Perhaps we should license bike use then? Additionally make the driver's tests something a blind cave fish trained by Ms. Keller couldn't pass?

Yep... all cyclists do that. Just like all motorists talk on their cellphone all the time and all women are secretaries.

I lot of cyclists, myself and the ones I ride with included, follow the traffic laws.

I challenge you to a race. 100meters. Pick any car you like (can't be a motorcycle). I'll ride a bike. I figure since we're getting silly with this argument, it might as well come down to it.

It does come down to state law. Speaking as someone who's had a teammate get his head crushed by a car passing too close (he lost control of his bike while they were passing), 3 feet is not too close. Dead is permanent, but roads are almost always wide enough at some point to give 3 feet.

Should motorcycles be illegal? Your basis is on the fact that cyclists are minimally protected from being hit with heavy machinery. Perhaps the heavy machinery should drive on heavy machinery routes designated to go between industrial zones and commercial zones, on their own roads, only being allowed to drive elsewhere in the case of specific delivery or need.

I've been ticketed for riding on the sidewalk. Of course, I was going 35mph, so I'd consider it fair. I've also been cut off, hit, cursed at, spat at, and threatened with weapons, by assholes like you, for riding in the right-hand side of a lane on a public road that I pay taxes to maintain. I've often wondered, given the similar amounts of provocation I gave these motorists, why they don't routinely do the same thing to mail carriers. What makes it different?

If you should get your wish, I hope you don't plan on ever walking anywhere, because there's almost as many dumbasses who ride bicycles as dumbasses like you, so look out for a 6 foot retractible right side bar under the car to trip up douchebag pedestrians. They call them sidewalks for a reason. Bicycles are vehicles, and vehicles drive on things called roads.

Ohio has (or had if they discontinued it, not sure) a law where repeat convicted offenders of DUI laws get a special yellow license plate with red letters, contrasting the normal colors of Ohio license plates. The biggest difference between that and this is those are served upon convictions.

Not so sure about arrests. I mean, there's really nothing you're going to do to refute a breathalyzer, but due process has to be respected.

Bags of sand?

I'll grasp who I like, thank you very much.

Those are the facts, as far as I know them. Consider the situation in Afghanistan though. More than a half-million casualties, over a decade of war. The country was blown to pieces. Then the Soviets back out, and so does the US, without much, if any, further aid to get Afghanistan back on its feet. Considering that the US was giving weapons, but no people, to the effort, one could feel like one just got used as the personal army of a third party pretty easily.

The wikipedia section (mind, I didn't edit it, promise) you point to goes on to say that after the Soviets (and the US) left in 1989, Afghanistan experienced a leadership vacuum that led to civil war and the eventual rise of the Taliban. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe they're purported to have something to do with the attacks on the WTC.

And New York was a retribution for US's lack of support in Afghanistan. US's lack of support there was a result of a war objective with the USSR being completed. If you look back on political history far enough, it just starts to look like one giant mosh pit where countries occasionally die.

Is throwing the Rubik's Cube against a wall a valid solution? If so I think I have a valid solution to your query.

But when's the last time you lounged in a chair in torn jeans and $150 dress shoes, a dress shirt covered nicely with a sweater vest, horn rimmed glasses and just-greasy-enough hair, looking up casually at the passers by before returning to one-handedly surfing for the latest website for wholly organic silica gel packets, at your local Burger King? That kind of policy just doesn't have the right flow, man.

Yeah, I guess I was thinking more along the lines of "there'll be more that meets the eye in the future than meets the eye right now." From a purely government point of view, it might not be that great. Didn't Spain get some nice bling from Central America and Mexico though?

Good point, but space exploration is kinda like particle physics in that sense (or discovering America for that matter). You go in looking for one thing (which we need to find) but the good finds come out the other side with something totally unexpected, and totally awesome. I don't think we need better than a "we could probably make some cash doing this," sort of probability before it's time to jump on it... I just hope the folks with the big bucks agree.