Linux has always been taking over servers, and {year + 1} is always the year Linux is going to take over the desktop.

If anything, MS is tightening whatever it was that got loosed.

Gas is cheap.. so let's ruin everyone's standard of living?

Those groups could publish anything they wanted during that time.

Like I said, you can play connect-the-dots and get back to free speech from what the IRS did, but I don't see it as an attack on free speech. Rounding them up and jailing them for tax violations would get me there, but that's not what happened. I get your point and it may have been in the minds of the government officials involved, but unless they were to admit to it, there's no way to prove that it was to silence them or that it was done to harass them. It's abuse of power either way. Whether it's an attack on free speech.. I guess we have our own opinions on it.

Sorry. It wasn't an attack Dubya thing. I was barely a teenager in '88.

If anything, it probably encouraged conservatives to have more rallies. Instead of the typical rhetoric about "big government", the IRS went after them personally which adds weight to the claims they had been making all along. It's almost a Streisand Effect. The TEA Party was starting to fizzle out at that point. The actions of the IRS reignited it for a time and gave the GOP a reason to put the federal government on trial (in front of a special committee anyway).

Nothing that the IRS did would stop me from rounding up some of my political cohorts and having a rally. In some countries, people put their lives at risk for speaking out. That's not even in the same realm as the IRS scandal.

What the IRS did was to punish people for speaking. The TEA Party rallies weren't shut down. The postal service didn't take their fliers to the dump instead of delivering them. Speakers weren't assassinated. Radio stations weren't shut down. Parts of the Internet didn't become unreachable. Free speech itself was still in effect.

You could argue that what the IRS did made it more difficult for conservatives to get their message out, and that's an issue, but that's not a clear-cut direct assault on free speech. I think we have to distinguish between the two. And believe me, I'm not apologizing or trying to minimize what the IRS did, people should be in prison for that. The fact remains that you're free to say whatever you want, but it might have consequences. That has always been true.

BS.

The US government didn't attempt to suppress the free speech of OWS or the TEA Party. Even the RNC's boneheaded idea of having "free speech zones" back when Dubya was in charge was summarily shot down by both sides.

Free speech may lead to more consequences since the times of Reagan, but free speech itself is still alive and well. The current administration even wanted to have a government official in each newsroom, and that was quickly shot down too, even in this very polarized administration.

It was not a predatory plan, it was a premium plan. It had excellent coverage. I'm not a lawyer nor an accountant so delving into the particular requirements of the thousands of pages of new regs that led to the policy's demise is a bit much to ask. I had the same policy for a number of years.

The AHA doesn't lower costs, it raises them. All the insurers and health care providers have to ensure they're compliant which is not a cheap thing to do. That expense alone raises costs. I'm judging the performance based on my own costs. The amount billed for care I've received previously haven't changed significantly, it's the replacement plan paying out less. So it's not the cost of care that's increasing, it's my out of pocket expense. So the new plan costs more and covers less. Maybe I'm in an unlucky edge case, but I hear a lot of people say the same of their own situation. Even the health care providers I see are complaining about it.

If Medicare pays so much, why had places like the Mayo Clinic dumped all their patients that have it? That's not a thing that is done lightly. That was a big talking point while the legislation was being debated. Many facilities across the country are faced with dropping those patients or charging more to everyone else to eat the loss. You're pointing to the pay as a problem, but it's not true that every doctor is raking in a fortune. With the decrease in compensation for services rendered, they have fit more patients in just to keep the lights on. Some specialists may be making a ton of money, but IMO, they've earned it. I don't want a minimum wage surgeon operating on me.

You have way too high an opinion of single payer. Visit the UK sometime and listen to their news and call in shows about the horror stories of the NHS. Canada has a problem with wait lists similar to our VA. I needed surgery before the AHA for a somewhat rare issue and was in the OR within about three months. I've spoken with people in Canada who had been wait listed for multiple years because there's an arbitrary cap on the number of those surgeries that can be performed annually, regardless of how bad a shape the patient is in. I met one of those patients at a hospital here in the US. They were here because they couldn't bear the pain and other symptoms any longer.

We're a fast food nation that doesn't exercise. That's less of a problem in the rest of the "developed" world. I think you probably realize that already.

We do have the best system. A lot of the groundbreaking advances in medicine happen right here in the states. It's not misconception, but the self-haters among us would like everyone else to believe that. I am seeing one of the leading specialists right now at one of our best hospitals. My old policy paid a lot more of the bills for me, but the newer plan still covers it somewhat.. mostly after I hit the annual out-of-pocket. If ever that changed, I would very likely end up on disability and die shortly after. I've seen many specialists and it wasn't until I went to the "expensive" hospital to see the "expensive" doctor that we finally came up with a way of keeping me in the workforce. That's why I take this whole mess very personally. Your life may not depend on it, but mine certainly does.

I don't like Obama's "take the pain pill instead of the surgery" rhetoric. I recall Governor Patrick of MA on the radio saying that one way to control costs would be to do as you suggest, block people from going to the best facilities. That's great, because for me, that's a death sentence. How dare any of you. Single payer would almost certainly implement such restrictions. The best care would then only be available to the uber rich that could pay out of pocket. No thanks.

I know that the AHA was responsible for the cancellation because that was the reason cited. Granted, they could have been lying, but the only reason would have been because the plan was no longer viable given the new requirements put in effect by the legislation, which would still mean that it was cancelled by the AHA.

Of course it was supposed to lower costs. That's what was pitched to the public. The first A stands for AFFORDABLE. Increasing out of pocket expenses is the opposite of making something more affordable. The average family's costs were supposed to decrease by a substantial amount, and for a lot of people, that never happened. The biggest group of people benefiting are those who get subsidized policies, but many of them had insurance before. Their costs went up like mine and suddenly they had to be subsidized. Some resent it. They don't understand how any of this helped when they used to be self sufficient and now rely on handouts to pay for a lesser policy than they had before.

I don't want single payer. It's not the federal government's job to force it on us. People from countries that have it come here for care they can't receive in their own country. That should tell you something. People in the UK go on medical vacations to other countries for treatment. The VA is constantly in trouble, federal programs like Medicare underpay doctors and hospitals forcing them to either close or to refuse to see those patients. You see where this is headed? Single payer would destroy health care in our country. That's what federal bureaucracy does.

There absolutely were secret wait lists. They were exposed, which is why we now know of them. Your point there is moronic. The fact that they existed for so long shows the depravity of the federal government with regard to people's health.

Your poor outcomes are lifestyle choices, not the fault of the system. Too many people make poor choices on diet and exercise, drug abuse, etc. It's "cool" to kill yourself slowly over time here. Single payer doesn't fix that. If anything, it encourages it. There's no longer any imposed financial burden. The US has a culture that's far different than that of any other nation. Those one to one comparisons do not work.

You're waving a loaded gun around. We have the best doctors and facilities in the world, and people like you are dead-set on destroying it.

If you want to have a real conversation, stop posting as AC. It's rude.

They should have stood up for their CEO and their organization. It's painfully obvious that being seen as a social justice organization is not good for them. They have alienated a good number of people. Attacks like this do not serve to protect a free and open Internet. Mozilla should have explained this in plain terms. You can disagree with the man's opinion in his role as an individual, but it should not spill over into his workplace. You say he still commits code, why hasn't OkStupid gone after him again then? Because it had nothing to do with his role, it was a personal attack. The liberal machine knocked him off a high perch and that's all this was ever about. Mozilla let it happen.

You want to know what they could have done? Read up on "Arthur T DeMoulas". He was a CEO of a supermarket chain here in New England. He was fired from his position in a power grab, and the employees walked off their jobs for weeks on end to defend him. They stood by their CEO even as it cost them their livelihood, because they believed that much in what they were doing and believed so much in their former CEO. They ultimately won. What happened to Eich should not have happened, and it could have been stopped.

Frankly, you prove my point. If what you hint at is true, that Mozilla was unable to rally their workers to defend their CEO, then that validates the general opinion that Mozilla is, in fact, an organization in pursuit of social justice. It may not be in the mission statement, but it's in the heads of the people working for them. Hence my point that their brand is toxic, and so is their software.

Now run along AC, go sign up for an account. They're free. Fortunately, Dice doesn't shun people for their political beliefs.

I wasn't able to keep my plan, and it was not a shitty plan. My health care costs have risen since the AHA took effect. Plans were supposed to continue and costs were supposed to go down.

Single payer is a nightmare. We have some of the best health care facilities in the world. Single payer will end that. We'd all be on secret waiting lists like the folks trying to get treatment at the VA. The only thing I see that would have been an improvement would have been to try and separate health insurance from our employers. Even that may have been "careful what you wish for".

No, I care about free speech and people's right to privacy. I don't see that Mozilla did anything to keep Eich in place and they allowed things to get out of control to the point where he couldn't continue. He was under fire from people within the organization just as much as he was from the likes of OkStupid. There were people there that posted about it, that they were too scared to speak up within the organization because they didn't want to be next. Are you assuming they were all shameless opportunists too? That's the atmosphere he was faced with. Mozilla failed. Eich was taken out by friendly fire as well as by the liberal propaganda machine. The fact that I'm still pissed about it doesn't mean it didn't happen.

I might not like their partnership with Google, but it's a valid business decision. Letting Eich's situation go the way it did is not valid and is 100% against a free and open Internet. To act like this is no big deal is shameless.

Sadly true. Although regulation could make it worse. At least the majority of the population isn't still using dial-up modems.

I don't think regulation is really what we need. Competition is what is needed. Look at high definition television. Cable companies offered very little for the longest time because they didn't have to. DirecTV went nuts and launched a number of new satellites and all at once switched the majority of their programming to HD. All of a sudden, the cable companies started scrambling (pun) to increase their HD offerings because they'd lose customers otherwise.

The same could work for Internet, except we're stuck with the wires on poles problem.

I still use DSL. It's slow, it's not very reliable.. but the only other "choice" I have is Comcast. So.. no choice.

O makes O sound bad. The "what I meant was" spin on "you can keep your health plan" is a perfect example.

That's your belief. It's not shared by everyone, or even the majority. In fact, most places that have voted have voted against your opinion. It's only some of the courts that are in your favor, and that kind of lawmaking from the courts should be abhorrent to all of us.

That's not even the point. It could have been any political issue. What was done by activists in getting him removed was completely inappropriate.

Eich didn't stand down on his own, he was forced to. We all know it. He didn't accept the job and then just suddenly change his mind. He was forced out. Rather than take a long battle through the courts, he walked away to move on to something else, rather than get stuck on this issue for years. He's the only one involved that had any dignity.

As for paranoia.. no. If they are now in the business of social activism, they cannot be trusted. CA law states that workers cannot be punished for political donations, but that didn't stop anyone. There is no reason to believe that they would not go data mining for other people to punish under the mantra of "progress". Their organization and their products are toxic.