The Constitution was designed to explicitly state what the federal government could do. It left everything else to the states and the people, with the exceptions that there were certain things that even the states could not overrule, namely, those enumerated in the Bill of Rights. Within those constraints, the government should have no additional powers without an amendment. Collecting all data is an expansion.

There is no restriction to the right to copy. Copyright is about the right to distribute copies. With that out of the way, you lose your right not to distribute something after distributing it yourself. At that point, it is on track to be public domain, according to how the original contract was written. Steps can, and should, be taken to save items for posterity once they are published. No such obligation exists for things not published. This was the original intent of copyright law, and there was even a requirement to register works. That should be brought back, IMNSHO.

I would disagree - we do, in fact, face real inflationary pressures. Our currency's value goes up and down on the market. The market going up means nothing if the value of the dollar drops. The market is priced globally, only represented in dollars. The two are in a nice lock step. Once you remove the dollar's variance, you'll see the true market and inflationary picture.

Dealing with the fed gov issue - there would be inflation, but the unemployment level is so high and pay dropped so low, that inflationary pressures are kept at bay by instant drop in demand should prices rise. There has been an effective drop in real wages for decades, and at this point the bulk of the population can no longer accept increased prices. So your simplistic model does not account for enough variables to draw any meaningful conclusions.

This is extremely simple - abolish the IRS entirely, remove income taxes, and go with a GAT. Done. Happy?

The deficit would be fact #1 - definitely a resource shortfall there. The real problem is we tax income including worker income, and our imports greatly outweigh our exports. Imports do not add to the tax revenue, meaning that those left working the in US subsidize taxes for all imports. A shift to a GAT applied universally to all transactions, including at all borders, no exceptions, would quickly set things right with the revenue picture, and have the benefit of encouraging domestic production. 10% might be a good starting number. That means imported goods would have a 21% tax, minimum, as they are taxed at the border and again when sold to the end user.

I'd be willing to bet that the "horrible environmental load" of building those sub 40mpg motorcycles may not be that much less than the Prius, especially when you add in the 2+ of them you'll need to ferry around the average family of 4, plus the extra cargo arrangement for carting home groceries etc, as AC mentioned. Then tally the human cost of even the most minor wreck on a motorcycle, all of a sudden they don't look so appealing by any metric.

Yes, I'm aware you can get a 100 mpg moped that'll do tops 30-40 mph, and that's great. Once you get out in the real world, and have to work at a real job, that might take you 40+ miles from where you live, 2 wheels just doesn't cut it. Some people require face time, and no, you're not going to move every 6-18 months. Get over yourself. If you want to ride a motorcycle, no one's stopping you, no matter how stupid you might be. Denying facts doesn't change them.

Wrong - insurance companies make a percentage, so the more things cost, the more they get.

It wouldn't be cheap for the first 17-20 years....

Interestingly enough, a Prius gets 51/48 est. mpg, which is significantly better than the average for motorcycles, meaning that the Prius uses less gas than most motorcycles. (Simple statistics) For all passenger cars, the average is over 35mpg. It appears that motorcycles on average aren't much better than cars. Sadly.

The proper answer would have been "We cannot discuss matter of national security" to all questions. The problem with this answer was that there was already an increasing chorus rising about their true activities, so the only thing they could do was lie in an attempt to discredit those telling the truth or attempt alleviate concerns of those worried about NSA violations of the 4th amendment.

HDMI Hack For those with the time and skills, not too hard.

And yet, I can easily hook up a camera and video the TV and hook directly into the sound pickups, and voila - a copy is made without circumventing anything. Depending upon hardware, it may actually be a reasonably good copy. And if I wish to go one step further, I can hook into the screen's display and record the raw video directly too, resulting in a perfect copy. Again - no circumvention required of anything the DCMA protects digitally. IOW, it's ineffective and only causes harm to those that wish to use things legally anyways. Those that wish to do illegal things will never be stopped by something like the DMCA, and as just stated, the DMCA doesn't even need to be circumvented to create a perfect digital copy. That implies that the DMCA itself is ineffective.

The legislative branch could start by jailing Alexander and Clapper for contempt of Congress. No trial needed. They lied to Congress, it's on video recorded for the world to see. Then they can just start going down the list. The real problem there is there are a few Congress people that are on the NSA's side, and are in the committees that are supposed to have oversight. So they'll claim they knew, even when they didn't, neutering the rest of Congress. And everything keeps going the way it is.

Based on what's being responded to this post, it doesn't seem an isolated case. Granted, there's no proof, but given what we've all seen, it appears to be at least somewhat true.

The simple solution is simply using a "trash" browser instance that you can completely clear all cookies and local data from, you can avoid the personalization almost entirely, at least for a short while.

On this you are wrong. I have 3 recruiters I keep in contact with, and they've been there for 4-8 years now. Like your friends, you need to choose more carefully.