As a security oriented guy the big difference for me is the complete lack of built in security features in pretty much anything that isn't Oracle or MS SQL. MySQL is especially bad in this regard in my experience. Some agency will decide to switch to it because it's free and they expect a lot of savings. Then they discover that lots of the security features that were givens with Oracle or MS SQL just aren't there in MySQL. Sure they can license packages and whatnot to provide for those security options in many cases but then it's not free anymore. They could write their own security packages, but again that will take a lot of time and money to develop, so not actually free. It could definitely end up cheaper in the long run but most program managers I've worked with don't seem to look at that as a viable sell to their customers.

Well typically what they mean is that they've tried everything except annorexia and bulemia. Both of those are far more harmful to long term health than being non-morbidly obese. Trying either of those disorders teaches your body to horde calories even more than it already does, which makes keeping the weight off even more difficult once you return to eating like a normal human being. The best and most consistent way to reduce weight and keep it off is to be more active, which is much harder to do when you are starving yourself. And of course when you are starving your body does not just consume fat, it also starts breaking down muscle tissue most critically the heart.

Making formula better than breast milk is a very tall order. In the case of gut bacteria, how do we know what the "right" gut bacteria is for any given child? And there are tons of other factors to consider. I'm all for trying to make a better baby formula as there are definitely children that need it to survive, I have a sister in law who doesn't produce healthy milk. But I would be very surprised if we figured out a better than breastmilk formula within this century.

Well that could depend on how you classify ">>" Running would burn off the calories faster, provided you are fit enough. Depending on fitness level walking could be better as it would require less recovery time and so you could spend more time actually performing the exercise, walking in this case.

Part of the process was broken, although giving LEO's more powers doesn't really address it. The big failure happened when individuals the CIA were watching and tracking entered the USA. Instead of bringing the FBI onboard and getting them to watch the terrorists, they kept it secret, hoping that the terrorists would leave the country where they could bust them for whatever it was they were planning. So now we get the department of homeland security which is supposed to handle all of it so that there aren't edge cases where one agency will keep another in the dark to hog all the glory of a bust. All we really needed though was a harch public smackdown of all of the management and glory hounds that caused the whole mess and some bit of law saying that agencies absolutely must hand off cases and intelligence to other agencies when it crosses jurisdictional boundaries.

Depending on depth barnacles and such might not be an issue. The ocean is actually more of a desert than an oasis so far as life goes.

I would propose whole units that could be towed up to the surface and placed in a barge for cleaning. It would probably be best to have a replacement unit already prepared and just swap them.

One of the things I'm curious about is whether or not sediment buildup could be a problem. The generate power from the tide the water must be slowed down. When the flow slows more sediment will settle out. Over time I wonder if the generating units will dune themselves in.

I like a lot of what you said there, especially the public money funding private patents.

I think another avenue though would be to limit federal student loans to some arbitrary cost per credit hour. Structure it so that if you want a Federal loan you had better be going to a very good value institution like a community college for the first couple years.

Now that's not entirely fair. Sure the Health Insurance companies have been actively exploiting peoples illness for personal gain in unfair ways, but they can still find a use in the solution. Have you looked at the organ donor waiting lists? If we only took a single kidney, part of a liver, and an eye from each Health Insurance executive we could help a lot of people!

I've been using a Seiko Kinetic Titanium for just over a decade now and I love it. The weight difference over my old stainless steel watch is very noticeable. And since it's a quartz movement powered by a capacitor and pendulum I've never had to wind it or replace a battery.

This really comes down to only the most extreme views on any subject garnering media coverage and hence becoming topics of general conversation. So far as global warming goes both sides have their own village idiots that spout off at every opportunity and make predictions that have no bearing on reality. What's sad is that even the most intelligent among us can fall for believing that any of those idiots are right. My Grandfather who is very smart and worked as a nuclear engineer for much of his life dismissed the entirety of global warming as a hoax because some insane prededictions he heard about it in the 1970's never came to pass. To me this is the equivilant of dismissing the principles of fire safety at christmas because once we left the lights on all night and the house didn't burn down.

Not all man made climate change has to be a result of industrial revolution processes. Just look at what's happening with the rain forrests. The Dust Bowl wasn't caused by industrial revolution events but by idiotic farming practices, many of which we still do today.

And to be perfectly fair the famine was man made entirely. While there was blight and so crops were less productive the lords exported record setting amounts of potatoes to other parts of the empire. The blight was used as an excuse to starve out the serfs and get them off valuable land.

Woah, woah, woah there!

If you hire them as civil servants that'll cost a lot more money. The salaries aren't anywhere near similiar. And while a civilian has to pay for some of their healthcare and retirement benefits you can bet the cost is much lower for military members. And if they actually have the gall to save for their retirement you then have to do some matching.

I always thought it was funny that my being fat, while still able to beat the other PT standards, was a big enough deal to possibly get an Admin discharge. Meanwhile so long as you could shoot something like 28% with the M16A2 everything was honky dorry. I qualified expert every damn time I went to the range and when someone actually challeneged me I shot 98% in a timed test, with one misfire and two stoppages. In an organization where shooting at other people is a real possibility, the only reward for being a good marksman is a ribbon for bragging rights.

What if it's swearing that makes someone uncomfortable? What if their idea of swearing and yours differ significantly? I received detention in school for using the words "pissed off" and "damn it" on seperate occasions both in a humorous context, but apparently my teachers were offended. The solution you imply is not workable because everyone has different opinions and thresholds of what is acceptable behaviour. The best we can really hope for is to enact and enforce laws that the majority can accept, and then allowing individuals to live in whichever society they prefer. Of course this results in some countries requiring the practical subjugation of half their population, and not allowing freedom of movement, and some groups actually want to force their views on others.