We've had many epidemics in the US. We've had scarlet fever, tuberculosis, cholera, typhus, polio, dengue, malaria, leprosy, influenza named after various places and creatures... the list is endless.

The problem is the CDC lost focus. With a relative lack of communicable diseases for going on five decades, like all bureaucracies with not enough to do they started expanding their portfolio to include lots of things you wouldn't think belong under "disease control" and took their eye off the ball. Now that we have a bona fide health threat all they know how to do is hold press conferences telling us not to worry.

The one thing the CDC doesn't need is more power and money. They already have broad emergency powers, and if they have enough money to do gun control studies and lesbian weight gain studies they already have too much money.

As a side note, the director would be a lot easier to support if he wasn't obviously lying when he says there's nothing to worry about. We're not children, buddy, so don't treat us like children. Obviously this strain of Ebola is quite a bit more contagious than earlier strains, and it falls in about the middle of the lethality range normal for that disease (20%-80%). We should be restricting travel from affected countries, and anyone coming in from those countries should be quarantined for 21 days.

True "patent trolls", the way I've always understood them, were always small companies. Once large companies start suing each other it becomes MAD. I win in Korea with patent A, you win in the US, you sue me in the EU with patent B, I sue you in China with patent C... Look at the way the Samsung-Apple war played out (is that over?).

But if the company is just a patent portfolio, there's no way for the victim to retaliate. The cheapest way out is to settle, which gives them enough money to go after the next guy (hopefully one of your competitors).

This is a situation faced by millions. You want to do something for a living but there aren't any jobs. They should really accept that fact and move on like everyone else. It's particularly hard to have sympathy in that this isn't something that just happened yesterday - it's been a long time since getting an academic position was likely. Longer than it takes to get a PhD.

I find it pretty amusing the same people who cheered the firing of Brendan Eich are outraged over this case. Let's not be hypocritical here.

If we combined a rather large vehicle meant to return with a shuttle-type profile (ceramic heat shield and glide control)...

I'm not convinced the shuttle has much to teach us beyond "don't do it this way". Powered landing has all sorts of advantages over wings, and I think that's where we should be concentrating our efforts.

Can anyone explain to me why we need the SLS when SpaceX is on track to provide the same functionality for a tiny fraction of the price?

While that's probably true it has nothing whatsoever to do with the legal concept of obesity as a disability.

It is seen as especially significant because of rising obesity levels in Europe and elsewhere, including the US.

Eh... no. This decision will have no effect on the US whatsoever. Or are you trying to say obesity in the US had some effect on the European decision? Either way, it's not relevant.

Australia has a pretty high cost of living, too. But more importantly, Australia has a more sensible immigration policy than the US and hasn't flooded the low end of the job market with unskilled labor.

Yes. We can look and see the relatively high cost of living that goes along with it, plus a very high youth unemployment.

How many years have I been hearing this? The South Bay was too expensive. Everyone was moving to Vegas, or Austin, or Massachusetts. They moved all right - to the only place outside Manhattan that was more expensive. Like real estate prices you have to believe it can't go on forever, but it can go on a lot longer than you expected.

That's what I was thinking. Putting earth bacteria on mars is like dropping naked people on the north pole and saying "go forth and multiply". I can't imagine them colonizing anything except in tandem with humans.

Less cynically, Air Force brass have been burned over and over again by companies who lowballs bids and can't deliver. It's human nature to try to steer contracts to companies that have made good on promises in the past.

My was in the Air Force and worked on big contracted projects. You would not believe how often the AF has to deal with companies taking progress payments and then declaring bankruptcy.

Of course the really big contracting decisions are all made on Capitol Hill *cough*F-35*cough*.

Oh, I'm willing to grandfather in people who are already retired, since finding a job at that age isn't a trivial undertaking. But I don't see why someone who is 60 gets to retire at 62 just because that's what he was planning.

I'm suggesting people who were planning to retire at 62 should work until 67 like I'll have to. What kind of planning do you have to do? So they didn't plan to work longer? Boo hoo. I don't want to work longer either.