errr ... 'he' = 'Snowden'. Bad missing antecedent, bad!

You don't rendition a prisoner to a black site for punishment - you do it to send a message to would-be followers. The UK flight tracking club has already disclosed that the CIA rendition plane was sent to Scotland as he was fleeing west and we know they grounded President Morales's plane to grab him the next day. That's a preponderance of evidence.

This is misinformed - he was transiting through Russia when the US revoked his passport, and according to the stupid nation-state rules, that grounded him. If anybody chose where to cause Snowden to seek asylum it was John Kerry. He would have been in Latin America if not for the US State Department. Which, ironically would have been worse for him because the USG has no compunction about doing covert ops there. #monroedoctrine

which they do with barely a whimper and certainly without action - so Detroit is wise to assume they will again, continue producing crappy cars, and give themselves fat bonuses.

They can improve the quality but the real deal is that Apple is ditching the 3.5mm jack for a digital, DRM, patent-encumbered connector. Beats will have it - if you want the cool headphones you gotta give up your Android. The royalties will enforce exclusively.

Apple has to do *something* to stop its marketshare slide - that they didn't put the $3B into R&D tells you how desperate the internal numbers look.

then go out with a Darwin for the hattrick?

not as socially poignant as Space Worms.

Google makes it clear you're talking to a corporation, Apple forces you to anthropomorphize your machine. Match goes to Google.

That means they should also forfeit the right to sovereign immunity. So fuck these assholes.

Correct. They can be prosecuted for breaking and entering, assault with a deadly weapon, involuntary restraint, kidnapping, etc.

Your move, Mass Gestapo, err, I mean SWAT.

No kidding - the GP has never done any driver development.

Which is why this project should just be canceled. There are private companies working on this. We don't have the USG competing with Intel, "just in case" they don't beat Moore's law. There's not compelling national security interest in putting a man on Mars - the whole program should just be defunded and let the companies work out how to do it. Return the money to the taxpayers, pay for some more healthcare, or whatever - the first step is realizing that the NASA model is not required in this case.

Yeah, yeah, pork for Congressional districts.

Yes, it's fun to have a discussion with people who can think beyond next breakfast but it's no fun having them with people who consider themselves so "smart" and aloof to join a club that selects its members by intelligence.

So, I joined up when I started a business because it was the most economical professional organization that had travel discount deals with big rental companies. And I knew where my SAT scores were so it was easy.

I've only been to a couple meetups, but the people weren't as you suppose and the conversation was good. No better or worse than a LUG meeting or showing up at a lecture at the local college, except fewer STEM nerds than you'd expect. I associate with all sorts of people who all have valuable contributions to make, but once in a while I enjoy intellectual engagement of the sort that high-IQ people tend to offer. Some members favor the board game nights because other members tend not to be easy to beat. etc. - there are benefits to any mutual support group of like individuals.

Point being, don't cast aspersions based on assumptions and hypotheticals when you could simply find out the truth of the matter easily enough by attending a meetup (I've never seen an ID check at a brunch or whatever). That would be the 'smart' thing to do.

Oh, and the TFS is vomitous - surely nobody without significant mental illness could be attracted to such a thing.

Yeah, that East German wall did a great job of keeping out the evil capitalists!

Snark aside, he could 3D print these. If it's just a tower of useless space (seems like a waste) then robots could do all the assembly. He'll probably need a few nuclear reactors to make all the cement and steel required, not to mention the mining. And an armada of delivery trucks if robot drivers aren't rolling by then.

Hey, there's some suggestive evidence that our universe may be discrete and quantized around 10^-27 (and cheats to the Plank length). That's almost aether.

Granted, we should study the skull surface shape of these scientists, just to be sure.

I only intend that the supreme court is tasked with interpreting the standing of the law itself as well as the standing of the law against a person.

The curiosity there is that the Constitution doesn't give them this power (they only 'discovered' it in Marbury v. Madison) yet they hold themselves as interpreters of the Constitution.

Infinite recursion, bus error.

What we should have is a clear decision on the facts of the law, and if the law is unclear, it should be cancelled and sent back to Congress, stamped Void for Vagueness.