The SFOR mission is hardly comparable to the invasion of Irak/Afghanistan.

I fail to see any wide approval anywhere in Europe. In Britain, the strongest U.S. supporter in Europe, essentially the election got lost by Labour because of the Iraq/Afghanistan wars. Approval ratings all over Europe are way below 50% and have been there pretty much since the very beginning. Please show me a link to the approval ratings that you mentioned. It would strongly surprise me to see any kind of major approval here.

And don't forget that the U.S. were those that made the Taliban strong in the 1st place by supporting them in all kind of ways. So telling that the U.S. are now liberating Afghanistan after they worked hard to fuck it up before is shading the truth.

I'm not saying that Iraq/Afghanistan were a heaven before the invasion. But that is by no means any justification to invade a sovereign country.

Besides the fact that the conflicts in Europe are on a completely different scale, they are also widely accepted as justified and humanitarian. The invasion of the Irak and Afghanistan are still widely disputed and somewhat shady (to avoid to call them illegal right away).

After explicit request (and "diplomatic" pressure) from the U.S. - the attacks got initiated by the U.S., no one else.

It might be hard for the Americans to understand but conflicts can be solved without armies. It's very uncommon over there as it seems but even you will one day learn that marching into someone else's country is the very last option and not something you choose whenever a conflict arises (e.g. Iraq, Afghanistan).

Two flaws: they operate world wide, not just in the U.S. and the investigation is directed towards the U.S. government, not Twitter.

I'm pretty sure that there is barely anyone that can argue that Twitter did the best they could to handle the situation.

My point: patents are more often in the way than they actually reasonably protect someone. Especially big companies have a ton of patents at their disposal that they can use to sue others out of business. I fail to see the benefit for the society here.

How often do things like your example happen? How often does it happen that companies like GE & Co. sue the living hell out of a tiny new company that might turn into a competitor one day?

Many (if not most) real research projects are backed or even fully financed by the government anyway. The little research that is actually done fully privately is pretty unimportant compared to the massive damage (high prices, keeping competition and further innovation away) that patents cause.

I cannot picture a single situation where patents actually help the society. It benefits very few and punishes the majority. The product should matter, not a theoretical idea behind it.

No, wouldn't say so. He had a different approach to solve issues but that's it. He was a pretty good superior (was mine as well) I'd say.

He openly declared one of his superiors to be an idiot - and got away with it. Everyone (well, mostly) treated him special and he pretty much enjoyed his special status. I still don't understand why that was tolerated. While he definitely was very good, he wasn't so exceptional that it would justify him getting away with pretty much anything.

And I think that there are very few situations where you really have a player that is so strong to allow him to play a one man show in a team.

Next they probably rule that being poor is unconstitutional because you cannot buy enough stuff and therefore damage the economy which seems to be the only important factor in the U.S.

Meanwhile I realized that the difference between Obama as president and McCain is probably not much more than the color of their skin. They are both spineless idiots that just follow the way that money leads them. I guess the only way to go for you guys is further down the same road that you apparently chose as the only truth: money, money, money. Will be interesting to see where that will lead you to. I presume civil war at some point when the gap between the rich and the poor has reach a level where the masses won't shut up anymore and even tanks and armed forces will be the lesser evil compared to poverty and the lack of a proper future.

Depends on how much former this PM is. If she's not responsible for this utter nonsense called security check then she has all reason to be upset. Instead of complying with all the rediculous crap I'd prefer to throw shoes at those people as well. Sadly I'd like to reach my destination so I throw shoes (and do worse things) just in my imagination and politely (as good as I can fake it) comply to get done with it.

I wouldn't call a settlement with just 5 permanents a town. Heck, I wouldn't even call it a village. It's more of a scientific outpost.

Longyearbyen on the other hand is a real town, a small one, but a town.