That one seemed a little weird. Obviously a terrorist who's planning to attack the plane, or wanted for some crime, or on the no-fly list would be in trouble trying to board a plane, but is it illegal to be a terrorist in and of itself? Some terror groups like Hamas and the IRA also have political fronts. Members involved solely in the group's attempts to go legitimate could still be described as terrorists. What's their standing before the law? Then you have situations like Bill Ayers where the guy is a terrorist but also a friend of the President. Good luck telling him he can't get on the plane.

Anyone know of any good double-blind studies comparing people's ability to tell FLAC from 320kbps MP3? Googling just turns up people debating in forums whether you would be able to tell the difference rather than any serious academic research.

... although the UN notes this cannot be done unilaterally ...

I'm pretty that a cease-fire CAN be broken unilaterally. All you have to do is start attacking the other side again.

While we're on the topic of warrantless wiretaps, there's something I've been trying to figure out.

Bush starts the warrantless wiretap thing, the reaction from the left is to fume with anger at the horrible abuse of power.

Obama continues it and adds in the whole "assassinate Americans using robotic aircraft" twist, and reaction from the same people is "I support the President on this, though I have mild reservations on a few aspects".

My question is... what the heck is up with that?

This kind of thing happens whenever you have an opinionated celebrity with controversial views that are at odds with a lot of their fan base. What's more interesting is watching to see how people's support of free speech is tied to how well the speech lines up with their own political views. Of course there is also something to be said for artists sticking to being known for their creative works and not for their extreme political stances.

No more getting two Netflix shipments a week by sending the movie back the day after you receive it.

Booth babes.

Given Obama's propensity for exacerbating every problem he tries to deal with (unemployment, health care premiums, middle class tax rates, gas prices, etc.), promising not to do anything is better than yet another spectacular backfire.

We should save the helium for more critical applications, such as filling up balloons and talking like Munchkins.

The code that has been written in the others pales in comparison to the sublime masterpiece GORILLAS.BAS.

Gun control is to the second amendment what censorship is to the first. These are authoritarian push-backs against the Bill of Rights giving people "too much" freedom. The Internet has shown what happens to such restrictive efforts once an enabling technology is introduced to the masses.

So as a result of Amazon caving to my state on the tax thing, I pay 8% more for my purchases, but might eventually get them a day faster. Not being the impatient and impulsive sort, I liked the old system a lot better.

This could however make other online retailers a lot more attractive. If I want to buy, say, an iPad, the cost is the same from any merchant thanks to price-fixing. So I could buy it locally for instant gratification, or online to save the tax. Before Amazon was my go-to for online purchases, being the fastest of the tax-free options. Now, however, I would go to a competitor with no physical presence in the state in order to save good money for waiting a couple extra days.

The Windows 3.1 most people knew was not part of NT, but Microsoft named its first server OS "Windows NT 3.1" to keep the version numbers the same. NT4 came before Windows 2000 by a few years. Windows 2000 was actually NT5, though Microsoft had changed their naming convention by then so it wasn't marketed under that name.

If you actually look at the platform, the Texas Republicans' opposition is to the Outcome Based Education philosophy. Proponents of this methodology sometimes label it "critical thinking skills" since after all, who doesn't favor that? The summary submitter (and about half of the comments at this point) fall into the same logical fallacy as "If you oppose the PATRIOT Act, you must oppose patriotism!", ironically due to a lack of critical thinking skills...

TFA claims that doing two raids a year gives you a greater than 50% chance of getting caught within 2 years (i.e., 4 raids). Let's check the math...
After 1 raid you have a 100% - 20% = 80% chance of eluding capture.
After 2 raids, it's 80% ^ 2 = 64%
After 3 raids, it's 80% ^ 3 = 51.2%
After 4 raids, it's 80% ^ 4 = 40.96%
100% - 40.96% chance of not getting caught = 59.04% chance of getting caught, which is in fact over 50%.