for the "parallel construction"? Will an entire digital US lifetime be held in a digital lock box removing all freedom of speech, association, contact with the press, public expression of faith, political support, protest, charity work, travel, reading of books/web use... open courts, warrants under oath and cross examination of witnesses...?
Re the "negative dealings with NSA" - the world can see the desire for a court friendly "lock box" call logs and 3 or more hop tracking.
http://www.theguardian.com/world/interactive/2013/oct/28/nsa-files-decoded-hops
http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/frame_game/2013/06/surveillance_lockbox_why_can_the_nsa_search_your_phone_records_without_a.html
The NSA just seems to be following the UK GCHQ down the "National Criminal Intelligence Service", "Government Telecommunications Advisory Centre" and "Government Technical Assistance Centre" efforts.
Where could the US end up vs UK attempts at legal telco law reform?
If the US gov uses color of law to get around the Fourth amendment and everything done becomes not illegal - its a bit like a legal digital Berlin Wall - kind of hard to hide.
Make it all legal and find a way into open US courts with gov experts/contractors to offer expert decryption, domestic US or global tracking, logs to the courts...a lifetime of phone calls in open court.
The UK could have told the US where it all ends up in the 1990's - everything interesting goes dark and all the people of interest are warned by 'contacts' in the police, legal system and press.

The US gov wants to keep it all for a legal, court usable replay over your lifetime.
Every call, email contact, a book buying list, travel arrangement, banking detail, friends, friends of friends, family, credit card use...
So if you become political, take up some issue in your State or federally, protest "the" next war, write to the press, write to political leaders, use your income for political issues, support charity events, support faith based groups - you end up on lists.
http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/frame_game/2013/06/surveillance_lockbox_why_can_the_nsa_search_your_phone_records_without_a.html
http://thelead.blogs.cnn.com/2013/06/18/nsa-whistleblowers-obama-administration-misleading-on-surveillance-programs/
From testimony to the Senate Judiciary Committee on March 30, 2011:
...."gotten together with the DOD where we've put together this technology database where I can go in, and I can, with one query, I can get all past and all future e-mails from a person,"
Parallel construction: https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2013/08/dea-and-nsa-team-intelligence-laundering
The tracking seems to be keyword and new contacts to know people, organizations, voice prints, call data, email, postage use, internet logging.... been seen at a protest or been linked to one.
With 2 -3 hops from any person been considered - the numbers of people been looked from one individuals positive identification: 1 person to 10-100 friends/contacts and all their 100's of friends/contacts and beyond with any their issues been linked back down that one person...
http://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2013/07/you-may-already-be-a-winner-in-nsas-three-degrees-surveillance-sweepstakes/

90% of the people you know are probably White. If you based world population trends on the area where you live you probably think most people in the world are White, followed by Blacks. Reality is most of the world population is Asian.

This is why so many U.S. science and medical studies fall under the W.E.I.R.D problem

http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/science/2013/05/weird_psychology_social_science_researchers_rely_too_much_on_western_college.html

Well, you're a troll. It's nothing like that. Having a manpussy in prison is largely voluntary. Rape does exist, but it's not like it's more likely to happen to you than not. Here's an article about what it's like to be a techie in prison. It's not this way everywhere. Lots of places have no tech access besides a Plexiglas covered TV. Worse, however, is the lack of any good material to read.

The library shelves or book cart is chock full with lot's of brand new religious bullshit and various other statist crap, or bubble gum escapist shite. There's hardly any good books on ethics from a secular viewpoint instead it's all "you're locked up because you're not right with God, imagine you're sucking Jesus' metaphorical dick and you'll be so right with God we'll see you next revolution of the revolving door," in not so many more obfuscated words. Origin of Species? God & Golem Inc.? Hitchhikers's Guide to the Galaxy? Ring World? SICP? Knuth's Art of Computer Programming? Nope. Most books besides religious crap are ratty and worn, pages and covers missing. Hell, there was even romance novels and interview with a vampire, but not a single Dragon Lance or O'Reilly?

I can run a program on a piece of paper with a pencil, I don't need a computer to follow along with Knuth, but damn, the prison and jail libraries have only mind numbing dreck that seems made to rot your mind and give you false sense of security that you'll be able to function and interact properly if you just gargle Jesus jiz. The criminal legal library is kept up, and there are some jobs programs that are OK -- They get their reading material at the behest of the corporate masters who want cheap slave drivable labor for dangerous or dirty jobs; A buddy learned underwater welding and works his ass off for good "honest" money now, helping oil companies rape the planet.

Anyway, yeah, the incarcerated could use some books. I'd have given up my food tray for a week for a good sci-fi book. Sad thing is, out in the free world there's libraries getting rid of books -- can hardly give 'em away because they're too abused, but they rarely find their way to where they could do the most good. Nope, those Christ fuckers who think Jesus is off preparing a place for them in the sky somewhere so the body of the church can get half-gay married into God's magical zombie family have a damn near monopoly on fresh reading material. I've read that damn insane bible in 6 different translations just to laugh at the inconsistencies -- Hell, did you know the whole virgin birth is based on a mistranslation error? Careful pointing out the bullshit though: Private Prisons are essentially Christian-Camp Cages.

Sounds like AC has got one hell of a prison rape fantasy up there -- It's not copy-pasta... They'll surely be disappointed if they ever grow balls and lose brains enough to make their dream come true.

A quick bit of Googling brings up this:

http://www.slate.com/blogs/quora/2013/05/21/medieval_europe_why_was_water_the_most_popular_drink.html

Contrary to what is found all over the Internet on the subject, the most common drink was water, for the obvious reason: It's free. Medieval villages and towns were built around sources of fresh water. This could be fresh running water, a spring or, in many cases, wells. All of these could easily provide fresh, disease- and impurity-free water; the idea that water from these sources would be the causes of disease and so had to be made into ale or beer is fanciful.

Where water was more likely to be contaminated, largely by tanning, slaughtering, or dying facilities, was in larger towns. But since medieval people were not idiots, they dealt with this in several ways. There were ordinances on where tanners and dyers could operate so that water for domestic use could be drawn from rivers and streams in the town to ensure the water was clean. And there were fines for contaminating areas of streams used for household consumption.

In larger cities, water-supply infrastructure was built to ensure public access to clean water. In medieval London, for example, the City Council began construction on what was called "the Great Conduit" in 1236. This was a complex of pipes that brought water from a large fresh spring at Tyburn to a pumping house with cisterns at Cheapside. This fed local cisterns all over London.

Wealthy Londoners could apply to have a private pipe or "quill" run from the conduit system to their house, giving them running water. This was expensive, and citizens who illegally tapped into the conduits were severely punished. Most people either drew their water from the nearest conduit cistern or paid a "cob" or water-carrier to bring them their day's water supply in three-gallon tubs, which they carried through the streets on a yoke. Public celebrations, such as the return of Edward I from Palestine or the coronation of Richard II, saw the city stop the water flow and fill the conduits with wine for the day, with people able to drink as much as they wanted.

People did drink a lot of ale and beer, but not because their water was so bad. The brews in question were much weaker than their modern equivalents but had the effect of providing much-needed calories to laborers and farmers, as well as being thirst-quenching and re-hydrating in hot weather or when working hard and losing sweat. Given the long days medieval workers put in, ale and beer were a major and necessary part of a laborer's daily energy intake. This should be seen as something like the medieval equivalent of drinking Gatorade.

Wine was the drink of choice for the upper classes and anyone who could afford it. It was produced all over medieval Europe and, due to the Medieval Warm Period that prevailed over western Europe until the 14th century, the climate meant it could be produced as far north as northern England. Wine was expensive and buying a small barrel was beyond the means of most people. But taverners bought it in bulk and sold it by the cup, so for a penny or even a halfpenny, an English peasant could enjoy a Bordeaux red.

In medieval England, the wine drunk most was red wine from Bordeaux and Gascony. Rhenish white from the Rhineland was twice as expensive and favored by the upper classes. Spanish white wines such as Lepe and Osey were cheaper and sweet wines from Greece, Crete, and Cyprus such as Romonye and Malmsey were popular after dinner.

There are also pols who genuinely understand the importance of a strong military.

As an aside, what does "strong military" mean here?

I agree that a society of shallow people who care more about government provided handouts than about freedom will have leaders who exploit that narcissistic ignorance.

But this phrase illustrates another route to governmental abuse of power. There are many ways to have a strong military. You can spend a lot. You can have a lot of dudes (particularly useful, if your goal is to put all your potential troublemakers in the military). You can have really shiny equipment. But these things need not actually help make your country become a better place to live.

Goals are another exploitable aspect. For example, current US strategic doctrine for the military is the "1-4-2-1" goal which means that the US can defend its borders while defending four strategic regions of the world with the capable to win two simultaneous regional-scale wars quickly including one "decisive" victory. How that translates into "we need this many guys and this much stuff" is rather arbitrary as this Slate article complains. And the potential tyrant can always change the goals to favor a military (or a military procurement system) that is more advantageous to them. It is then the work of a moment to label those undemocratic shenanigans a "stronger military".

Another perspective:

http://www.slate.com/blogs/moneybox/2013/04/11/san_francisco_zoning_needs_more_density_and_tall_buildings.html

Before science gets hot and bothered about the loss of data scientists need to do something about the quality of the data they produce to begin with. Frankly given the complete lack of quality controls that a lot of scientists use the loss of their data is probably for the best. Depending on the field as much as 60% of all scientific research cannot even be reproduced. Work that cannot be reproduced by another team is far from isolated to one field either:

http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052970203764804577059841672541590
http://www.popsci.com/science/article/2013-05/half-cancer-scientists-have-been-unable-reproduce-studies-survey-finds
http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/science/2012/08/reproducing_scientific_studies_a_good_housekeeping_seal_of_approval_.html
https://www.xsede.org/gateways-for-open-science
http://www.eusci.org.uk/articles/data-doesnt-lie-scientists-do

Depending on the study that means that either the data has been fabricated by unethical scientists, or the data has been misrepresnted for political purposes. Studies are often improperly interpreted by failing to take into account sound statistical modeling and noise is reported as science. In some fields politics have effectively taken over (e.g. social sciences) and standards are used that would never be tolerated in other scientific fields.

The very culture of science that demands quantity over quality needs to change as the rat race that inspires junk science to begin with. I can't think of any other field where those kinds of failure rates about the reproducibility of your work would do anything other than get you fired for fraud and destroy your career. I like science, I have since I was a young child, but the junk were getting labeled as science doesn't deserve the label.

... and they are not going to use it for this kind of case.

Bomb threat from unknown source? Boston? Possible foreign connections? The NSA is allegedly supposed to be involved in investigation of terror threats. It's the other stuff they're doing that's got people upset.

Why would the NSA crack TOR to spy on terrorists and such like they're supposed to when they can be stalking potential love interests and making sure their Significant Others are faithful?

If well deserves some kind of punishment, i wonder how much punishment gets people that do real damage and actual consequences, like drunk drivers (that may have killed several people), rapists, or even people that beat others leaving them maybe permanently injured (and lets not touch the consequences of lying to the congress or stealing trillons). What used to be a practical joke it seem to worth more than things with real life consequences in the actual society.

Red states do use the most social services. http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_reckoning/2012/10/25/blue_state_red_face_guess_who_benefits_more_from_your_taxes.html But they vote by the supposed moral stances of the parties. Why? Propaganda. There's not 2 parties here, but a junta divided across the public and private sectors. This game's been going on for 20 years where moral stances are pronounced on the supposed 2 parties, and they give and take just enough to keep the elderly vote in balance. It's extremely predictable, so it's easy to keep the people needed by the junta in office, which then gives them the needed credentials to move to the private sector as need be. Gerrymandering helps too.

Clear signal that they are still lying. The director of the NSA had no problem nor consequences for lying to the congress, and Obama had no problem lying to the people multiple times. And you are trusting everything to people that intentionally is lying to you, and trying at all cost to catch the person that could inform you what the truth behind all those lies?

You may find this article interesting: http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/crime/2013/12/gun_ownership_causes_higher_suicide_rates_study_shows.html

Yes, less guns means less suicides, as everybody who has ever talked to anyone whose suicide attempt failed will understand.

That's not that case AT ALL. Take a look at California which has a very wealthy population, the rich there lean more to the left. The rich put Obama into office. Also in the South, Republicans tend to provide the people with most of their jobs since Republicans are very heavy on defense spending. Most military bases and recruitment are in the South and with the US spending nearly 3/4 of a trillion dollars each year on defense the South gains the most.

There's no level of profit which is ever "good enough" to any company, or even most people. Human nature, or maybe just nature, is to grow accustomed to what one has and then immediately seek to gain more. Cancer cells or really any other living thing will consume food until it reaches starvation. With monopolies or in other profitable times, companies don't just stockpile money usually, they spend it trying to grow bigger. Those that do are rare, and dumb things often happen when they do stockpile

Granted, investors, shareholders, and executive boards should ideally be able to have better foresight than cancer cells, but in reality they don't.

The patent office basically can't reject patent applications. Blame the megacorporate-captured American government, not the folks manning the desk at the patent office. http://www.slate.com/articles/technology/future_tense/2013/12/the_simple_fix_that_could_heal_the_patent_system.html

The headline as submitted isn't really correct. The planet is not the biggest found; there are several whose mass may be larger, like the exoplanets announced just last week (and this planet has 11 times the mass of Jupiter; we don't know its actual size). The real issue with HD 106906 b is that it is so far out from its parent star, much farther out than planets with that ass should form. Either it formed farther in and got tossed out (which is unlikely) or it formed where it was, which current theories say is difficult; usually objects forming that far out have much higher mass. I explain all this in my own blog post about it.

Is a bit different than that. They are complaining now because the revelation of this is making their paid users to stop using their services. They may or may not be worried about their users privacy, but for sure they are worried about their profits.

In the other hand, tif well they knew the cut of the cake they were getting, they didn't know about all the other companies into the same and how wide and deep were this. Also, the revelation on how the NSA infiltrated their internal network without their knowledge or consent could had raised some alarms.

In any case, if the NSA head can lie to the congress without consequences after that being found out, why can't they tell all of them that it is over while keep doing it (and keeping the backdoors in their internal networks to keep doing the dirty work) or force them in a way or another to tell the world that all is over when is not, or even plant a fake whiteblower that confirms that the NSA stopped their programs ? By now trust is deeply broken in all that surrounds the NSA, if tomorrow they say that 2+2=4 you should bet that they are doing math in base 3.

If this article over at Slate is to be believed, then "... accountants and managers deciding it was not cost effective to let bright people play with weird reactors" would be easily explainded.

Why do I even bother responding to this nonsense.

Cancer gets cured about once a decade, sometimes by real doctors, sometimes by "quacks." I could show stats from real doctors with similar results to this one, which never saw the light of day once it was discovered (or rediscovered).

Please, do show us the stats. I get tired of the false meme that "oh, we would have cured disease X already if the results weren't being suppressed in a big conspiracy"! Medical research is hard work, and frustrating. Not only do you have to cure the disease in the test tube, but then you have to cure the disease in a living patient, and make sure it doesn't do something equally or more horrible to the patient in the process.

On top of that, the public has been oblivious to the fact that real progress in cancer treatment, and yes, even cures, are being made. Many leukemias and lymphomas are now curable through chemotherapy and radiation. This boy in the article is in the small minority that standard treatment did not work. Solid tumor cancers are getting better early detection and treatment. Mortality from many cancers has been dropping over the last 2 decades. What was once usually a consistent death sentence doesn't have to be.

People don't actually like creativity, even in medicine:

http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/science/2013/12/creativity_is_rejected_teachers_and_bosses_don_t_value_out_of_the_box_thinking.html

Staw says most people are risk-averse. He refers to them as satisfiers. “As much as we celebrate independence in Western cultures, there is an awful lot of pressure to conform,” he says. Satisfiers avoid stirring things up, even if it means forsaking the truth or rejecting a good idea.

In medicine, innovative things happen all the time. When *you* go to the doctor, you get the same ol' thing that has been done since 1952.

Most of us physicians try to live up to our creed: "First, do no harm." This includes not jumping to try every crazy-ass, untested treatment that some would-be genius cooked up and put in a syringe on the patients under our charge, if there are other treatment options that are still available. And here's a crazy thought: some diseases are better off untreated. I have an 85 year-old with dementia that was recently diagnosed with a lung tumor, likely malignant cancer but slow growing. Am I going to recommend putting her under general anesthesia, the knife, follow-up chemotherapy and possible radiation? Hell no.

If you truly think the standard of care in medicine is the same as 1952, I invite you, when you get sick, to turn down any or all recommendations for an MRI or a CAT scan. No heart catheterizations. No minimally invasive or laparoscopic surgery. No joint replacements. Very few blood pressure, cardiac, or autoimmune treatments. None of the advances for asthma and other lung diseases. If you're infected and allergic to penicillins and sulfa medications, good luck! I certainly wouldn't want the alternatives: veritable bleach in the veins or antibiotics toxic to the kidneys and ears.

tl,dr: You're full of it.