So they have to stream the music at least once in order for it to get to the SD card. That implies the existence of all that power consuming infrastructure, whether or not it gets used to stream music 5 days a week.

The thing is, he doesn't have to think about it. India is the only country on your list that doesn't have a native population with fertility at or below replacement rate.

File server is clearly better in that case because it can store a lot of other peoples' single photos too while you're wasting a whole SD card on one user. The file server is somewhat more resources consumed than that SD card, but those resources are split over a large number of people, while the SD card only supports one person. That's not even getting to the functionality aspect.

In what ways? Obviously, we're not choking on high levels of smog. But neither are we enjoying the fruits of economic success compared to China. Regulation is responsible for both the cleaner environment and the killing of the economic golden goose.

Three common problems with these "small compromises" is that a) the proposer is often entirely clueless about the issue, b) the "compromises" aren't small, and c) they often don't actually do anything for the environment.

Considering your example of the SUV driver, why should their need to prove their manliness be less important than your feelings about the environment? Merely, being slightly more polluting than alternatives is not IMHO compelling.

Pretty much sums up the problems with environmentalism. It's "us versus them" with clearly identified hate targets like businesses and gas-guzzling SUVs. For example, do you really think that environmentalists never start their own businesses?

If this is what people want (and for a lot of people, yes, this is what they want), then I'm not going to take it away from them.

Which thing? Your post or how NASA "does it"?

Exactly. When you take wealth from some to pay others to do useless or even harmful things, you're destroying value and creating opportunity costs. Just because you don't see the window, doesn't mean it wasn't broken.

Yes, it's so unfair to be blamed for monumentally poor management of a project.

That's a non sequitur. Even if Lockheed was being paid to make a viable fighter jet - rather than the reality that they were paid whether or not they made a viable fighter jet - it's not the same as being paid a large pile of money to do an IT project.

That's a different issue. FOIA applies to public work done by private companies as it does for public work done by US/UK government organizations.

In other words, a relatively nasty government. So what are you going to do about it? And why treat them any differently than say Zimbabwe or North Korea?