And what do you do if Solitaire refuses to run if it can't contact the ad servers, hm?

Is the west often bad? Yes. Were the communist nations consistently worse? Also yes.

Destruction of the environment is not a "democracy" thing. It's a human thing; "we need this now, we'll worry about consequences later". And it's worse when those responsible can hide it--which in turn is easier under a repressive government.

But it's not "their own turf". That's the whole point. Crawl back into your hole, shill, and enjoy your salary.

Keep in mind that in World War II, the Japanese had lots of bases on little tiny islands. And it took hundreds of thousands of Marines to take them away. The US then took advantage of these islands to support attacks on other islands and, eventually, the Japanese mainland.

Taking them as part of the "island-hopping" strategy (which was a good way to advance to the Japanese home islands) was expensive, although not "hundreds of thousands". Iwo Jima, one of the bloodiest of those battles, was fought by 70,000 US troops, which is still a large number, of course. Neutralizing them was much simpler. The kingpin of the Japanese bases guarding the Central Pacific was an island called Truk. You've never heard of the great battle of Truk, because there wasn't one. We blockaded it, staged a massive bombing raid to destroy the aircraft and warships stationed there, and rendered it completely irrelevant. No attempt was made to take the heavily fortified island itself (which would have been a much tougher task than taking the islands we did take), because it wasn't necessary. Truk never fell; it was still under Japanese control when the Japanese surrendered. But without supplies and replacements for the destroyed planes and ships, it could no longer affect the course of the war.

The airstrip isn't the motivation, it's the means. The oil and gas is what they want, and the airstrip strengthens their position to enforce their claim on it. Which doesn't mean that they won't find other uses for it, of course.

And very comforting that will be to all the fishing boats and other unarmed east Asian shipping that China's navy forces out of the zone.

Of course, given that the prosecutors didn't want an indictment in the first place and given that the prosecutors are the ones in charge of trying to convict the defendants, one wonders what the chances of actually getting a conviction are...

When will Microsoft realize we own the computers, we are ultimately the ones who make decisions about the computers, and they simply can't dictate to us what software is on our computers and how we use it.

Not while they can dictate to us (and they can, except for the exceptionally knowledgable) and make money doing it.

What if there is no "relative power" involved? What if a man goes into a city park, walks up to a group of 10-year-olds and asks who wants to have sex with him? There is no power he has over them, they can leave or ignore him as they choose, or they can choose to go with him of their own volition.

Except for the fact that he's more intelligent than they are, vastly more experienced and knowledgable, much richer, and twice their size. Except those things, he doesn't have any power over them.

So, precisely how again do they suggest sites verify ages?

Standard politician answer: "That's your problem, not mine."

,,,the future we want.

You really need to get out more. There's a lot more people out there than your friends, and they don't dress the way you do. I wear a buttoned shirt every weekday, and so does everybody I work with.

No, the people of Tibet know they're part of the PRC. It's just that a lot of 'em don't want to be.

You've never seen shirts with buttons? You need to get out more.

The people who live in Taipei don't think they're part of the PRC. I kinda figure it's their decision.