Back in 2003 the company I was working for shared a building with GiantInsuranceCompany.

One day coming in to work I noticed that the dumpster near the entrance I used was overflowing with stuff.

The stuff was hundreds of Model M keyboards being thrown out. I snagged about 50 of them and gave about 20 away. Kept 30 for myself. Down to 20 now because I've gifted some more away. Over time I've picked up some new ones from EBay. Including a black one with nipple.

I wish I had appreciated the value of these fully. Back in the 1980's I had a 3101 terminal which had a very clicky keyboard so I knew I liked the feel. But I had no idea these would become almost a cult.

We don't recapture military costs. We don't recapture climate costs (we can't even quantify that). We don't recapture pollution costs. We increasingly don't recapture road maintenance/construction costs.

Some states just dump gas taxes into general revenues and borrow road maintenance costs (Yes NJ I'm looking at YOU).

Plus the tax is ridiculously regressive.

Not to mention roads have a lot of other external economic effects, both positive and negative.

I think we should just get rid of gas taxes. So when something replaces gas we won't be trying to tax that to replace gas revenues.

Law enforcement is likely to be able to get around that.

Since the invention of the wheel machines have been replacing labor. The result has always been temporary displacement in the labor force and increased overall standards of living.

It won't be any different this time.

Blimps and dirigibles maybe.

I'm going with Phoenicians at about 350 BC as the first westerners in the Americas.

Comparing teacher salaries to private sector salaries is misleading. Often teachers have benefits that cannot be matched in the private sector including generous defined benefit pensions, retirement health care and time off. Total teacher compensation is heavily back-end loaded.

http://www.ed.gov/oii-news/tea...

He must be using a Microsoft spell checker.

Isn't there a more specific property that doesn't rely on location specific strings?

I mean the whole friggen world isn't English.

A science denier would just make an ad hominem attack, like you did.

I don't know about you, but the cards I've been getting recently include a chip in order to support two factor authentication via chip and signature.

The problem is the retailers haven't implemented terminals to support it yet.

Well the possibility is that at some level the weather will exhibit chaotic behavior and no matter how big your model gets it won't matter - the coin flip will be just as good.

The thing about this that pisses me off is the question WHY HAVEN'T THEY ALREADY DONE IT.

Crikey football legislation gets fast tracked and important crap like tax entitlement and immigration reform - nothing.

Throw the bums out is basically the only reasonable thing at this point.

Have you followed McCain's comments in the news at all? I seriously believe that we would be at war in 7 countries now if he had been elected.

And then there is his VP candidate. The fact that he selected that batshit crazy ex-governor-dumbass for VP is prima facia evidence of senile dementia. Much as his miserable debate performance showed.

While Obama has done a shitty job in a lot of ways, putting forth McCain as a viable alternative is flat out insane.