There's a great MST3K ep riffing an Air force propaganda film called the "The Starfighters" featuring the F104s. Well worth the watch if only for the "refueling" riffs (and the "Tech Support" segments between the film).

Agreed. Dropped TWC almost 4 years ago, only have Internet (which might come with some television channels but never cared to look). Still too damn much money, but no other serious option. Netflix and Amazon with a Roku for films are good options (as long as it's a Roku 3 - Amazon and Roku seem to have broken the delivery on the Roku 1 and 2 but of course, that is just my experience and opinion - Netflix is great with a Chromecast, I sure hope Amazon and Acorn get added to Chromecast so I can toss these Rokus to Goodwill) and I pay $5 a month for Acorn.TV - a good selection of British television shows shown without commercials. I won't give Hulu a dime as they charge a subscription fee then *still* toss in commercials - but I guess a lot of folks will put up with that - Hulu apologists always remind me of the "little bit pregnant" line; in any case, not a lot to see in American television shows in any case, IMO.

Agreed, but I was referring to cab monopolies and making certain that cabs are "safe", and there are "background checks" to keep unqualified drivers off the road. Do you really think it's any different in England? Perhaps you do, but I don't. In my opinion, and what I've seen in my lifetime, money always wins and nothing will change that. I've had some pretty sketchy "black cab" rides in London and had more than a few drivers try to "bugger the Yank". Same thing in NYC. It's the same game all over the world, in my opinion.

As per the surreptitious Puppeteer breeding programs, they'll attack too soon and we will be victorious! Kinda makes you wonder what the Puppeteers have been doing to us, besides breeding for luck...

I suspect that you have never gotten a hack license, worked as a cabbie or take cabs very often. I drove a cab for a short time while in college, leaving after one of the drivers I worked with was killed for pocket change. In the world of cab monopolies, money seems to go a long way. But that's how it's done in America. Money always talks and smooths the path; to believe otherwise (or even, in my opinion, believe what the money folks tell you) is a bit naive. But that's just my experience, yours might be different.

Wow, thank you for sharing that conspiracy theory! Nazi Flying Saucers, Stanley Kubrick and citing Richard Hoagland - what a hoot! I thought I had heard all the moon hoax theories, but this one is the best. Never underestimate the gullible that have the price of an eee PC and a cablemodem, I guess.

Or "Wheelchair", if being disparaging. Great read - "Waldo & Magic, Inc." has been a constant re-read of mine every 3-4 years since I was a kid.

Why not just watch the trailer?

Well said!

I don't generally reply to ACs, but a 7.8 share (about 22 million viewers) for the Master's on Sunday isn't bad at all (even though it was one of the lowest Master's Sundays in recent years) and the lower number this year was probably due to both Woods and Mickelson not being present (casual viewers are drawn to names that they recognize and "last day, back nine dramas").

I am not trying to be rude, but what is your point? Augusta is a private club. There are lots of private clubs in this country, not just golf. Lots of places you and I will never see the inside of or even know about. Yes, Pebble is expensive, but there are affordable to play courses near Pebble. There are hundreds of inexpensive to play courses across the country. It's like cars; you drive what you can afford. Like it or not, this a capitalistic country, and money pretty much always wins. I don't get why people are bitching about this kind of thing; in America, it's all about accumulating wealth, and there is (and always has been) a class system in America (we just liked to pretend there wasn't until 2008), and money is one of the big stratifiers (the folks that were living way too large for their incomes, pretending to have more money than they did in 2008 learned that in a very hard way; folks that lived conservatively and invested took a hit, but never got upside down and ended up making out pretty well when the market rebounded). With money, you can afford better food, homes, cars, education, medical care, etc. Social stratification naturally follows (I can't think of a single capitalistic/quasi-capitalistic country that this hasn't happened in, but I am writing this pretty much "off the cuff"). I m not attacking or defending capitalism, I am just acknowledging it's the game we play here in the US, and if you don't know the rules, you can't play the game well. Either acknowledge the rules and learn to use them, fight to change them, or be exploited by them; we're all in this overloaded boat together. Just my opinion.

Unfortunately, it ends this season after only 6 eps. Fortunately, that means I'll be able to see the whole last season on Netflix or Amazon a lot sooner.

1. You have every right to disagree with me.
2. I was addressing the OP statements about people not lacking a "moral compass" and "I agree that the person dug themselves a bigger hole, but when jobs are not available what is a person left with as choices?"
3. IMHO, we citizens have a responsibility to our fellow citizens to be the best humans we can be, to do our best every day to be better people. I am not successful at it every day, but I try. Very few people start out being criminals (sociopaths, perhaps?); it's usually a long line of bad decisions that gets one there. All I'm saying is pretty much everyone has a lot of choices before they end up having to "commit a crime out of desperation". This is just my opinion and personal experience; perhaps yours has been different.

Please excuse me, but I call bullshit, AC. This certainly is a "Moral Compass" issue. You find out what city you can get day-labor in, and you go there (there are probably even day labor jobs in the city you live in, you just might feel "too good" to work shitty jobs, or not willing to get up at 5:00 AM every day, or stay sober every day, etc.); Greyhound, Megabus, rideshare, hitch, sell your mobile phone, whatever it takes, find a shelter or couch surf, show up every morning at the day labor office at 6:00 am, sober, work the full day no matter how shitty the job is (and I know from personal experience that they can be really shitty at times), be there every fucking morning before they open, and you will become known as someone who wants to work, shows up and does the job, and you will work every day. Eventually, you will make more money, and if you are absolutely reliable, you will get contracted into a full-time position, and if you impress that employer, you will go from contract to regular employee. Then work your way up from there, even if it's just unloading trailers on a warehouse floor, or working as a janitor; you have a job and a place to start from. It's worked for a lot of people that wanted out of a bad situation. Just my own opinion/experience.

I no longer expect outrage, as that seems to be beyond our capacity anymore, but it feels like we treat this kind of news as if it's just trivial bullshit. Has it come to that? Doesn't anyone call their representatives, no matter how deaf they might be? Anyone write letters to their local newspaper about this kind of erosion of personal liberties? Anyone trying to get someone to listen and pay attention, or are we all just willing to head blindly to the kill-floor, tweeting and texting the latest lolcat?

It seems to me that we are giving our lives away for nothing.