"US sanctions against Russia imposed by the Bush administration were lifted by the Obama administration in May 2010."

And? How does that negate the fact that the country was invaded on Bush's watch?

Russia pulled out of Georgia, so the sanctions against them should have been lifted, as they were.

the Chechen wars both started under Clinton

And continued, unopposed, for many years under Bush.

Why do people that read a legitimate news story always try to assume something is advertising.

Perhaps because it's utterly and totally devoid of valuable information on the subject? When your copy is just "Ooh, look... Shiny!" and uncritically copying bits of info out of the manufacturer's press release... you are doing nothing more than advertising a product.

If everyone blocked ads, many quality web sites would likely cease to exist, including Slashdot. Just because you can block, doesn't mean you should.

Adblock Plus allows non-annoying advertisements through the filter, to be displayed by default...

If every site used non-annoying ads, ad-blockers "would likely cease to exist."

In what way were German fathers "assholes" during World War I?

Starting the war... Invading neutral countries... Sinking ships of neutral countries... Introducing chemical (poison gas) warfare... Executing "over 6,500 French and Belgian civilians between August and November 1914, usually in near-random large-scale shootings of civilians ordered by junior German officers." etc., etc.

the next generation doesn't tend to copy his behavior.

They did, and took it up a notch, too.

"it was common for Germans in the 1930s to justify acts of aggression in terms of perceived injustices imposed by the victors of World War I."

It will last approximately until the Gen2 kids of the Jihadists realize " Dad was an ASSHOLE ". Nazis, Japanese, USA vs. Mexico/Indians... it usually self corrects if Dad gets paddled.

It didn't work with Germany after WWI. In fact WWII is usually blamed on the harsh "paddl[ing]" Germany received.

Care to explain how Obama was responsible for Chechnya or Georgia?

Why is plugging in a charger difficult?

Because any of a million things can happen to render a microUSB port useless... And the failure of that tiny part makes your $1,000 smartphone similarly useless and worthless.

I'd go for something like a magnetic surface-mount charging cord, if I got to make all the R&D decisions. But since I don't, an induction coil with some power loss is better than having to fiddle with fragile microUSB jacks all the time.

The most terrifying moment in history was Nagasaki, because they already knew what happened in Hiroshima.

Early nuclear weapons aren't modern fusion bombs. More Japanese were killed by conventional bombs and napalm.

And more than that, they simply didn't know how many we had... Which is actually a GOOD THING, because we spent the only two that were available, and the threat of us dropping lots more of them (which we didn't have) ended the war.

I think there are enough examples in history to prove that appeasement does not work.

Seems to have worked pretty well for Mexico.

It is the tepid response given to atrocities elsewhere that has sent the message that Putin can do this with impunity.

As opposed to Bush's decisive action, which led to Russia invading Georgia with impunity...?

The proper response to this is to strengthen military forces in new NATO member states surrounding Russia,

Ukraine trying to get NATO and EU membership was a major issue causing this crisis in the first place. At the first sign of other neighboring countries expressing an interest in NATO membership, expect another invasion force, BEFORE US forces have a chance to ever get on the ground.

I think we're better off with the Afghanistan model... Give Ukraine a ton of man-portable anti-tank and anti-aircraft missiles, and pay them a few dollars for every multi-million dollar Russian tank they destroy. Just think of it as faster sanctions...

History says that if you just let them take one or two countries they will stop and all will be well.

There are a huge number of examples in history, where expansion does stop after one or two objectives.

The Spanish-American war, and the Mexican-American war are examples of expansion that didn't ever go any further.

A shooting war with Russia means the entire US East and West coasts are within range of sub-launched cruise missiles,

Which is why US attack subs are following the Russian boomers around...

While people may have been all pissy about Bush, unilateral wars, and Team America World Police, the fact of the matter is that it was better than the alternative.

Bush was the one who ruined the good relations with Russia, the one who destroyed the economy that made it possible to pay for his wars, and the one who made the US public extremely weary of more war, or giving the president power to make such decisions. Even now, it's the divided congress with intractable Republicans that makes it a questionable proposition if the president could even get authorization to go to war.

Obama never had any red lines for Ukraine. It's utterly ridiculous to pretend that Bush or any other American president in history would ever have been willing to risk going to war with Russia over Ukraine. Not Regan at the height of the Cold War... Nobody. Ukraine is not West Berlin.

If there is research to do regarding what service to choose, how does comcast have a monopoly?

Well... Comcast could be the only wired internet service provider in an area, BUT they might only offer service that is so expensive and slow, that someone has to choose between Comcast, cellular, and satellite.

If your mother just wants to check her e-mail and download a few pictures every once in a while, then the ever-increasing speed of Comcast's cheapest tier is wasted, and saving a few dollars by going with something like T-Mobile's $30/month 5GB cellular plan might be cheaper and just as good.

I do not believe that "bork" is a legal term with any validity.

Umm... It sounds funny, because it's Latin. Lawyers just *love* Latin words.

quidquid Latine dictum sit altum videtur