It is a win, at least on paper. But the fact is that it doesn't stop the spying from happening anyway. As we have been finding out over the last few years about a very common missuse of power by our (US) gov't. That is prohibited by law, even the Patriot Act. It's hard for the police to police the police when they don't even know the police are policing.

A little known fact- The Golden Gate Bridge is a privately owned bridge. They can charge whatever they wish really.

You took the words out of my mouth. The toll system on the GGB has always been a nightmare ever since I can remember. I wonder when the last time Philip Hynes actually commuted over the bridge and had a meaningful conversation with toll booth operater who informs you the bridge toll is $6 and stares at you while you try to scounge the change together stuck inside your ash tray whith 50 cars behind you wondering why you are taking so long.

</end rant>

This is going to make finding 'eye patches,' 'wooden legs,' and 'rum' a little tough to find.

we could only be so lucky.

This is sounds like their wet dream (excuse the pun) of protests waiting to happen.

One of the best experiences I had with learning linux was installing ARCH, which requires you to really customize the system as you install, not to mention some inevitable troubleshooting. While going through the installation process you are going to have to read the step by step guide, which covers some really great aspects of the OS and forces you to get comfortable with *gasp* the command line.

Granted there is a plethora of other things to learn beyond just an installation, but I found it to be a really great step by step learning process. Not to mention the distribution is as bare bones as it gets and forces you to choose everything you want in your sytem, thus making you LEARN about it.

I don't know if I would go so far as to call it a matter of "ethics." Quite frankly, the government should not be involved at all- what so ever but instead let the free market move as it does, and let the consumer decide if they really think a product is good because @Littlepuppy7 tweeted it. If she happened to have been paid $5000 to endorse a butt plug, lets hope its a good one otherwise it is her reputation on the line. It's like when a professional athlete wear's someone's logo. We don't require them to tell the world they are being paid to wear it... We just know they are the guys cutting him a check. I'll stop the rambling now. But less government invading the lives of the private sector the better.

Because there are no moral hangups about mutilating someone (blinding them) and letting them live out their misserable existance in a misserable country. I think I'll go with the armed ships option.

The only problem with this is the paper work to allow private operated vessels to go to port in countries with weapons on board.

(Not to be redundant here)

... I guess they are just doomed to go blind.

nope i didn't bother. Honestly didnt think they would do make one after him. how amusing.

Could be worse... Just wait for the USS Jimmy Carter!

The only thing I can think of is that the neighbor starts finding this suspicious stuff about them online. Calls the cops (or the cops call him) and then start pulling records off the wireless router.. Like you said the MAC address should be recorded. They may have been able to subpoena (or not, thanks patriot act) the local ISP's and start pulling mac addresses from the neighborhood.

lesson learned heh.

wonder how he got caught...

My god! That woman owns underwear..... Fire her, Smithers.

...really? Job loss?