There are plenty of ways of looking at this problem constructively without resorting to name calling. Address the problem not the person.

You get people who are out of their depth. Whose skill-set is ill-matched to the job's demands. You even get those who are a dead-weight liability. But calling them "idiots", even with the quotes to distance yourself from the word, doesn't accomplish anything and is more counter-productive.

But one thing to consider; if you have an "idiot" on your team, then who is the bigger "idiot" who recruited them?

The point is that some people's machines may have sensitive information on it. Just because you personally can't think of any doesn't mean there are none. Maybe commercial secrets. Maybe juicey blackmail material. Maybe they live in an oppressive regime and are writing a book the government doesn't care for. Or maybe they've just got a sexual orientation that the religious police don't find acceptable, and any evidence of that would be fatal. Withdrawal of things like Truecrypt hurt these people too. It's not all about self-interest.

Do you trust all governments, and all future governments, to never use their backdoor into that for any other purpose, other than the all the good, wholesome things they say they need it for? You know, the holy trinity of "war against terrorism", "national security" and "protecting the children". You really think that "protecting economic interests" never, ever, features? Really?

I really hope you're not giving us the "if you have nothing to hide then you have nothing to fear" line? Because that one has always been bullshit.

You are totally clueless to what "the government should be interested in", and have even less of an idea on "the government is be interested in".

Neither the headline or OP bothers to give the slightest hint to what "Reading Rainbow" is/was. I therefore find myself underwhelmed as to the significance.

I'm also struck by the incongruity of "every web-connected child" and "Universal access". Particularly when I suspect both are also missing the key word "American".

It makes no sense at all. It is totally moronic. The backspace is not a navigation key. My keyboard has plenty navigation keys, backspace is not one of them.

It makes as much sense as using the back button on your car's CD player to engage reverse gear and press the accelerator. It's totally not what you wanted, not what the button is for, annoying and dangerous.

The terrible truth is that as far as coherent plot and credible universe-building are concerned, Star Wars has always been third rate. When it does uncomplicated space-opera it's fun, but as soon as anyone tries to stretch it beyond that, it rapidly falls apart.

The best we can hope from Episode VII is that it doesn't try to mend all that went before it, and just concentrates on being good in itself.

So its just a case of "we're going to be alright, the regions that aren't were probably going to be fighting about something sooner or later anyway, so meh, whatcha gonna do?"

You should read some history. It's not uncommon for those who end up in a war zone to imagine "it could never happen here". All wars are about allocation of resources (Plenty are dressed up to be about other things, but the truth is they're not.) As soon as you have sudden scarcity of key resources, especially when they are unevenly distributed, you'll have war. Wars tend to escalate.

So that's ok then. Look forward to more of the same, just on a global scale never seen before. How bad could it be?

You do realise that entire sentence is tautology? How did the species that aren't alive today manage? Not so good, I'm guessing. But they'd be useless at supporting your argument, so we'll just ignore them.

No-one is saying that this spells the end of humankind. But what it does suggest is a nasty period of upheaval heading our way. And yes, that might even impact on you personally. You might not care about that, maybe you think you'll be dead and gone before it gets really unpleasant. But others would like to not be the generation that screwed everything up for the next 10,000 years.

How nice for rising sea levels to only affect the US.

Wait.. you mean there are other places?

Flooded land = reduction in available resources. Some places are going to lose out big time. Do you think the people losing out are just going to shuffle over, and the people next to them will make room? Plenty resources for everyone! That's is so not going to happen. Flooded country is going to look at unflooded country and decide its time they shared. Unflooded country is going to think hell no, we're not taking 10 million immigrants.

What will happen is upheaval, famine and, yes, war. Same way that humans always handle situations with limited resources.

Wow. I guess I forgot that you don't post on the interwebs unless it's all about you. Seems everyone assumes that it is anyway.

What I was doing is called "empathising". It's where you take into consideration the differences between people and consider how things may be perceived/experienced by others. That way you avoid mindless, accidental discrimination and also, it's generally accepted, makes you a nicer person. I believe it's a big part of HR training, but evidently not that big a deal on slashdot.

Not everyone is like special little me. Not everyone is like Mr Beer-monster either. Not everyone is like anyone. So repeatedly running a company sponsored event that revolves around enjoyment of one thing, with the expectation that all employees join in, is clearly going to discriminate against those who don't/can't enjoy it. Especially when the activity has a very real legal and medical boundaries. Telling people to quit complaining and join in is the talk that discrimination law-suits are made of.

I'm mystified to the point you think your making.

I was commenting on how elderly Americans needed to have an arranged service with foreign nationals in order to get a conversation. They can't get casual chat with family, friends or neighbors closer to home, because they're not interested. Instead it's being farmed out to complete strangers who get something else out of it. I think that's kind of sad.

What this has to do with prior methods of communication escapes me.

The methods used by USA in the 50s were completely different. The costs in the 50s were different. The resources used in the 50s were largely "one-shot" disposable. The kind of people on board are completely different and have a completely different attitude to risk.

You should go back a hundred years or so and mock the people in motorised carriages. After all, it was old tech. They did nothing a good horse couldn't already.

Can't be bothered conversing with the old folks? Fed up with their tales of the old days and embarrassing folksy casual racism?

Problem solved! Get a developing nation child to talk with them instead, so you can get on with your busy life. All the advantages of cheap labor without the annoyance of immigration!