Bullshit. I've worked at plenty of places where such contributions result in massive bonuses and stock grants. Or its a path to becoming management and access to those sort of bonuses in the future.

The way you think is why you are not management.

Public Employees get paid based on the political influence of their union. There is almost no correlation between their skills or output and their compensation.

Was googling around, didn't see anything that had all critical components working.

Total bullshit. Javascript/Node is just fine for some projects.

Look, I code in and love Scala primarily these days due to my projects requirements. Static typing, functional, oo and compiled, its great for many "serious" applications. That said, for the 50% of web applications where time to market, and not maintainability or performance is most important, Node.js is better. I fail to see how "real" programmers could have any problem coding in Node. Its dead fucking simple.

A scramble may lead to some rapid technological innovation. Sounds like a good thing.

That said, the moon is really really big and we struggle to put more then a few tons on it right now. Not too worried.

Good riddance? Yes, say goodbye to those of us who have incomes, pay taxes and largely cover the costs of you schools and roads.

By all means, lets secede. No more wealth transfer from NYC Metro to the rest of you leachers.

Funny, but fortunately not accurate.

Food production is now a big company thing, done by companies owned by those of us who live in NYC. A more accurate rephrasing of your statement is:

"If the people who actually have power and money suddenly didn't, and uneducated rednecks were in charge, things might be bad for people in NYC".

Also, you should be relieved to note that NJ, NY and New England have more then enough agriculture to feed ourselves. It really isn't a Urban vs. Rural argument either, as we love rural folk up here and vice versa. Its really about NYC & New England versus fly over country.

The U.S. spends 4.7% of GDP on the military. I don't think its gone over 5% since the 60s.

I live in NYC, and I'm not a rich white guy. That said, I adore Bloomberg and am sad to see him go.

Easily the greatest Mayor in the history of NYC.

Young POOR people, who have far worse job opportunities then the boomers had, are paying for the boomers to retire.

After the boomers ran up the bill on multiple wars, raided social security, screwed up the economy, screwed up the environment, they are now asking us to further subsidize their retirement.

You know what? FUCK THEM. If I had my way, the current generation over 55 and younger then 85 would get nothing more then preventive care from the health insurance pools the rest of us are subsidizing. Anything more then that they can pay for out of pocket, or not get care. Ambulances should be equipped with credit card terminal and require pre-payment for that whole sleazy slefish generation.

Well, I am going to do everything I can (short of not working or fraud) to avoid paying into this system. I won't be a slave to another generation's mistakes and retirement. Im not actually against programs that fight poverty or encourage education. However until things are reigned in, and its clear I'm not going to be effectively enslaved for the benefit of others:

Thats on a state by state basis, and yes I would be all for slashing subsidies for the south/midwest.

Thats a big part of it actually. As a resident of a blue state, I am tired of being forced to subsidize religious fundamentalists and anti-sicence zealots in the south. I would also like to see fiscal restraint (a la Bloomberg) be the norm, not the exception. Military, Health Care, Social Security, all needs to be cut. Extensively.

I see no reason why I should be forced to pay for the retirement of Boomers. Boomers who have raided Social Security at every turn, stuck us with generations of war debt, fucked the economy through a combination of stupid regulations and private greed, and generally been dicks. Cat food, cool aid and nothing more then preventative care is more then fair.

Your facts assume some sort of link.

We also have one of the largest immigrant populations as a percentage.
We have a host of other things unrelated to HC, like our agriculture policy, which have massive effects.

So, do your facts tell you that US HC system is bad, or that having immigrants is of mixed benefits? Or that subsidizing corn is really awful?

Your facts prove nothing.

I wasn't about to vote for religious nut, so I vote O. However believe me when I say that many of us have a serious issue with the portion of this country that consumes far more from the fed then it pays in taxes.

As soon as the GOP gets its act together and push a fiscal conservative who stays away from guns/god/women, the days of big government will be over.

Simply not true. For many people, health care in the US is far by better then the rest of the world. If you have good private insurance or can pay cash, its quite simply the best.