Really?

To all intents and purposes, they required the companies involved to take money out of their left hip pocket, and move it to their right hip pocket in the name of net neutrality.

I mean, "we're required to charge ourselves for data usage by us" is a bit bizarre, when all is said and done....

Sufficiently intelligent beings who have learned to travel faster than the speed of light

FTL isn't necessary for interstellar travel.

Hollow out Ceres, put a few million people on her, send her off toward Alphacent at 0.01c. In 430-odd years, it'll arrive, the descendants of the original inhabitants will colonize that star system.

Lather, rinse, repeat. Fill up a star system, then send off a few colony ships to nearby stars. Even at 0.01c, you fill the galaxy in 10 million years or so. Which is an eyeblink in the lifetime of Earth, much less the Universe.

Not really, because if they were determined enough the majority could push through a constitutional amendment to make it happen.

Supermajority. A simple majority isn't sufficient. 2/3 of the Congress plus 3/4 of the States are required to amend the Constitution.

Or read a book - you could use a Kindle which works, except when you need color

Got to admit I haven't looked at a Kindle in a while, but my Nook, which is several years old now, does color.

Of course, my Nook (and I'm pretty sure Kindle these days) is basically an Android Tablet when all is said and done....

Slashdot in particular can't stop fellating Uber over what is probably a largely illegal operation.

Hmm, "largely illegal operation"...

I think "arguably" is a better term than "largely", but let that go.

The notion that people should automatically oppose "illegal operations" is interesting. Mostly because so many precedents come to mind.

For instance, assisting slaves to escape from the South was quite illegal. Did its illegality make it wrong?

Or there was that whole hiding Jews from the Nazis thing....

Yah, those are rather incendiary examples, but history makes clear that opposing bad laws is a necessary prerequisite to getting them removed.

Disclaimer: Do I think that Cab Medallions are a good idea? No, I think they're designed to limit competition (just like franchises for cable or internet do). Do I think Uber should be legal? Yeah, because I'm opposed to buying legislation to limit competition in general....

Also, shouldn't Minneapolis' club being removing the franchise for the unpaid franchise fee? If I don't pay Comcast, they turn off my cable.

And if Comcast doesn't pay Minneapolis, Minneapolis turns off everyone's cable, right?

So, basically, the aliens are the kind of assholes who would watch someone get into trouble and do nothing to help them get out? Gotcha.

It was in the low 50's (about 11C) outside on game day.

The balls were found at 10.5 psi, and the minimum Regulation pressure was 12.5 psi.

So, 84% of regulation pressure means (since pressure is proportional to temp, all other things being equal) that the balls would've had to be inflated in a 338K environment. Which is 150F.

I suppose the Pats could've inflated the balls in a sauna, but it's rather unlikely that the Refs would've failed to notice that the balls were hot enough to burn them when they checked the temps before the game.

In other words, no, the Pats cheated. Did their cheating matter in the end? Nope, the Colts sucked so much that day that the Pats could've played fair and won.

Alas, playing fair isn't something they're all that familiar with.

I've pondered sortition government, but I wonder how you would reign in the power of the bureaucracy.

Rein in.

What makes you think anyone has managed to rein in the power of the bureaucracy with current government types?

Face it, the larger the government becomes (relative to the population/economy), the more the government is dominated by its own bureaucracy. Note by the by, that the US Government's budget is ~20% of GDP. So one dollar in every five spent in the US is spent by the government....

Basically, anyplace that a search warrant by a US government agency will work, the Fourth Amendment applies. Anywhere else, not so much.

We need to have a monopoly on violence, otherwise it gets to be dog eat dog very quickly. But a government that isn't held to complete account by the people is just another mad dog.

So, just curious, how do you hold the guys with a monopoly on violence to "complete account by the people"?

When a population is committed to opposing an invading force the invasion will never been finished.

Umm, no.

When the invading force is required (for whatever self-imposed reason) to be nice to the locals, a resisted invasion will never be finished.

The USA could have won in Vietnam, if they'd not decided that invading North Vietnam was something they couldn't do. Giving your enemy a safe place means you never run out of enemy.

Seriously, consider the possibilities for ending WW2 if the Allies had decided that Japan and Germany were off limits to all attacks - attack occupied France or the Philippines, no problem, but you're forbidden to attack the enemy homeland....

Most of us practice head shots for hours at a time.

Only an idiot tries for a headshot. Anyone with a clue knows to aim for center of mass.