They were already equal under the law!

Did you know that farmers get money for farming from the government? So where's mine? I don't farm, but dammit equal protection!

No, I don't get free money from the government for farming unless I actually farm.

It's the same way with state-defined marriage. The states didn't establish a right, they established a subsidy. A subsidy for people to have sex. The reason states were happy to grant this subsidy was generally people having sex produce children. More children, more people, more commerce, more chances for taxes.

So in exchange for expansion of their future tax-base, states afforded tax breaks and other incentives to get people to commit to creating and raising little future tax-payers.

Thus gay persons were already equally eligible for this marriage benefit -- if they were willing to marry the opposite sex. Obviously this was not an acceptable requirement for gay people who wanted the subsidy and other incentives associated with marriage despite their natural inability to reproduce as a homogenous team. Well, there were heterosexual exceptions with marriage so:

Redefining marriage to include sex-acts that generally don't produce children was a bet some states thought was worth making. So they did. But now SCOTUS has decided for ALL states they must include homosexual unions as an exception -- the same exceptions they make for sterile and old people.

Sigh. Once again...

The states didn't establish a right, it established a subsidy. A subsidy for people to have sex. The reason states were happy to grant this subsidy was generally people having sex produce children. More children, more people, more commerce, more chances for taxes.

So in exchange for expansion of their future tax-base, states afforded tax breaks and other incentives to get people to commit to creating and raising little future tax-payers.

Redefining marriage to include a sex-act that generally doesn't produce children was a gamble some states thought was worth it. But now SCOTUS decided that states should include homosexual unions as an exception -- just like they make exceptions for the sterile and old people.

Equal rights applies to people only when they are in the same venue.

Say, Bill Gates has a tax liability of a million dollars and gets taxed at say, 19.2%. But John Doe, who washes his windows only makes $20 thousand a year and pays maybe 1%

"Equal rights! I should only have to pay as much as John does", says Bill Gates.

It doesn't work that way. The law only applies to you if you're doing the same thing.

The 14th amendment essentially says if you're making a law, it has to apply to everyone regardless. So whether you're Morgan Freeman or Bill Gates, you still have to pay the higher taxes because you made more money than 99% of the people in the country.

The debate on homosexual marriage was (at the legal level) merely about subsidizing sex. States have always been happy to subsidize sex because it generally produces more tax-payers. Reproduction over the years results in exponential growth. Exponential growth, means growing economy and more economic activity, and thus ultimately way more tax revenue then the skimpy subsidy they gave to married people in the first place.

Redefining marriage to include people whose sex-act doesn't produce future tax-payers was something the states may or may not have thought was going to pay off in the long run. But apparently SCOTUS determined that there was enough room in each states' budget to make room for subsidizing homosexual marriage along with the other marriage exceptions of sterile and old people.

I believe this was the gist of a conversation overheard between Charlie Sheen and your mom.

Dependent is probably more the word I was looking for.

You'll notice the article only has one reported incident of a drone and wildfire. The other, is a neighbor taking pictures of a house fire.

They want to ban them for "regular" people and then only allow law-enforcement and paying customers -- I mean, ahem, um, large public-good website commerce sponsors -- to be able to fly and violate private airspace.

If the fire-fighter is the one shooting down the drone -- they're already there.

And in this case, the fire crew can send the fire-alarm bill directly to the drone-operator. The FAA doesn't need the money anyway.

Okay, I'm like quad-triple posting this... but I really think I finally have this figured out:

The network of male overlords want to eliminate all their male competition: (e.g. like schools of fish or one of the main points of Dr. Strangelove [imdb.com]). Since the technocracy is rising, they can soon rely on robots for all the heavy lifting -- their only problem remaining is the maintaince and programming of the robots and systems they don't want to be bothered with -- so they still need some annoying technical people around. At the moment they're mostly male. :( Not good if you're trying to be the last man on earth!

Conclusion: if the goal is for the males that are now in power (or their great-grandsons who will be in power) to be the only males on the face of the planet: then for everything to keep going they must somehow inculcate females to code and eliminate the need for all (other) males entirely.

Low-income girls would be a nice controllable group to start with.

The network of male overlords want to eliminate all their male competition: (e.g. like schools of fish or one of the main points of Dr. Strangelove). Since the technocracy is rising, they can soon rely on robots for all the heavy lifting -- their only problem remaining is the maintaince and programming of the robots and systems they don't want to be bothered with -- so they still need some annoying technical people around. At the moment they're mostly male. :( Not good if you're trying to be the last man on earth!

Conclusion: if the goal is for the males that are now in power (or their great-grandsons who will be in power) to be the only males on the face of the planet: then for everything to keep going they must somehow inculcate females to code and eliminate the need for all (other) males entirely.

Low-income girls would be a nice controllable group to start with.

I finally realized what all this pressure for female coders is about! The powers that be want to be able to eliminate all their male competition: (e.g. like schools of fish or Dr. Strangelove [imdb.com]). Since the technocracy is rising, they can soon rely on robots for all the heavy lifting -- their only problem remaining is the maintaince and programming of the robots and systems they don't want to be bothered with -- so they still need some annoying technical people around. At the moment they're mostly male. :( Not good if you're trying to be the last man on earth! Conclusion: if the goal is for the males that are now in power (or their great-grandsons who will be in power) to be the only males on the face of the planet: then for everything to keep going they must somehow inculcate females to code and eliminate the need for all (other) males entirely.

I finally realized what all this pressure for female coders is about!

The powers that be want to be able to eliminate all their male competition: (e.g. like schools of fish or Dr. Strangelove). Since the technocracy is rising, they can soon rely on robots for all the heavy lifting -- their only problem remaining is the maintaince and programming of the robots and systems they don't want to be bothered with -- so they still need some annoying technical people around. At the moment they're mostly male. :( Not good if you're trying to be the last man on earth!

Conclusion: if the goal is for the males that are now in power (or their great-grandsons who will be in power) to be the only males on the face of the planet: then for everything to keep going they must somehow inculcate females to code and eliminate the need for all (other) males entirely.

The intent of the United States of America was to protect and value the freedom of the individual over and above the good of society.

Nowadays it seems people here in the "home of the brave" are fearful and lazy. So they would rather society protect them instead of having to be responsible for themselves.

Have you run a Java applet lately? Or maybe you'd prefer Silver-light?

I think Adobe had something called Flash that's pretty popular too..

Nah, just build a water pipeline to Canada.