Slashdot Mirror

Going the DRM-free route is truly surprising and appreciated, but it's tainted by the eBooks all being more expensive than the paperback versions. That's a hard sell for a lot of people. :-/

I agree that going DRM free was a surprise, especially from JKR, who has long been very much adverse to ebook releases, often citing piracy as one of her objections. Apparently once you are filthy rich its not such an issue any more.

As for the Ebooks being more expensive, this too may fall, because until Apple got involved with ebooks, it didn't use to be that way. Books in Ebook format used to be 5 to 7 bucks, 9 bucks for a best seller. Then Apple enabled the publishers to adopt their so called Agency Model, and all the ebook prices jumped. Everybody else had no choice but to go along. The DOJ is currently looking into this, and in fact there are already indications that some publishers are quietly talking settlement.

Because of Apple's well placed friends, it took an EU Investigation to nudge the DOJ into action.

Constructed in secret, Cameron's undersea craft is really propelled by a Johnson outboard motor.

They'll just spam public internet services to suppress what they view as dissent, ramp up coordinated cyber attacks, make their lawyers swear oath to the Communist Party, force real name registration on internet services, continue censorship of social networks when deemed necessary, and continue to massively build out CNO and espionage capabilities, all while on track to exceed even the United States' defense spending by 2025.

But yeah, no big deal.

You get cheap crap proudly made in the USA too:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/blogpost/post/pink-slime-boycotted-by-grocers-heres-where-you-can-eat-slime-free/2012/03/22/gIQAY3RHUS_blog.html

Speaking of crap, you know that e. coli problem? If there's e. coli in your beef, that usually means there's literally shit in your beef. The reason it's there is because of poor slaughtering practices. But everyone likes to blame the consumer/chef for not cooking the meat/mince thoroughly. It's just shifting the blame[1] so that they can continue to sell you crap. Same goes for the salmonella problem - one of the reasons why it is a big problem is often because of poor processing practices where one contaminated chicken can contaminate many other chickens.

[1] like that "identity theft" thing- Banks prefer to call it that since if it's "identity theft" it's the customer's problem (or even fault), whereas if you call it "fraud" it's the bank's problem. The customers are just getting screwed.

Since when has investigating people on the other side of the country been NYPD jurisdiction

"Other side of the country"? Try "other side of the world.

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/spy-talk/2010/11/nypds_foreign_cops_play_outsid.html “The NYPD has an assistant commissioner who is responsible specifically for the supervision of overseas officers" who are posted in London, Paris, Madrid, etc.

http://news.cnet.com/8301-1001_3-57402589-92/jobs-act-clears-senate-one-step-from-becoming-law/

The JOBS Act has passed the Senate. In a 73 to 26 vote today, an amended version of H.R. 3606, which opens startup investing to individuals ("crowdfunding") and gives young companies more flexibility in filing to enter the public stock markets, cleared what is probably its last major hurdle before becoming law.

I'm really surprised that it passed the Senate as the JOBS act is chock full of poorly thought out deregulation.
It's so bad that the head of the SEC has come out against it and State securities regulators are against the bill

If this bill becomes law, it'll directly lead to the next wave of investor fraud.

I'm glad to see "book burning" is alive and well in America. I guess that's what the conservatives mean by restoring America.

It is. Here's what a Pastor said while introducing Rick Santorum two days ago:

"This nation was founded as a Christian nation...there's only one God and his name is Jesus. I'm tired of people telling me that I can't say those words. [...] If you don't love America and you don't like the way we do things, I've got one thing to say -- Get out! We don't worship Buddha. I said we don't worship Buddha. We don't worship Mohammed. We don't worship Allah. We worship God. We worship God's son Jesus Christ."

So there you have it. Santorum didn't object at the time, either.

His historical and theological inaccuracy aside, the ironic thing is, depending on the pastor's faith, it may very well consider Catholics, and thus Santorum, as not being true Christians, for example, due to fundamental differences in how they interpret the Bible.

It was a very poor translation

This is the tired-old excuse. Iranian officials have said plenty of argressive things about Israel, of numerous occasions. It's not merely mistranslation.

  http://www.wnd.com/2012/02/ayatollah-kill-all-jews-annihilate-israel/

  http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/middle_east/iran-says-it-launched-satellite/2012/02/03/gIQARNuDmQ_story.html

I'm glad to see "book burning" is alive and well in America. I guess that's what the conservatives mean by restoring America.

It is. Here's what a Pastor said while introducing Rick Santorum two days ago:

"This nation was founded as a Christian nation...there's only one God and his name is Jesus. I'm tired of people telling me that I can't say those words. [...] If you don't love America and you don't like the way we do things, I've got one thing to say -- Get out! We don't worship Buddha. I said we don't worship Buddha. We don't worship Mohammed. We don't worship Allah. We worship God. We worship God's son Jesus Christ."

So there you have it. Santorum didn't object at the time, either.

Oh trust me, I am aware. I've been arrested (case later dismissed) because of women lying about me, and even had to call the cops three months ago to explain how another girl I'd been involved with was trying to spoof emails to frame me for "harassment" in order to avoid paying me the money she owed me. But the US government has wanted to get Assange extradited to the US so they could try him under the Espionage Act ever since the Collateral Murder video. I don't see how they'll be able to do that just from this, maybe they think they can put more pressure on the Swedish government than the UK, or maybe they think discrediting him as a rapist or putting him in Swedish jail is satisfactory. Sure, I admit I can't prove it's part of an ochestrated smear campaign or conspiracy, but given the fact that the accusations are based on an apparently obscure and rarely used "surprise sex" law, the timing of the incidents, the fact that at least some people in the Swedish legal system wanted to just throw the case out when it originally happened (this is from memory, sorry I couldn't find a link), I think I'd have to be gloriously naive to think the US didn't play a role in all this, even if they weren't directly involved with the two women making the accusations.

If this is unreasonable, call me out on it, but honestly how can anyone take these charges seriously?

Agreed, it was a pretty stupid (and damaging) mistake that is unfortunately all TOO common among journalism these days. I guess the modern way of proving yourself as a respectable organization is to have the balls to own up to those mistakes. Apple's response should be interesting... if any. The last paragraph doesn't say much about Apple in this WaPo article.

Khatami(the closest thing Iran has had to a moderate and the only honestly elected president Iran in the last 40 years) wanted to normalize relations with the US in 2003. Iran hated Al Queda who they view as an enemy and a rival for power. In 2003 iran was willing to do everything the US wanted(including fighting al queda,stopping support of hamas, full cooperation with the IAEA) in exchange for normalized relations and "mutual respect". A detente with the US would have likely strengthened Khatami's power base in Iran.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/world/documents/us_iran_1roadmap.pdf

Bush wanted iran to capitulate to all US demands first instead of "mutual respect"

Actually the breakdown is in the analogy. The copy of the media is a perfect copy (at least of the interesting part.) If your copy of the "Legal Tender" was also a perfect copy, at least on first glance, the studios would love to receive it. Of course then, you really would be guilty of counterfeiting and I'm sure the studios would notice you were paying them with bills that all had the same serial number.

The issue at hand is and has always been the philosophical battle surrounding "Fair Use". As far as the businesses pertaining to music and movies are concerned, there is no such thing. You should be forced to pay if a kid down the street whistles a tune, and the kid should be forced to pay for the public performance of copyrighted material. If they could, they would estimate the number of songs and movies you will ever hear and see in your life and charge your parents at your birth for them. They are greedy, and whats fair in their minds is that you give them all your money. Is any of this mysterious or confusing?

A senior account executive at Goldman Sachs just resigned (and he's now in the papers) because of what he refers to as a profound lack of moral backbone and a business which glee's in raping its own customers to 'make a buck". I posit that American Corporations today are for the most part interests in one thing and one thing only. Profit at any cost, and specifically profit for the few members in control at the top of these corporations. The record and movie industry are simply a symptom of a larger more fundamental problem. The business schools of our top universities have been polluted with a corporate philosophy that is devoid of ethical or moral consideration and they're teaching our young business people to rape and pillage. This has resulted in a climate and ecology for global enterprise that is doomed to a sick kind of cannibalism. Even Adam Smith warned that Capitalism only works in a strict framework of regulation that prevents the concentration of wealth and power and ensures the well being of the working class. In 1980 when then exCIA head George H.W. Bush ran against Ronald Reagan for Presidential Candidate, he referred to Reaganomics as "Voodoo Economics" long known to result in boom bust cycles and an ultimate collapse of the economic system. Congratulations, we're now harvesting that legacy. Is it any wonder that the MPAA and RIAA are busy trying to scrape up the last of the scraps left on the floor.

None of this is surprising. Just sad. We've allowed a paltry few greedy self interested men, to Wallstreet our future into a straightjacket of poverty and ecological decline to feed their personal need for wealth and power. When you scrape all the lies, and spin, and obfuscation off, its incredibly simple and its profoundly disturbing. We've been bought and sold.

there are so many regulations that complying with them all is an undue burden on business.

That's what the guy in the penthouse bringing down millions per year in salary and stock options says, but I, for one, don't believe a fucking word of it.

Now go add in all the tax laws,

How are you to fund government without taxes? Or are you an anarchist?

all the environmental regulations you listed,

Look here, boy, that's a sore spot with me. I grew up in Cahokia, IL a couple miles south of the Monsanto plant in Sauget. Before environmental regs, you had to roll the windows up driving past, even in 100 degree heat and no AC because the air BURNED YOUR LUNGS. Rivers caught fire back then. You ignorant kids have no fucking clue how bad the environment was before the regulations.

I didn't see Monsanto going out of business, but drive past there now and you can actualy breathe. It doesn't even stink any more.

the work laws

You mean like the ones this comapny broke? Like OSHA, which if it were in place in 1959 my grandfather wouldn't have fallen down four stories? Son, I hate to break it to you, but you are a damned fool who listens to those who would do you harm in the guise of doing you good. Wake up and smell the sewage.

> As opposed to...the energy needed to ship incandescents from China, then drive them in garbage trucks to a landfill site?

To be fair at least some incandescents were made in America, and the garbage truck was going to the landfill anyway, and used lightbulbs don't add appreciably to the payload. Moreover, the garbage truck represents big centralized collection and transport, which I think is arguably more efficient than hundreds of thousands of consumers jumping into their Accord to drive burnt-out CFLs to the recycling center (along with their old paint, oil, and other things you're not supposed to throw away.)

An issue I've been worried about for awhile is that the Joe Consumers out there, the people who buy a sack of potatoes and have it put in another sack, don't really have a cerebral or emotional connection to recycling CFLs properly, and will just throw them in the trash. I know, there are people who will drive them to recycling centers, but I suspect that if we counted CFLs sold, and CFLs recycled, we'd see a huge gap. Regular people just don't care. "The trash can is right here, and I don't even *know* where the recycling center is".

This is made worse by the fact that the 12 count "blister pack" CFLs seem to have a terribly high infant mortality and a much shorter lifespan than the more expensive "boutique" CFLs that are sold separately. I was an early adopter of the consumer integrated CFLs, and of the four bulbs I bought in 1995 or thereabouts, three are still working. I then made the mistake of buying a big box of CFLs at Costco, and *those* aren't giving me any better lifespan than incandescents. (And I will never do that again.) My concern is that significantly more of the cheap CFLs are made, and purchased, most likely by the very people who are least likely to dispose of them properly. It'll be interesting to see what the mercury content in our landfills looks like in a couple decades.

>> It would be similar to how the ACEEE's study showed EVs are no cleaner than a 45mpg gasoline vehicle (and less clean than a natural gas Civic or 88mpg Lupo TDI).

> Which completely ignores the fact that electricity is independent of it's energy source, whereas natural gas, diesel and petrol are all fossil fuels which can't be easily substituted.

EVs have the *potential* of being holistically cleaner, but that depends on a number of factors that your average consumer doesn't think much about. It's very much like CFLs -- it all depends on the implementation. Zero point emission is not the whole story.

Unless of course your John Corzine....

“Jon Corzine was one of the best colleagues I had in the Senate and he's one of the best partners I have in the White House.”
President Barack Obama, Oct 21, 2009.
http://projects.washingtonpost.com/obama-speeches/tag/support/?page=19

Oh, I forgot. It appears possible- that China has some 3000 nuke missiles, that they have not admited to.
Seriously, China is not to be taken lightly. The above is probably why they are so edgy about our spying on them. USSR never was that edgy. Nor were we. In fact, we WANTED them to know roughly what we had, just not how to do it. USSR was the same way.
China does not want us to know what they are up to. That is the actions of a nation that is planning a surprise attack.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/08/17/AR2006081701485.html

It's kind of unfortunate that the whole Rush Limbaugh stupidity (almost a tautology there) has skewed the coverage so much. Very few people outside of progressive policy wonks or the backwaters of the right-leaning blogosphere know who Sandra Fluke really is.

Ezra Klein (Mr. Progressive Policy Wonk for the Post) had a brief write up on Sandra Fluke prior to the controversy. It turns out that she knew about Georgetown's contraceptive policy before she even enrolled (over 3 years ago, long before any contraceptive controversy) and enrolled with the idea of changing the policy. Which has pretty much been her full time job ever since - she was the president of Law Students for Reproductive Justice during this time.

So, on one level, she's exactly the sort of activist "expert" that both sides invite to these panels, but she was being sold as "just" a student with a story to tell. It's annoying that this kind of stuff goes on. I'm not opposed to activists being on panels - they have immersed themselves in the issues - but I would want that stuff mentioned fairly prominently so I can properly weigh the testimony.

Ms. Fluke has been politically active for many years - she's a professional activist (not the most unbiased sources, but you can find details here and here). She's not a young law student who got swept up in events (aside from Limbaugh's disgusting comments).

Tell me your background and give me your data - I'll try to be open minded about both. Just don't play these gotcha games.

WAIT! It's a story from Fox News. Wait until a more reputable news source reports the details. All every other reputable source is saying is that some dude got arrested and the feds think he's part of lulzsec. The rest is probably exaggeration if not complete fabrication and speculation on the part of that news organization. Do not assume anything in the article is true.

This is really cool, because I just finished reading how badly Washington Post screwed up with the "Inventor of Email" story. In fact, if you look at the comments you can see that former OSDN CEO Robin Miller (aka roblimo) suggested that they hire someone from the slashdot crowd to work on IT reporting. Maybe they took it to heart.

Yet, they haven't shot at anyone.

Unlike certain free country which is pillaging and burning things around the world, both militarily and politically.

Stop that fucking nonsense, ok?

Since what you wrote is false, how about you first?

State Sponsors: Iran

Iranians 'targeted Israeli diplomats' - Published: 15/02/2012 at 04:35 PM

Thai authorities charged two Iranians on Wednesday over an alleged bomb plot against Israeli diplomats, officials said, piling pressure on Teheran over accusations of a terror campaign against the Jewish state.

Authorities said they had laid criminal charges against two Iranian suspects accused of involvement in the three blasts in central Bangkok yesterday.

One of the men -- named as 28-year-old Saeid Morati -- lost both legs after he hurled an explosive device at police while fleeing an earlier blast at a house in the capital. The satchel containing the bomb, which he threw at a police vehicle, bounced off another vehicle and exploded at his feet.

A second Iranian suspect, Mohammad Hazaei, was detained trying to board a flight out of the country at Suvarnabhumi airport. A third Iranian suspect is believed to have fled to Malaysia, officials said.

"These three Iranian men are an assassination team and their targets were Israeli diplomats including the ambassador," a senior Thai intelligence official told AFP, speaking on condition of anonymity.

"Their plan was to attach bombs to diplomats' cars." . . . .

Israel accused Iran of orchestrating attacks on Israeli embassy staff in India and Georgia on Monday.

An Israeli diplomat in New Delhi suffered grave shrapnel wounds when a motorbike assailant attached a bomb to her car on Monday.

Experts: Iran's Quds Force Deeply Enmeshed in Iraq

U.S. blames Iran for new bombs in Iraq

Iran’s Quds Force was blamed for attacks on U.S. troops in Iraq

Iran's Quds Force: Supporting Terrorism Worldwide

Leader of Iran’s Al-Quds Forces Says Iraq and Southern Lebanon Are Under His Control

Iran threatens to close Strait of Hormuz over EU oil sanctions

Iranian weapons seized in Afghanistan

One more, then I'm going to stop since this could easily turn into a seemingly never-ending story. I've hardly touched on Iran's activities around the world. I've hardly even scratched the surface of Iran's involvement in Lebanon, and with Hezbollah, and the massive amount of arms that they've been providing. You do know that Hezbollah, aiming at the desturction of Israel, has 50,000 rockets now, right?

Simon Wiesenthal Center: Iranian Calls to Destroy Jewish People Unparalleled Since Nazi Germany

Frankly, I'm baffled by how people miss this. I guess it doesn't come up at the "anti-Zionist" meeting

Take a look at this to see what Israel's leaders really think. http://voices.washingtonpost.com/checkpoint-washington/2010/07/netanyahu_america_is_a_thing_y.html

Netenyahu, when he thinks he's in private, says that America "is easily moved" and that he can get America to do what he wants easily. Then he proceeds to brag about how he successfully sabotaged the peace process.

The Koch brothers have filed a lawsuit for control over the Cato Institute, a Washington DC-based libertarian think tank.

As far as I can tell, Cato Institute's business consists of conducting research for well-healed corporate clients, to generate one-sided reports which can then be used in lobbying and congressional and judicial testimony. They did a lot of work for Microsoft around the time of the DOJ antitrust investigation.

Math perhaps but anything with any political aspect will be fought over, i.e. Texas re-writing history textbooks in an effort to lesson the constitutional barriers of separation of church and state.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/03/17/AR2010031700560.html
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/13/education/13texas.html

Ahem!

There's a particularly poignant point about half way down the article where it's said that Ebenezer Jobs shut down Apple's philanthropic programs when he returned to the company in 1997.

I don't know how much of a problem this is in higher academia, but according to more articles like this

And the fact that prestigious universities such as this only accept a handful of students in computer science in a year, it's not surprising. One of the more surprising things is that UW received 40 million dollars from Paul Allen a while ago, and they used it to build a giant 40 million dollar new computer science building. But the number of students they accepted per year didn't change. Why is this? If you have lots of students who want to go there, why not use extra funds you have to expand the number of applications you can accept?

I dunno, I'm sure the downward trend of education spending all over our country isn't helping universities to expand the number of students they can accept either.

Yeah, fuck the government, with their fancy secrets and intelligence gathering operations. Don't let the fact that the world knows who they are, US citizens voted for them, and that they're accountable for their actions fool you. Government is teh evilz, and we have no privacy with them around.

Instead, let's put all our faith in a bunch of unelected, unaccountable, juvenile, anonymous vigilantes and vandals who take pride in stealing information from organizations and publishing it on the internet just for fun, while doing it in secret without exposing their identities. That will show the world what we really think of the idea of privacy and how wrong it is to gather information. America! Fuck Yeah!

Meanwhile, I'll be here contemplating the irony of a bunch of school kiddies attacking a non-government organization for what they believe are government intelligence gathering operations, while sitting in their basement believing they are immune to that same surveillance.

Our governments don't sell our private data to everyone.

wrong!
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/frompost/march98/privacy9.htm

I guess you never heard of the robo-signing scandal.

Also you must be rich because you have no empathy.

No, it's completely about access to birth control. To say it's about religious freedom is, at best, hypocrisy, and at worst an outright lie. Let me first start by saying it *should* all be moot, and certainly would be under a single-payer system, since Jesus says "Give to Ceasar what is Caesar's..." in other words, don't stop paying taxes because you morally object to their use.

But putting that aside, here's a very good article on why the bishops are full of it: http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/on-faith/bishops-contraception-objections-fail-their-churchs-own-moral-reasoning/2012/02/14/gIQA3en3DR_story.html

DC teachers approved a contract in 2010 that had 20% salary increases, $20k-$30k max bonuses for merit pay, but allowed teacher quality to trump teacher seniority in firing decisions (imagine that!).

Washington Post broke the story late last year:
 
  http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/georgetown-students-shed-light-on-chinas-tunnel-system-for-nuclear-weapons/2011/11/16/gIQA6AmKAO_story.html
 
Though they can only predict the size/length, not the actual mapped location(s).

Soooo...speaking the truth is bad if it doesn't fit with your perception bubble? "All go to hell except cave 76! oh and Google!~ Rah!" please. Name a single thing the guy wrote that wasn't factual. Billion dollar web advertising company? simply look up their SEC filings and it says in black and white they make more than 96% of their income from ads, and they are a multi-billion dollar company, so check there. And Google having a history of privacy violations? I would say that's a pretty big yes. So I'm sorry if his post breaks your perception bubble but truth is truth.

As for TFA give me a damned break, we've tried that crap over and over and over and over its sucked the big wet titty. ChromeOS is going exactly nowhere,service across the country is spotty so good luck if you have anything important due soon and your connection takes a big crapola, and finally the performance sucks. As another wrote the future is rich native apps that have the ability but not the mandatory requirement of web integration. This way you have the speed of native and can choose whether or not to use the cloud for syncing or backups or getting the latest data.

Major General Smedley Butler, United States Marine Corp, was an extraordinarily brave and devoted Marine who served the United States in an exceptional manner while in uniform, earning two Congressional Medals of Honor - the highest American medal for bravery on the battlefield. Out of uniform and in the realm of politics, however, citizen Butler involved himself in leftist fringe politics. I would be inclined to follow Major General Butler anywhere on the battlefield, but nowhere near a voting booth. In this regard he is like Chomsky, a man of exceptional virtual in his field, but a political crank (popular though he may be) and genocide denier.

. . . . Back in the 1930s, the U.S. Communist Party recruited a former Marine Corps general, Smedley Butler, to give speeches on the eve of World War II denouncing military preparedness as a capitalist racket. The idea was that by persuading an individual man of valor to propound shameful views, those views would somehow become less shameful. It didn’t work then. I doubt it will work now. - Wesley Who?

War is sometimes chosen for you by your enemies, not by some secret cabal in government or industry. Other nations and groups have their own plans, such as forcing Islamic conversion and Sharia law to replace the US Constitution on the US independent of anything the US does.

If the so called Military-Industrial complex is so powerful, why has the long term trend since World War 2 been towards decreased spending as a percentage of the economy?
Defense Spending as Percentage of GDP Well Below Historical Average

If there is no threat, why do we keep seeing arrests and convictions like this?

Federal agents arrest Amine El Khalifi; he allegedly planned to bomb Capitol
Federal authorities on Friday arrested a 29-year-old Moroccan man in an alleged plot to carry out a suicide bombing at the U.S. Capitol, the latest in a series of terrorism-related arrests resulting from undercover sting operations.

FBI’s Top Ten News Stories for the Week Ending January 27, 2012

Denver: Man Arrested for Providing Material Support to a Designated Foreign Terrorist Organization

Jamshid Muhtorov was arrested by members of the FBI’s Denver and Chicago Joint Terrorism Task Forces on a charge of providing and attempting to provide material support to the Islamic Jihad Union, a Pakistan-based designated foreign terrorist organization. Full Story

Baltimore: Man Pleads Guilty to Attempted Use of a Weapon of Mass Destruction in Plot to Attack Armed Forces Recruiting Center

U.S. citizen Antonio Martinez, aka Muhammad Hussain, pled guilty to attempted use of a weapon of mass destruction against federal property in connection with a scheme to attack an armed forces recruiting station in Catonsville, Maryland. Full Story

Washington Field: Man Pleads Guilty to Shootings at Pentagon, Other Military Buildings

Yonathan Melaku, of Alexandria,

You list the Mormon Church with Raelism, Moonies, and Harold Camping?

I suspect you don't know anything about that religious group, and what you think is self explanatory is probably wrong.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/on-faith/post/the-mormon-church-and-the-medias-cult-box/2011/07/19/gIQAZgj9NI_blog.html

(posting as AC because I'm too lazy to register)

If you can't use Google here's a link to a nice pretty picture based on the analysis.

and don't forget also:

The GoDaddy CEO publicly supports waterboarding
GoDaddy already has an history of shutting down domains without requiring to see a court order
GoDaddy has a long history of getting its customer servers/accounts hacked and not saying anything about it to its customers
And during the SOPA exodus, which is still going on, it's been dragging its feet on domain transfers (a violation of ICANN rules and regulations).
Hopefully, they'll have their domain name registry privileges taken away by ICANN because of that last one.

Send him to Gitmo!!! He's obviously an Terrorist Evildoer(tm) bent on destroying the American Economy!!!

Haven't you heard? There's a Democrat in the White House, so Gitmo and the drone strikes are no big deal.

Calling this "mark to market" is horribly misleading, not only for the reason I cited above (it's actually a wealth tax, not an income tax) but also because a wealth tax would demand a substantial fraction of assets would have to be shed each year, thus diluting the market for that asset class. It becomes an Heisenbergian problem.

A wealth tax assumes liquidity: for instruments such as REITs where the underlying asset is not itself terribly liquid (imagine, for instance, owning a shopping mall outright), how does one go about liquidating such a thing in part? Finding another partner? And then the next year, when the same thing has to happen again?

Finally, the issue remains of incentives. France has a wealth tax, and the net result of this is that while it has collected $2.6 billion (equivalent), it has resulted in $125 billion in capital flight since 1998.

Actually, Apple is the single biggest PC manufacturer in the world.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/technology/apple-with-ipad-is-top-pc-maker/2012/02/03/gIQAE5IUnQ_story.html

how about this: Five Myths about Voter Fraud Funnily enough, the first one is about ID laws and their ineffectiveness at doing anything except disenfranchising.

Singh and Gandhi in compromising positions and pigs running through Mecca, Islam’s holiest city

The first part make the lawsuit make a little sense and make it so that the Slashdot Title is incorrect. In the US it could be considered parody, but parody usually comes close to libel and slander. Gandhi and Singh are also not Gods but religious figures. I'm a bit surprised they took a stance on the Pigs running though Mecca, but it's probably politically motivated to appease some Islamic views so that maybe possibly they might find some common ground (wishful thinking but that's what it sounds like).

The Slashdot summary and the article it links to both got the name of the original story's author wrong. It's "Rajiv Chandrasekaran." He's a somewhat noteworthy reporter because for slashdotters because he was The Washington Post's lead reporter covering the Microsoft Antitrust Trial in DC. He practically lived in that courtroom during the trial.

The Slashdot summary and the article it links to both got the name of the original story's author wrong. It's "Rajiv Chandrasekaran." He's a somewhat noteworthy reporter because for slashdotters because he was The Washington Post's lead reporter covering the Microsoft Antitrust Trial in DC. He practically lived in that courtroom during the trial.

Ron Paul you say? Let's see...
Racism which his sycophants are trying to whitewash: http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/ron-paul-signed-off-on-racist-newsletters-sources-say/2012/01/20/gIQAvblFVQ_story.html -- check.
Being a dominionist with a hidden religious agenda: http://scienceblogs.com/dispatches/2007/10/is_ron_paul_a_dominionist.php -- check.
Looking for a return to the gold standard, which is what made the great depression worse: Hamilton, J.D. "The Role of the International Gold Standard in Propagating the Great Depression," Contemporary Policy Issues, April 1988 -- check.
Yep, that's the guy!

http://torrentfreak.com/copyright-industry-calls-for-broad-search-engine-censorship-120127/
An idea like that would be useful for the USA. Its from "copyright holders" not some US gov group, content becomes harder to find or is just de-listed.
So terms like “mp3, “flac”, “wma”, “aac”, “torrent”, “download”, “rip”, “stream” or “listen”, “free” get pushed to the back of a few 100, 1000? pages of search results or are just de-listed.
As for secrets? If you write a book you may end up like Glenn Carle, a former CIA agent who wrote about Gitmo http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B86rc2VJAio
Or if you write a paper on the "internet" as Sean Gorman did mapping fiber-optic networks http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A23689-2003Jul7?language=printer you may face new "security guidelines".
The next step is Costas Tsalikidis (Greek telco whistleblower) , Adamo Bove (head of security at Telecom Italia) - nobody will know anymore.

What was google's market cap when it ipoed?

23 billion USD

Remember, this was back in 2004, when Google was just a search engine. Gmail, Google Docs, Google Maps, Google Chrome, Google Earth, and Android did not exist yet.

Google's current market cap is 188.77 billion. Is Facebook half as valuable as Google? I guess the market will soon decide that...

Like... when the Israeli's held American's hostage for over a year?

Amazing how the Tehran hostage crisis manages to completely shut off any thinking sense. America waged war on Vietnam, Ho Chi Min totally humiliated the US, and here we are a few decades later with diplomatic relations with Vietnam, all buddy-buddy.

More generally, Israel downed an American navy ship, and waged a terrorist campaign against US interests in Egypt. So I guess the US should nuke Israel?

The fact is, if you want to keep diplomatic relations, you'll find a way to do so, even if someone shoots civilian aircraft down (like the USSR did to KAL007, or the US did to an Iran civilian aircraft.

Or like in 1988 , during the Israeli mass executions of political prisoners?

Regarding the 1988 executions: a quick Google search shows you're referencing the execution of
People's Mujahideen. Interestingly, Wikipedia says the source for this is none other than the People's Mujahideen. The People's Mujahideen is (from a NPOV) a terrorist group (a group that uses violence to achieve political aims).

Or when the Israeli's stood in huge crowds, cheering, as their leader crowed about nuking the US?

Sorry, what? That never happened. Or are you referring to their President quoting Khomeini talking about the current Israeli government vanishing from the pages of time (like the USSR did)? If so, how do you get from there to nuking the US?

Or the 2 year detention of US hikers by the Israeli's?

Hardy har har. Hikers. I hear there's some great hiking to be done on the border between one unstable country (Iraq), and another one that's been targeted as an "Axis of Evil" by the US (Iran). After they get done with this hiking tour, I think they'll be checking out the sights in Chechnya, then the Korea Demilitarized Zone after that. Some great hiking in Kashmir, too.

Try this on for size: Iranian "tourists" found "lost" in the Arizona or Texas desert. "We were just hiking--honest, officer!" Do you think the American public would accept a weaselly excuse like that? Why do you expect other countries to do so?

Is funding Siri such a good idea?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/apples-siri-threatens-to-damage-cellphone-service-for-all/2012/01/23/gIQAZ1O5TQ_story.html