FACT:

The federal government has never been constitutionally tasked with lending money for anything to any private entity. Both of you lose. You've been trumped by the fact that the money should have never existed.

Wait, you ACTUALLY said that garbage. Look, I don't mean to hurt your feelings, but Obama is rich. His proposed "buffett law" would only tax the working wealthy. Capital gains and taxes on assets are what affects the truly wealthy. Of course Buffett wants to be taxed on his INCOME. Just don't touch his dividends or gains from the market, or his ridiculous personal wealth. Yes, he already paid taxes on his wealth. Yep, at lower rates due to capital gains or other maneuverings.

Feigned caring is what I see. Feigned so as to keep people from seeking the truth. I don't trust either party. I especially don't trust a part that wants to grow government, and let unions exert ridiculous levels of control. Big government and big unions are both bad, and were never meant to be. We needed unions, but we no longer need what they've become. We don't need FEDERAL programs. Keep Health Education, and Welfare at state levels.

We are individuals with a set of rights, in a united republic of individual states, with a federal government for dealing with international, trade, interstate roads, national defense, and a handful of other purposes. We are too far from what was intended, in government growth, at all levels.

I agree that we need to use oil in the near- term, and quit throwing money at ridiculously expensive alternatives that don't have reliability. Nuclear is reliable, and newer plants will have safety measures that surpass the decades old standards of plants that have had issues. Modern combustion vehicles can be powered by on- demand generated HYDROGEN. No batteries. No BS with low power, high cost. You aren't storing miniature Hindenburg levels, you don't even have to store at all. Emissions... aren't.

While I strongly support ditching alternative garbage near-term, which supports the oil industry, I am quite certain that the oil industry is the leading reason why the hydrogen powered combustion never got off the ground much.

Please note that BMW has done this. I know of a real world converted vehicle that gets better power than gas.

I also know that, just like the 110+ octane fuel made from roadside "nuisance" grass in Indiana will never be mass produced.

We need to think like a country gone corporate. We need to promise big oil our love, and then ditch them with the reminder that they tried to usurp our authority as their boss (the consumer).

All my moderately informed opinion. Converting to hydrogen now would force a LOT of lost jobs, as an aside. We need to be back on top before doing this.

I'm good with that. Compared to expanding government. I will take ultimate freedom over being locked into having the government own everything, run business, tell me when i'm too sick to bother treating, etc. Yes, insurance companies TRY to do it too, but you can sue, and you can even use the government for that.

Removing garbage like welfare for life, bullshit bailouts and free money for failing, well that would be a good government shrink. The EPA? too much power. Unions..... WAY too much. We even lock up drug dealers for longer than rapists, because the government propagates the lies about drugs ruining the world.

Let me ask this:

How do we compete with China, if our work environments are wide open for safety, pollution, discrimination, and numerous other lawsuits frivolously filed, and subject to union threats of shutdown if assembly line workers don't make the same as well educated IT workers?

How can we continue to give away billions for aid to other countries, while we spiral out of control into debt?

Why are we giving away money to support research into pointless endeavors like electric cars? Solar? While we are not balancing the budget? Extending unemployment so far out that between that and welfare people can live most of their life in government CONDO housing, and still have a big screen TV.

Why is it that minorities MUST make up about 46% of any federally backed loans, regardless of ability to pay, if a bank wants to qualify for federal backing?

Do we really need a government to be so large that it perpetuates funding for bad ideas like treating races of people as "different"?

Do we need government to prevent businesses from failing, yet keep unions in force, therefore keeping labor costs ridiculously out of scale?

This same big government is not raising capital gains. Obama had 2 full years to do anything he felt was important. He crammed his garbage money pit health care through on a "budget" vote, instead of increasing cap gains, as a priority.

The TEA party isn't a 100% answer. It is much farther down the road than the two parties that run things as one mind.

What if I don't want steam running on my machine. I am sure you think it's fine. I don't . I run my machines lean, and I refuse to install Steam due to it's insistence on being a launching platform for when I play.

I grew up with: Buy game. Install game. Play game. End game. No game services or processes running. Play next game. repeat.

This is MY PC and I want absolute control over every fucking bit of software running, and if it's done running, it's processes should fuck off and die. Until resurrected by me.

Interesting...... So... if the software companies are enjoying a >300 billion dollar business, with 85% piracy, I guess that they actually deserve more like 2 or so TRILLION per year, right?

Could we stop with making up numbers for copyright infringement that are supposed to represent losses, when there is no way that the shovelware being pushed out could ever actually get that much purchased? Sure, i'm pulling that "fact" out of my ass, much like pundits for industry are doing with their numbers.

It's all a joke. The companies are thriving, and I don't see people profiteering from sales of copyrighted works. Well, not in the U.S., anyway. Blatant in China and other places? Sure. Yet we seem to love making consumers look like cheap-asses that would never buy anything unless forced. Laws do not resolve problems. Enforcement does. We have too many problems with violent criminals to pay so much attention to this. If we actually enforced these laws fully, rapists would do a 30 day term, due to overpopulation.

The idea that we need more laws and restrictions on this, to fill prisons and cost tax payers, despite our other real issues, is sad. It's also wrong.

I disagree. If you haven't made your money in 15 years, let others build on it, and reap the goodwill from "giving" something to the world.

The limitation to smoking, and smoking marijuana should be the same as that of other laws created sanely: you cannot perform an activity that encroaches on those rights of others defined by the Constitution. If smoking cigarettes, drinking, or smoking marijuana presents a direct health risk, or indirect (you get in vehicle and drive under influence), then you are in the wrong. Marijuana is not physically addictive, cigarettes (nicotine) are, as is alcohol.

The argument for legalization of marijuana is strong (in my opinion) largely because it has less bad effects than currently legal substances, and has been shown (in Amsterdam) to not see larger use in adults when legalized (or, in that case, where law looks askance). Incidence of use among younger folks is lower there than here, also. I won't bother citing, go look it up for yourself. I believe the same study cited lower use of addictive, more dangerous drugs in Amsterdam also. This makes sense, because if you can get a clean "high", for cheap, why bother to spend many times the money for known dangerous and illegal drugs. Sure, some do. The interest for casual, productive users is probably less, because cocaine, for example, is less convenient, risky, and questionable in content.

Sorry to side track there. To the thread, I say that copyright, trademark, and patenting, all need to be reviewed, and seriously changed.

Are these -your- kids? The government does not own me, or my children. I do not even own "my" kids. So, please, feel free to take your communist (I hope you are an idealist, and not a Socialist) views, shove them up your ass, and add a twist for effect. I refuse to respect any law that forces my children to go anywhere against their will.

Summary: go piss up a rope.

It was a budgetary matter. They have already used the majority vote process to pass key legislation that could be loosely called budgetary.

Fuck you. Fuck you for pointing out the obvious truth, and qualifying it. Fuck you for adding another reason to just leave this country, in favor of some other place with a lesser political system, but one that gets better results.

You probably feel as saddened as angry about it all, just like me. Fuck us both for not being able to be sheep, and follow the herd while we can.

While I agree with your sentiment, your facts are not facts. They got into trouble for -lying-. Specifically, lying under oath, and lying on national news media.

Take a look at what over zealous use of immunization costs. Taking the worst case scenario of your side of the argument only proves that in fringe cases and exceptional circumstances (malnutrition, poverty, poor sanitation) that induce higher rates in all conditions will there be a good argument for vaccination.

Guillaine Barre' syndrome. Spelling may be off. I got it from vaccinations. 1 in 10,000 WILL get it from vaccinations. More vaccinations is more rolls of the dice. Some ailments aren't worth injecting potentially impure or bacteria laden substances DIRECTLY into the bloodstream for.

There are absolutely two sides to this. If you want to lock me up for not vaccinating my own kids, or otherwise penalize me, I can and will go elsewhere. I don't need a government to decide what rights I have with my/my kids' bodies outside of what is constitutional.

In short: don't tell other people how to live. Also, since when is trusting Bill Gates wise?

It does not meet the criteria for making sense. It does, however, seem to fit neatly into the direction things are going. Individual freedom and expression aren't being outright taken away, just discouraged to the point of pointless.

I wish I had something positive to say here. Really.