Rather than mark your ballot, you have to go to the polling station personnel, and tell them that you decline your vote. That is treated differently than a spoiled ballot.

It is simple. It's just hard, and people don't want to do things that are hard.

My ex was/is obese, and all the chocolate bar wrappers I found in her car, and empty ice cream containers I found in her house, may have had something to do with it. Now she's an a meal-replacement diet and has lost over 20 lbs. in about four months. No, it's not easy, but I respect and support her for taking control of her health.

You are right that some military personnel would presumably join the revolution. What are the odds that they would bring with them all the infrastructure (fuel, personnel, maintenance equipment and parts) needed to keep those A-10 Warthogs, F-18s, secure communications networks, satellite sensing systems and other high-tech machinery running as you fight the people who own the skies, seas, and telcos?

Here's the thing: the State has weapons that could reduce you, your house, your neighbourhood, or your city to a smoking ruin. They have people (stronger, faster, and more capable than you), who train daily to kill in the most effective ways, with weapons and equipment that are simply unavailable to you. If they were to take you seriously as a threat, they could locate you in seconds and put a drone through the nearest window.

So owning your very own semi-automatic, or even fully-automatic small arms is completely pointless except, at the very best, to let your corpse serve as a witness to the rest of the world that your State kills its own. Armed resistance can not overcome the enormous imbalance of power that modern states possess.

Resistance is not futile, but armed resistance is. The most effective counter to government encroachment is not to be found in the Cliven Bundys of this world.

And the one who taught you to spell "apostrophes"!

I'd be more inclined to say that they value their own power and influence over your individual rights (I'm not American, and so have no rights in their eyes). If they really worried about your physical safety, they would be getting evidence on polluters, unsafe working conditions, social collapse, the prison industry, and all the other things that contribute to the decay of your quality of life.

US military bases in Canadian territory? That would be news to me and, I suspect, to our government and military. There are certainly joint exercises here, and US military personnel working with Canadians, and occasional visits by US ships and planes, but no permanent facilities.

I'd agree with this. My son had the times tables drilled into his head mercilessly, when he was about 10. Now, in Grade 11, it makes the algebra, functions, and trig smoother and less mysterious. I challenge both my boys to do mental arithmetic all the time, because I believe it's so important to be able to estimate results that a computer/calculator spits out.

I have to say that my first instinct is to ask where you see your quality of life. If you have so much expensive stuff that you spend significant time and energy protecting it, then maybe having that stuff is the problem.

I haven't locked my house for at least a couple of month, and when I look around to see what might be stolen, the computer — and, more specifically, the hard drive in my desktop — is the only thing that I would really miss, that would be hard to replace. The laptops, TV, Playstation and other gadgets can easily be replaced. You know what? It's liberating not to have to be afraid of losing things.

I remember going to a dairy farm in South Africa (about 25 years ago) that used ostriches to guard the dairy cattle. An ostrich can disembowel you with a single kick, and they are mean.

Verizon received tax breaks from the New Jersey government of $2.1 billion in 1994, in exchange for a promise that every household in the state would have 45Mbps symmetrical fiber by 2015 (50% of them by 2004).

Verizon then donated heavily to the political powers of NJ, and was released from their promise with no penalty.

Who's the parasite again?

You're a Johnny-come-lately.

I remember connecting to bulletin boards with my 300 baud modem (circa 1988), and I could read the discussions as they came in. That's right, my reading speed was about the same as the transfer speed.

The modem used to overheat, and I would have to put it in the freezer for a while so I could use it again.

Japan is nowhere near able to feed itself. It produced under 40% of its caloric needs in 2011. It does produce all the rice it needs (thanks to ridiculously subsidized and protected farmers), but is the world's largest importer of corn.

I would also be surprised if it had any significant textile/clothing industry; everything now comes from other countries in Asia.

I suppose it's theoretically possible that vandals are risking arrest to remove -- and not break or damage -- a single antenna (out of the several on a cruiser), the one antenna that could embarrass or implicate officers in inappropriate/illegal behaviour, but it's ludicrous to suggest that it is likely or even probable.

I'm pretty sure that people who work in retail are basically on camera all the time, certainly when they in the public areas of the store. In private, of course they should not be monitored. Unless, perhaps, you count ankle monitors that some convicted felons wear as an alternative to being in prison.

If you were in England, you would be on some of the estimated 6 million surveillance cameras: 70,000 operated by the police, 300,000+ by schools, 13,000 by the London Tube, etc., and most of the rest private individuals and corporations.

Given the track record of police abuses in the U.S., and the dramatic [fall in complaints about police behaviour](http://www.policefoundation.org/content/body-worn-cameras-police-use-force), plus the usefulness of having on-the-spot video evidence against criminals, I would support mandatory cameras for all of them.