That's what stars do. They're spoiled brats. It's not good, it's not right, but it's certainly normal. People ride the star's gravy train and are, usually, willing to put up with it. See Charlie Sheen in Two and a Half Men or Christian Bale absolutely losing it while filming Terminator (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0auwpvAU2YA). Hell, I went with some friends to watch a taping of the show "Friends" over a decade ago and we were there from 10am to 9pm, watching very, very little of the show being taped because Jennifer Anniston was "having a bad day" and didn't want to come out. We weren't allowed to leave our seats to get food unless we were leaving permanently. That day sucked.

Moreover, it wasn't that "his food wasn't warm". It's that there was no regular dinner. They had finished filming at 10 or 11pm and the hotel cook staff had already gone home. All that was left was a cheese/meat plate. Clarkson was already drunk, so his inner asshole was more pronounced than normal. That's obviously no excuse, rationale, or justification, but it's a more correct appraisal of what actually led to whatever happened.

You're thinking of Mr. Darcy in Pride and Prejudice.

The UK has much, much lower tolerances for satire and criticism than the US. Check out this list of "screw-ups" that Clarkson made-- all of which contributed to his final release from the BBC. (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/motoring/top-gear/11137651/Poll-Which-of-Jeremy-Clarksons-gaffes-is-worse.html) Almost all of the "wrongs" done have been issues of him being "rude".

Drink-driving, July 2008 - The press would like to have you believe that this is was illegal and atrocious. But it wasn't. He was in a customized, polar-ready Toyota Hilux driving to the North Pole over international waters. There were no roads. There were no people on the ice. There were no laws forbidding drinking behind the wheel.

Lorry drivers, November 2008 - Like many subgroups, Clarkson feigned disdain for truck drivers by describing them as hard-working, but sloppy, porno-obsessed men who murder prostitutes. This fits perfectly in with his "overgrown ignorant man-child" character that he plays on TV.

Gordon Brown, February 2009 - He called the Prime Minister a "one-eyed Scottish idiot". The PM is blind in one eye. It's disrespectful but does no damage to anyone.

Black Muslim Lesbians, October 2009 - In an exaggerated protest of diversity efforts within the BBC, Clarkson said that the BBC was obsessed with hiring black, Muslim lesbians. He never implied that it was a bad thing (especially since he's quite fond of lesbians), but was point out the obsession with diversity.

Burkas and lingerie, July 2010 - During a Top Gear discussion on distractions while driving: “Honestly, the burka doesn’t work. I was in a cab in Piccadilly the other day when a woman in a full burka crossing the road in front of me tripped over the pavement, went head over heels and up it came, red g-string and stockings.” Again, this is a conversation between a few "guys" on an exaggerated comedy show, not Sesame Street. There's no reason for this to be a mark on one's record.

Special needs, August 2010 - Clarkson referred to a Ferrari as 'special needs' and a 'simpleton' as a way of giving it a bad review. Many people still use the term "retarded" to describe an action today. Some people take offense to it. In the UK, when "some people take offense", it's a scandal.

Mexico, February 2011 - An actual issue! Clarkson, during a discussion on Top Grear with fellow presenters James May and Richard Hammond, described Mexicans as "a lazy, feckless, flatulent oaf with a moustache, leaning against a fence asleep". This is prejudice and stereotyping of impermutable characteristics and they deserved every bit of flak they got for it... but that's audacity humor for you.

India, January 2012 - Viewers complained about Clarkson's provocative remarks concerning the country's clothing, trains, food and history. To be fair, they demonstrated the issues with the trains and food, but I don't remember them saying anything critical of their clothing or history. Clarkson put a toilet seat on the back of his car "just in case" he got diarrhea. Ask anyone who has been to India-- this is a genuine concern. I have colleagues *from India* who refuse to drink anything but bottled and will refuse ice when offered (since it's made from tap water).

The 'N'-word, May 2014 - First off, Clarkson never said the N-word in the purported clip. He never even mumbled it. As he said in his explanation, they had done 3 takes of a scene where he was reciting "Eeny Meeny Miny Mo" where in the old school version would use the term n**ger. In one take, he murmured something to take the place of the word. In the second take, he left the space blank. In the third take, he replaced the word with "teacher". In reviewing the takes, he immediately contacted his production crew and ordered them not to use the first take because if you turn it up REALLY loud, you can convince yourself that the word is being said when it wasn't. (Paul is dead.) YEARS LATER, the video of the unused take resurfaced and somehow became a scandal.

Slope, July 2014 - Ofcom said he had breached their guidelines, when he referred to an Asian person as a 'slope', again on the BBC2 show, while on location in Burma. The fact of the matter is that the Top Gear team had just finished building a bridge over a river and in viewing the bridge while a local Asian worker was walking over it, Clarkson and Hammond were discussing the quality of the build. Clarkson mentioned that the bridge "had a slope on it" directly stating that the bridge was leaning, but allowing the viewer to associate the appraisal of the bridge with the outmoded slur for the Asian worker crossing the bridge. Clarkson did not directly call an Asian person a slope-- he played a mind game with the viewer, much like this well-memed "legs or lamp" image (http://goo.gl/BwGEdF).

Argentina, October 2014 - In their visit to Argentina, Clarkson drove a Porsche with the license plate H1982FKL which some locals took as a reference to the Falkland Islands War. It was well-proven that the license place came with the used Porsche when Top Gear purchased it.

Fracas, February 2015 - After a long day of shooting, a producer had to tell the Top Gear team that the hotel's cooking staff had gone home and there would be no hot meal-- instead, a cheese and meat plate. Clarkson, who had already worked his way through a bottle of wine, was belligerent and verbally abused the producer. Whether Clarkson punched the producer is still not 100% clear because, due to the flowery way in which these things are described, there has been no direct statement of such. The most clear statement was that "Clarkson aimed a punch"-- but what in the world does that mean? A wind-up? A thrown punch, but a miss? An actual strike? All that's known is that the whole thing lasted 30 seconds (from first yell to being broken up) and the producer left with a fat lip. In the US, this "Fracas" would get Clarkson in trouble, but not thrown off the show. Just look at Charlie Sheen.

Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing the Required Tools for Intercepting and Obstructing Terrorism.

It's a hi' falootin' acronym, so it need to be capitalized. (http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/PLAW-107publ56/pdf/PLAW-107publ56.pdf)

Because the of the external costs of retrofitting the plant with GHG emissions capture is less reliable and more expensive than simply switching to natural gas.

I'm not even too concerned with interference. I'm concerned with batteries. Replaceable, non-replaceable-- it doesn't matter. I would much rather have a lighter keyboard and mouse that never needs to be recharged because they get their power via USB. I would much rather not have to eventually dispose of the toxic Li-On batteries let alone the entire device when the non-replaceable battery craps out.

This is the classic ruse we've heard for years but in other sectors.

We need more skilled teachers!
We need more nurses!
We need more doctors!
We need more ... computer programmers!

And then the educational system ramps up to make those teachers, nurses, doctors, and programmers... but no one's actually hiring. There's a need, but that need is irrelevant unless there are jobs. Take the assertion that there are 545,000 IT jobs waiting to be filled until there's a list of positions and locations.

We are still a very, very long way off from any attempt at saturating American roads with driverless vehicles. It won't happen until we have decided (at the legislative level) how liability is to be handled and set some very specific guidelines for human take-over of the driverless vehicles.

I'm still trying to figure out which will hit the mass market first: battery-swapping EVs, hydrogen fuel cell vehicles, or driverless vehicles. I have a feeling it's in that order.

Disclaimer: I work in an administrative department and am not a programmer or IT support employee. I just happen to be the dept's "power user", so I know how to fix 99% of problems which is a boon to our IT group who sits in an office 1.5 miles away as the crow flies.

My response, however, has nothing to do with tech support. It has everything to do with people not trimming down what they have to say to a 5-10 minute discussion sans digressions. Some people can do that just fine. Others just need to go on and on and on and on. I never have a "relaxed" day. Most people in the office stay fairly stressed because we do as much as possible with as little as possible. But there are some that coast ever so comfortably on actually *doing* little, but talking about a lot.

Worse yet, there are people who would prefer to yell between offices or have people in the cubicle farm play telephone for them than pull open our departmentally supported chat program and send a message.

Phone calls demand time now (often insensitive to others' priorities). Yelling is annoying. Walking over to talk in person is useful, but should be used with caution as a 10-minute discussion about a single project can turn into a 1-hour discussion about children. Email is best, but isn't as quick. Text chat is concise is the great intersection of phone calls and emails.

It depends on how you define "risk".

If, to you, risk is a a measure of the severity of a cataclysmic failure, then nuclear power has some fairly bad potential.
If, on the other hand, you measure risk as the likelihood of a cataclysmic failure, then nuclear is pretty damn safe.

Most people measure risk (personally) in potential severity which is why everyone is so afraid of everything. Kids are frequently disallowed from walking or biking to school because there is (technically) an exceedingly low chance of a stranger kidnapping the kid. (~115 kids/year | https://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles...).

Fearful people don't understand probability. And that's understandable. Evolutionarily speaking, fearful people stay alive. They may not advance to procreate as much as those who are willing to take certain risks, but they still survive enough to pass on their ways to their offspring.

THANK YOU!

It's not exactly a summary if such necessary details are omitted.

Background: My heart is in education. One of my passions is sustainable transportation. I've only ever worked in the public sector and with non-profits. I don't ever want to be paid more than $75k/year for my work because I believe that true civil servants should only take what they need (with need being definable individually).

Kurt Vonnegut's book "God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater" spoke to me rather intensely. In that book, the main character, Mr. Rosewater, is so admired by the town of loonies in which he volunteers, that he was asked to baptize a set of twins. These were Mr. Rosewater's words to the babies: “Hello babies. Welcome to Earth. It's hot in the summer and cold in the winter. It's round and wet and crowded. On the outside, babies, you've got a hundred years here. There's only one rule that I know of, babies- 'God damn it, you've got to be kind.' ”

I know that the world is not full of kind people. It's full of people. Many are just scared. Some are mean. Most are kind, but too timid to show it. But I think we could slowly create a better world full of kindness if we actually attempted to instill kindness in our children from a young age.

Suggestion #1: Advise that she defaults to kindness. No, kindness will not always be immediately appreciated, so also advise that she assume that her kindness will be appreciated at some point and to take solace in that it will beneficially affect the person regardless of immediate observation.

Suggestion #2: Advise that sometimes she accept failure and always admit fault. It was a hard-learned lesson in life that sometimes, I fail. Coming to terms with being imperfect is one of the great life lessons. Remind her that to always learn from failure and commit to improvement. Along the same lines, I found that life was much less stressful and my relationships much more rewarding and after I learned to admit fault. "I erred. Here's what I did wrong. I'm sorry. Here's how I plan to be better." Getting into the habit of admitting fault where it's due (even slightly) requires that one be vulnerable... but it also makes others feel safe in vulnerability. When people together learn to admit fault and flaws, they are more accepting, forgiving, and open to change.

Suggestion #3: Advise that in an industry (STEM) still dominated by males, females are frequently uncomfortable with what passes as normal social standards. The worst way to influence change in these situations, with fellow male geeks, is by attack. Geek guys have been attacked their whole lives and when they finally are amongst other geek guys, they finally get to feel safe. Attacking that safety by denigrating the person and demanding change instantly instead of considerately request changes in behavior over time is unwise. We see this most immediately with with the entire GamerGate fiasco where everyone looks like assholes regardless of side or intent. Remember: EVERYONE is insecure and a request for change is frequently seen as an attack. You must be gentle and you must be kind if you want to genuinely affect long-term change.

So what does this mean for me?

Ads and privacy concerns aside, does this mean that if I unblock ads for a site to help their revenue, will these HTML5 adds be less CPU-intensive than the Flash ads? Will they decrease in size (bandwidth concerns on smartphone)?

In what universe is this an "insightful" comment. Let's just take it apart:

"I just don't understand how Slashdot can be flooded with stories of US government incompetence and malfeasance at every level"

-- That's called bias. Slashdot can be flooded with stories about anything as biased by story submitters. There is no implication that the frequency of stories is directly correlated with the truth or severity of an event. Moreover, can you show that Slashdot is actually "flooded" with stories of government incompetence? How does the frequency of those stories compare to the stories of government competence. Or are stories ever really written about government competence?

"yet people swear up and down they can be trusted with healthcare"

-- But they're not entrusted with providing healthcare. The Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) is not a healthcare system. It is not a set of hospitals. It does not train or employ doctors or nurses. It's a set of laws that requires actual insurance providers (who in turn employ healthcare providers) to abide by certain standards and creates a mandate that all citizens be enrolled in a qualifying healthcare plan or pay a fine (equal to the cost of enrolling in a qualifying healthcare plan). Setting health and safety standards and fining people for not meeting those standards is directly in line with the role of the US government.

"Our government is filled with bad and/or stupid people"

-- Really? And how did you come to that conclusion? Survey? Records analysis? Extreme bias? Who is "our government"? Are you considering just elected and appointed officials? What about day-to-day employees? Secretaries, analysts, programmers, coders, engineers, etc. Are they all bad and stupid as well?

"The US government does not have your back. Ever."

-- That's funny, because the various levels of US government has provided me with roads, plumbing, housing, access to safe water, electricity, dial-up and then high-speed internet. The US government made sure I had schooling, food in my belly, a roof over my head, and sufficient health care as a child. The US government paid for a major portion of my college education and made sure that I paid minimal interest on the loans I needed to fill the gap. The US government will also (eventually) help me buy my first home and provide the standards that will require the person selling me the home guarantee the safety of said home. Chances are that it has done all of the same for you.

If someone fires a gun at my home, guess who will show up to assist in the capture of that person. A government employee.
If I ever get thrown in jail and need representation despite having no money to pay for representation, guess who will try to protect my rights. A government employee.
If I find out that a neighbor's child is being abused and I need to get that kid to safety, guess who will be there to help me do so. A government employee.
If I want to travel from Los Angeles to New York in 5 hours with a near 100% guarantee of my safe transportation, guess who will make that possible. A crap ton of government employees partnering with private industry.

You say that the US government does not have "your" back. I assert that the only reason most of us have the opportunity to to read or write such comments online so frivolously is the effort of a massive amount of government employees.

Yes, the US government, from the president to the lowest municipal worker, is massive. Yes, it hemorrhages money at many points because bad people get employed (everywhere). But the only reason that our government is so massive is because you want such an extremely luxurious life and aren't willing to put in all the effort to sort it out yourself.

Want to try it? Go ahead. Don't use ANY public services. No running water. No roads. No products affected by safety standards or food grown/raised with government-based safety standards. See how long you live and how happy your life is.

People comment based on experiences or the stories of others.

Women have, historically, had the socially-supported option of getting pregnant instead of being old and single or instead of entering the workforce. In fact, entering the workforce is still a relatively new concept for women and still not universal throughout the world. Men still have the socially-enforced expectation of tying one's finances to the mother of his children regardless of the involvement of those men in the lives of the children or the mother. This is a genuine hobbling of the uninvolved man's life post impregnation and thus fear of a coerced pregnancy is a significant fear amongst men. As a result, SOME men are suspicious of women when it comes to birth control.

Thus, you shouldn't be surprised by pessimistic online comments reading as "Women trick men into marriage by getting pregnant".

But it does not define the entirety of the population. It MAY describe a part of an aging population of experiences (the younger generation doesn't seem too keen on popping babies out), but by no means defines an entire community.

You can see such patterns of experiences -> comments by taking a look at your own. Your experience with your wife (cooperative birth control expectations, a happy outlook on parenthood, etc.) will bias you towards believing that women have not/do not use pregnancy as a investment-- but it would also suggest that you're fairly far-removed from the lives your male peers if you cannot understand their fears.