Sorry, but there is quite a distance between 'subtle' and being an arsehole. He could have said something like 'Hey, interesting idea but that is not what we are looking for. You can do what you want but I won't add it. Full stop'.
You can do a lot of things without having to resort to such behaviour. For someone so smart and that has achieve so much, he can be pretty dumb and insecure.

He might be the greatest developer of all times, but he has a very serious character flaw. I am not a doctor but I'd say he is a megalomaniac. People follow him because he currently has the power, but he fails to see that his power is not absolute. People want to contribute to Linux, not Linus.

If you think about it, it all makes kinda sense. The name 'killer whale' is wrong (result of a bad translation), it should be 'whale killer' and with a revelation like this, I think it makes the Orca a more perfect hunter as it not only hunts whales in packs and communicate between each other, it could also speak and understand the language of it's prey.

Orca Alpha (voice only): Yo bro, wanna buy some Krill? Got the best $hit around.
Whale approaches. Gang of Orcas pop out from behind an iceberg.
Whale: Like, OMG! Orcas! Run!
Orca Alpha: Hehe. Run my friend and you will only die tired. Attack formation Delta-Y

For those that do not know the political parties in Germany, the CSU is basically the Republicans, SPD are the Democrats & Grünen are the Greens (though more powerful in Germany).
And if they all agree on something (which is like nearly never), then you can pretty much take it as true. Through in the FDP (market liberals) and Pirates (popular party) and that Mayors comments are pretty much mute.

Also, I wonder what the Mayor's technical knowledge is of the whole LiMux actually is. When my mom complains about 'the internet not working again', I know she means she probably forgot to turn on the modem again, and not that her Ubuntu (yeah my 65y/o mother uses Ubuntu, she has no clue but knows what to click and what not) or her Firefox is somehow not working. So far her system has never had a problem! **
So I question if the Mayor even has enough ground to stand on to make such claims.

** contrary to the other parts of my (extended) family and friends that all use Windows. They are constantly calling because this or that won't work.

Has nothing to do with big or small government, it has to do with handing absolute power to a bunch of frat-boys.
Just as sensible as handing over the keys to the house to your college son and his friends for the weekend. What do you EXPECT would happen?
And just to be sure, have your son call in daily to confirm everything is o.k. yeah that will work fine.

Uhm, commercial airliners constantly fly over/near warzones, though usually at very high altitudes.
Though I do agree with you, though don't forget, "Ukrainian separatists" (if it is confirmed to be them) are not the only ones to have shoot down civilian aircraft.
The problem for me is the question: 'could they have known?' In the Korean and Iranian instances, the shooters could have known because they had the possibilities.
I wonder if the Ukrainian separatists (again, still not confirmed) have the possibility to find out what that plane at 10km really is.
And if it is a plan flying over a war zone, and the people on the ground have no way of knowing what it is but know that it cannot be theirs (these are separatists, not a 'real' military), it is plausible that they could shoot. Not that I condone it, mind you.
The US would have no issues with that if the table's were reversed, so why the fuss?

Also, let's not forget that this has a LOT more to do with who's side someone is on then the actual incident. The US & Western Europe is on the Ukrainian side, so EVERYTHING will be the Separatists' / Russian's fault, because anything that can be used to promote one side's agenda will be exploited.

That used to only reserved for blacks and 'communists'. Remember the FBI will target and try to crush anyone who is not white(enough), non-Christian and is not politically right enough. i.e. MLK, MalcomX, ACLU anyone who ever supported them. On the other hand, they had no problems supporting mafia thugs such as James "Whitey" Bulger. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
Btw, we only have a bunch of 'criminals' (kinda like a 70's version of Snowden) to thank for exposing COINTELPRO.
Does anyone honestly think they just stopped? Read what they did during COINTELPRO and then ask yourself, do you think they, as well as the NSA or other groups, have any level they would not stoop to? What else have they done that just has not come out yet?

guess not: http://www.wired.com/2011/09/f...

As for the BS 'judge approval', they will simply rubber-stamp any request that comes in. Not to mention in a secret court!
To quote the Article: But its rulings are notoriously one-sided: In its 35-year history, the court has approved 35,434 government requests for surveillance, while rejecting only 12.

Do you honestly think congress actually cared? I'd say they went through a few pretty simple logical questions: Is he in the US (because that would really be bad press)? Would killing him threaten the lives of his own (drones are being used, so who cares?)? and do I have an excuse (target was deemed a TerroristNaziCommunistPedophile by the SpinDoctors)? Does it affect my carrier? No, no, no, so bombs away.
Innocence, legality or whatnot does not matter. Like some kid dying in Africa, if it does not affect the congress man's carrier, he will not care. Sadly goes for most people.

The US gov has never had a problem coming up with excuses to bomb things. What makes you think they will have problems finding one now or in the future?

And languages are constantly in motion. Just like we do not speak the King's English, our kids and their grand kids will speak differently from us. We do not only not speak like them, we do not even behave like them. Every thing is and always have been in transition.

It is the age old battle between generations. The older generations always complain about how bad the younger generations are and how everything is 'going to shit'.

What people do not realized is that they have moved from the younger generation and become the older.

Hey wait a minute, Powell had like a ton of Powerpoint Slides with proof he showed in his speech at the UN. And if the US says that, you KNOW it must be true. They would not lie to start a war. Not like those evil people that always come up with fake reasons to invade countries for their own goals.

Replace 'government' with a better word, and you are spot on. I do not see government as something bad. Your or others' implementation might not be good, but government is needed.

I would suggest 'oppressors', as that also would fit for other, non government, groups that have power but equally want a dumb populace. Radical religious groups have the same problems.

Expanding your horizons frees up the mind. People who are not given that chance are fearful. They do not know the world and are afraid. They also do not realize there are different ways to think/do/live. Perhaps not better or worse, just different.

No more smart people means people working in low paying jobs. Combine that with an education system that highly favours an 'elite' clientèle (i.e. the same group of people that are in charge), and you have the old multi-class/-caste system again.
A saying I remember, 'someone worrying about where tomorrows meal will come from has no time to think about rebellion'

Just make sure that you indoctrinate the 'you are free, you are created equal' into the poor as a way to accept their fate.

Btw, this is similar to the tactic the British did in their colonies (it also has a name I cannot remember). All smart people would be shipped off to other colonies to remove them from influencing the local (same 'race') populace. In the other colonies, they presume, they would not be able to cause problems. Gandhi is a prime example.
A similar tactic is also done with troops, but that is going OT.

Education of our children is and should be our PRIMARY goal. Nothing is more important.
"let's make college tuition either free or really low and if you have a country full of whip-crack smart people you have a country the rest of the world will fear."
~ Henry Rollins

If you pay your [sport] coach more then your Maths/[Language]/Science/Arts teachers, you have a problem.

Finally and not to forget, the US imports a large amount of foreign elite students. I read somewhere about 70% are foreign.

No pardon, that would mean what he did was wrong.
If you are a whistle blower that can show that laws were broken, it should not matter how you got the information ('stealing'), the extend of the information ('to much' or even 'not enough'), nor how you made it public ('aiding the enemy'), you did the right thing and thus you should not be the one the law goes after.
It is like someone stealing from a drug boss to expose them. THEY were the one's initially breaking the law. And by logic, their wrong makes your wrong, right!
Anything else would basically give those trying to hide their crimes more ways to cover them up.

And then call it the 'Snowden-Law' (and watch the trolls choke on it).

And it should not be the people, but the government and their employees that have to live by the rule 'if you have done nothing wrong, you should have nothing to hide'.

Well Syria is different as the power-delta is a lot lower and, compared to many of the western countries, they have not bought into the government's crap.
In the west we seem to have swallowed the governments rhetoric so perfectly that our government can use it as a leverage.
If the government cannot get us to love them, they get us to love the troops, who work for the government. They sell us the whole 9 yards and we fall for it, hook, line and sinker.
And you can be damn sure that they play that card at EVERY friggn chance.

In addition, the rebels are heavily supported from the outside, who support (or not) it for their own reasons.
Plus, they are ONE example and in total the examples are far and few between.

If you take Egypt f.i., the western support for the initial rebellion was low. Mainly because the west wanted Mubarak. After the rebellion, the Muslim Brotherhood (coincidentally the wests favorite) won. The people were not happy and again rebelled, much to the west's dislike.
Had the rebellion not worked, the west would have been fine with the results.

Perhaps 'populace control' goes a little far, but the real issue is different and has more facets.
On one side, yes, the government wants more control, but what they are doing now is unrealistic. Kinda like trying to find the needle in all the hay stacks.
But the people expect them to 'protect' them, so they have to do something. And look, they can spend all this money. And they give it to contractors, who have that consultant job for the general lined up after his retirement. That contractor also helps the general define all kind of threats that will help get more financing.

The NSA is a bloated mess. Without real oversight ('don't limit our budget or our power or else you will be helping the pedofiles/terrorists/communists') they inmates are running the asylum.

While I agree that the governments are scared of us, I believe the whole 1984 thing is overrated. Back then people thought they needed force and coercion and secret police to control people. The sad fact is, they do not. What real threat would we be to the government? We have guns? Well they have subs and aircraft carriers and tanks and Specter gunships. We might rebel? haha, when was the last time that was ever a threat. Of all the crap that has gone down in the last few decades, when have you seen the last real 'uprising' that could even come close to something that might threaten the government? Nope, we are sheep and we are content to thinking that having the 'freedom' to vote for the two candidates selected for us somehow makes us free. We are more like fish in a tank. We swim around happily, build little nests and have young. We might even get eaten, but hey that is life and if need be, they remove the bad fish that did it. Life goes on. Swim on little fishy.
No, the governments know that they do not have to control us, they just have to give us the illusions that we need. And as long as we are filling the coffers of those that are really in charge, nothing will change.

Yup, and they claim to be protecting us from the bad guys. They ARE the bad guys!

The last time someone tried to close a government organization, he wound up dead in Dallas.

How about fixing the problems in stead of moving them around? And by fixing I mean doing a complete overhaul, including society.
Release all the 3rd-Strikers. Don't incarcerate people for having trivial amounts of drugs. Then work on real rehabilitation. Focus your justice system fully on the really bad people.
You are caught in a vicious cycle where people are unable to break from. Help them instead of kicking them and leaving them to fend for themselves, as the 'easiest' thing to do is crime.