Google isn't working on a car. They're working on an autonomous driving system that would be added to someone else's car.

Can we take a second and thank the person who came up with the fantastic backronym "Mercury Surface, Space Environment, Geochemistry and Ranging" for MESSENGER.

For those that don't know, Mercury was the messenger of the Gods.

You're wrong. I don't care enough to get into it. Mod me however you want.

That's the summary, not the actual code. What is the definition of a "religious", or "charitable" group?

Those are the general guidelines. They don't really mean anything. As you note, the meaning of "religious organization" is unworkably vague. So are the meanings of "charitable" and "educational" groups.

Here's the IRS form you fill out to become tax exempt-

http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/f1023.pdf

The important parts are the questions like "Does your organization attempt to influence legislation", and the details of your finances. If you answer those correctly, they don't really care if you're a church, or a cult, or just a group of people who don't like wearing pants.

That makes no sense. The 501(c)3 tax code doesn't mention churches or religion at all. So, no, churches are in no way tax exempt because they're churches. They're tax exempt because they meet the requirements of 501(c)3- just like the Sierra Club and the Humane Society.

There is absolutely no constitutional way to make churches pay taxes without also requiring the Sierra Club to pay taxes. The only way to make Scientology lose their tax exempt status is to show that they violate the existing rules.

We love to make fun of the useless "suits". But that's a situation where you need good executive management and good lawyers. They need to negotiate good contracts up front, and then make sure the contracts are abided by.

Anathem was pretty brilliant. The first 300 pages seemed really boring at the time, but later you realize that they have to be there.

Only if you live in Italy. It was developed and built by the Italian Space Agency.

So workstations on an airgapped network can never get software upgrades?

The situation changed quite a bit when they recently launched HBO Now. For non-cable subscribers, piracy used to be the only option. Now it's not.

Seasons 1 through 4 diverge some from the books. Season 5 apparently diverges a lot, since they're setting up for a season 6 with no book to work from.

They just launched HBO Now, so your complaint is moot.

Sure it is. An "air gap" is a network configuration- e.g. there is no wire connecting the network to the outside world.

I have heard that many air gapped networks also put super glue in the USB ports, but that's not required.

The number of H1B visas hasn't changed since 2005. And that's controlled by Congress, not the President.