That's not really a lot of money in federal terms. Heck, that's less than a couple modern jet fighters. Plus, it's only in Utah. No other senator or representative will care since it's not in the district.

Please don't take this personally, but OMG PLEASE STAHP. I hear this repeated all the time, and it frustrates me endlessly. Maybe this is the rule of thumb for speaking to mutants, farm animals or teenagers. But if you have an at least moderately intelligent audience whose attendance is not compulsory (e.g. a modern workplace), telling me the same thing three times will make me stop paying attention to you. Training people that you need to repeat themselves three times in a presentation is part of why many presentations are so boring and why we all ignore them which is why you have to repeat yourself three times and NOMAD ERROR. ERROR. ERROR. EXAMINE.

I do plenty of useful presentations all the time, using the crazy technique of just telling people what I want to communicate to them, one time. (Reiterating important points within a slide if necessary.) If they were multitasking, napping or ignoring the rest of my presentation because they expected to hear it three times, that's their problem. And I don't feel bad.

True as far as it goes, but I would argue that very, very few people are actually taught how to give presentations. Think about it - someone may have taught you how to use PowerPoint, but did anyone teach you to present? I am sure we have all gotten "coaching" at one point or another from some jackass reviewing our slides pre-presentation telling us that "you need more pictures" or "spell out the acronyms on slide six" but I doubt if more than a handful have actually received decent instruction on how to organize one's thoughts and communicate effectively to an audience. Not just that - for example, I have a few stupid, inoffensive canned jokes that I tell at the beginning of each presentation for a new audience at work. It's cheesy and groan-worthy, but it establishes an air of informality and receptiveness that makes the audience far more willing to listen. Does anyone get taught that kind of stuff anymore?

Plus, no amount of good or bad PowerPoint usage will make up for someone just being a bad communicator (especially in front of audiences). You can use PowerPoint as a crutch, but the greatest software in the world can't save your presentation from sucking if you have issues ranging from "stage fright" or "fear of public speaking" all the way to "just being an idiot who can't think linearly from A to B." I'd venture a completely unsupportable opinion that at least 2/3 of all humans in a modern white-collar workplace are either subpar thinkers or subpar communicators, so we can expect at least that percentage of presentations to suck.

And I love how the far left are somehow heroes, while on the other side of the coin, the far right are somehow crazies. From the middle, you both look the same. Something to think about.

Well, yeah. Isn't this what any company is supposed to try to do?

In Hawaii, the statute of limitations for a lawsuit over a written or oral contract appears to be 6 years. In California, where I'm guessing Luckey resides, it appears to be 4 years for a written contract, and 2 for an oral one. (Source: http://www.nolo.com/legal-ency...)

Oh yes indeed - it all depends on what type of company it is. I am oversimplifying here, but there are (at least in the US four (and a half) types of companies based on ownership structure:

• Sole proprietorship : There is a dude named Bob Smith (BS) who owns Bob Smith Plumbing (BSP). BS and BSP are separate entities for tax purposes, but BS can do whatever the f**k he wants to with BSP - sell it, keep it, use its finances to expense hookers. The downside to Bob is that if BSP goes bankrupt, there is no barrier for creditors not to go after Bob personally.
• Partnership or Limited Liability Partnership: There is a group of people who own Bob Smith Plumbing, which may include Bob Smith, a rich uncle who gave him the money to finance his startup costs, whatever. The partners who own shares in it control 100% of what the company does, and nobody can force them to do anything they don't want to. But if things go tits-up the partners who aren't involved in day-to-day operation of the business (e.g. Bob's uncle) may be shielded from some bankruptcy or lawsuit claims while those who ran the business daily (e.g. Bob) are not.
• Corporation (private) : Here it gets interesting. Bob Smith Plumbing, Inc. is now legally separate from Bob or any of the owners - i.e., if BSP Inc. goes bankrupt, creditors can't come after Bob or the other owners. (In return for this legal separate personhood of the company, BSP Inc. must have independent board members, file quarterly reports and go through other legal oversight to prove that Bob isn't treating the corporation like a personal asset; if the books show that, creditors can "pierce the corporate veil" and hold Bob or the other shareholders personally liable.) Still, the owners are the owners and nobody can make them sell, not sell, or do anything else they don't want to. However, a large private corporation usually has a LOT of owners - founders, Venture Capitalists, etc. - and they all get to make big decisions based on the % of shares they own. If you get a buyout offer from $MEGACORP and the founders and employees (who own 49% of the shares) don't want to but the VCs (who own 51% of the shares) do, then you get bought out.
• Corporation (public): Same as above, but you are no longer owned just by founders, employees, VCs, etc.; you have started selling your shares to anyone who wants to buy (ranging from jackasses like you or me with E*Trade accounts to hedge funds and institutional investors). Going public is a goal for most companies because it converts your shares of the company into actual, you know, money (think turning potential energy into kinetic energy). But going public means that (as above) not only does your company have to follow the will of the Board (as elected by shareholders based on their % of shares held) but you also are subject to lawsuits from those shareholders (or criminal prosecution by the FTC) if you run the company in a way (e.g. turn down a lucrative buyout offer) that is deliberately against the monetary interest of shareholders. On a side note, public corporations can create ways to avoid hostile takeovers like Poison Pill plans, too... but if more than 50% of shareholders don't like your way of running the company, you are out.

I say "four and a half" (despite there being other business entity forms) because the last "half" is a company that's in Chapter 11 bankruptcy. Long story short, once you file, the previous owners of the company don't own s**t. The US government - in the form of a bankruptcy judge - now gets to decide what to do with the company, whether that means shutting it down, selling parts of it off at auction, or allowing the previous owners/managers to demonstrate that they have a plan to get the company back on its feet. Regardless, in bankruptcy nobody but the judge gets to decide what will happen to the company.