Someone trained in the scientific method can evaluate data impartially, as long as it does not conflict with his own work or contradict his own research.

But a scientist is just as likely to lie, cheat, or steal as anyone else, when it is in his interest to do so.

I question the validity of any study that "proves" scientists are more ethical than non-scientists.

Since their HQ is in a former Nato bunker, you'd think that Nato would know its vulnerabilities: a small thermonuclear blast, or a slightly bigger one? Whatever it takes -- no one will complain if there's a bit of collateral damage, as long as the spammers are destroyed.

The Constitution specifies that there must be at least two witnesses to a treasonous action.

A wiretapped phone call from Anne Chennault to Bui Diem is hardly evidence against Richard Nixon.

Especially when that phone call allegedly took place on November 2 1968, three days before the election. It could hardly have changed the outcome of the peace negotiations, as had the call not been made there still would not have been an agreement before the election.

If you're going to prosecute private citizens for negotiating with foreign governments, then don't forget to indict Jimmy Carter for meddling with North Korea during the Clinton, Bush 43, and Obama administrations.

You might also find something to charge Jay Rockefeller with, when he advised Syrian president Hafez Assad (father of current dictator) to warn Saddam Hussein that Bush was serious about regime change and that he should get ready for war. That was in early 2002, so Rockefeller was giving more than a year's advance warning to an enemy.

Excuse me, but it was Johnson who escalated the war, raising troop levels from around 20,000 when he took office to over 500,000 when he left.

Nixon did not escalate the war. He simply changed the commander in charge -- out with Westmoreland and in with Creighton Abrams -- and changed the strategy to one that actually worked.

When the peace treaty was signed in Paris in 1973, it was the result of military victory by the US and South Vietnam. Defeat by the North Vietnamese came later, after Senate Democrats cut off aid to South Vietnam. It was those Democrats who were really the ones guilty of treason, since we're throwing around that term.

The people who steal music or movies or other digital media were probably never going to buy that stuff in the first place.

It makes sense, of course, to keep thievery from becoming so easy that everyone can do it -- and it was that way back in the early days of file sharing. But nowadays there is a sharper line between buyers and stealers.

If energy consumers in other countries want our coal and are willing to pay for it, that's great!

The people who will document their lives most completely will be the ones with lives so boring that no one will care.

The fascinating ones will leave behind endless mysteries for speculation.

I've added RAM to one of the older, harder-to-access Minis. Once you get that far, swapping out a hard drive would take another five minutes. It looks intimidating but it's not that hard.

I actually prefer a tower like the Mac Pro, but you can buy four or five Mac Minis for the price of a Mac Pro.

We've only got two Mac Minis in the family. One has been running continuously since 2005, the other continuously only since 2010. The optical drive on the older one stopped working, but otherwise they've been trouble free.

When people pay the FICA tax, that money goes to pay benefits for people who are already retired. If people think they are buying something for their own retirement, then they are mistaken.

Additionally, the Supreme Court has ruled that there is no contract -- Congress can change the rules whenever it wishes. For instance, if the Federal Reserve keeps printing money then there will be significant inflation; but Congress is not obligated to keep the automatic cost-of-living increase in SS benefits.

People are entitled to Medicare and Social Security, but they did not pay for the full future value of those programs. So if they get what they paid for, they'd receive much reduced benefits.

You apparently believe that retirees have an unlimited claim on the earnings of younger generations -- which they cannot have.

Not true -- women and minorities will be hardest hit.

The "study" did not take impartial data, then construct a hypothesis. Instead, "evidence" was constructed to support a pre-determined conclusion.

No actual research was involved.

I was just reading a book about the pre-Civil War era. In the 1856 election, Philadelphia was the swing state. If John C Fremont had carried Pennsylvania plus just one more small state, like California with 4 electoral votes, then he would have been elected president instead of Buchanan. Of course, the Southern states were already talking secession even before 1856, and Fremont was a political incompetent who would have been a terrible president. But the point is that in a narrowly-divided country, one or two states will always be decisive.