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Comment Re:Think of the children! (Score 1, Insightful) 413

Actually, you can't blame this one on the NSA. Their mission is to observe and alert. In the case of the Boston Marathon Bomber, the Russian FSB (the follow on for the KGB) told the US authorities that these brothers were Islamic terrorists. And the FBI did nothing about it.

Who's in charge of the FBI? Oh, Eric Holder. Well, that figures.

What's on second.

Ida know . . . third base.

This call for vigilantism looks seriously dubious to me . . .

Comment Re: Why is this a surprise? (Score 1) 79

by PolygamousRanchKid (#48900443) Attached to: Fish Found Living Half a Mile Under Antarctic Ice

Think of it - the environment is only 30' in height top to bottom, the bottom is subjected to continuous bombardment by gravel and rocks so nothing can live on the bottom, and anything that is slow (low-energy) gets stoned out of existence, and it's -2C.

No sunlight, sulpher, or thermal vents to add energy to the ecosystem, hundreds of miles from the open sea

So, in other words, Slashdotters would call this "Mom's Basement" . . .

Comment Re:US politics are tainted with money (Score 2) 120

by PolygamousRanchKid (#48899563) Attached to: Fark's Drew Curtis Running For Governor of Kentucky

If Jesus Christ returned and was running for congress today, we would probably see attack adds smearing his family, alleging connections to Romans, and questioning the time he spent on the cross.

Turning water into wine? Bootlegging; producing alcohol without a license or paying taxes on it.

Healing the sick? Practicing medicine without a license, and violating FDA rules.

Walking on water? Illegally operating an unlicensed water vessel, without a license.

Feeding a crowd with just two fish? McDonald's and Burger King would sue him, and demand an FDA inquiry into his kitchen methods.

And, of course the racist crew would call him a "Jewish Bastard", which is kinda sorta technically correct.

That's probably why he hasn't come back . . .

Comment Re:Insurance (Score 1) 216

I once drove some of my daughter's friends home from a birthday party. Should I have had to have a commercial driver's license?

No, but you should have been arrested for transporting minors for immoral purposes.

Oh, and how much do your "daughter's friends" charge for a "birthday party" ?

Nudge, nudge, wink, wink, say no more . . .

Comment Re:Salary versus cost of living in each city (Score 2, Informative) 136

Time for a wee bit of Schadenfreude.

A married couple of tech professionals in Silicon Valley, both earning just slightly above average, $125,000 a year, . . . will qualify as "wealthy", greater than $250,000 a year, . . . and get hit by Obama's new tax policies.

The gag is that the seriously wealthy aren't worried about Obama's new tax policies, because they can afford a tax lawyer who can prove that they earn nothing.

Submission + - Patriot Act Idea Rises in France, and Is Ridiculed (nytimes.com)

Submitted by PolygamousRanchKid
PolygamousRanchKid writes: After shootings last week at a satirical newspaper and a kosher market in Paris, France finds itself grappling anew with a question the United States is still confronting: how to fight terrorism while protecting civil liberties. The answer is acute in a country that is sharply critical of American counterterrorism policies, which many see as a fearful overreaction to 9/11.

Valérie Pécresse, a minister under former President Nicolas Sarkozy, said France needed its own version of the USA Patriot Act, which gave the United States more authority to collect intelligence and pointed America’s surveillance apparatus at its citizens. Politicians and civil rights advocates on both sides of the Atlantic bristled at that suggestion, and at a string of arrests in which French officials used a new antiterrorism law to crack down on what previously would have been considered free speech.

Dominique de Villepin, the former French prime minister, warned against the urge for “exceptional” measures. “The spiral of suspicion created in the United States by the Patriot Act and the enduring legitimization of torture or illegal detention has today caused that country to lose its moral compass,” he wrote in Le Monde, the French newspaper.

Submission + - What Can Tony Fadell Actually Do For Google Glass? (dice.com)

Submitted by Nerval's Lobster
Nerval's Lobster writes: Google Glass is no longer a part of the Google X research lab that birthed the project, according to The Wall Street Journal; instead, it’s now part of a standalone unit overseen by Tony Fadell, the CEO of Google subsidiary Nest. Given Fadell’s rising profile in the technology world, it seems unlikely that he’d inherit the Glass project just to kill it, which would make him look bad; it seems more likely that he’ll try to revamp the technology, much in the same way that he overhauled smoke detectors into sleek, Web-connected devices with aesthetic appeal. But what can Fadell actually do to "save" Glass? He could slash the absurdly high price of $1,500 for starters, and perhaps give it a design revamp, but what other actions can he take beyond that?

Submission + - Lost Beagle2 probe found 'intact' on Mars (bbc.co.uk)

Submitted by Stolga
Stolga writes: The missing Mars robot Beagle2 has been found on the surface of the Red Planet, apparently intact.

High-resolution images taken from orbit have identified its landing location, and it looks to be in one piece.

The UK-led probe tried to make a soft touchdown on the dusty world on Christmas Day, 2003, using parachutes and airbags — but no radio contact was ever made with the probe.

Many scientists assumed it had been destroyed in a high-velocity impact.

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