JSON is a pretty significant force behind modern Web design. Without it, the Web would still be a pretty static place.

Nah, we'd just be putting actual XML in our XMLHTTPRequests instead. (All JSON does is represent the same data as the XML would, in a less verbose format.) We'd still have all the Asynchronous Javascript And XML.

It would be better... if you could program [Objective C] on something other than a Mac.

You can!

"the Commission" (caps? should I say it in an evil accent or something?)

I was referring to it as a proper noun ("the [Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications] Commission"), not as a generic commission.

If it ain't broke, don't fix it. Software isn't always better because it's new.... So, color me unimpressed by Powershell, Agile, objective C, json and Azure.

What is Objective C doing in that list? Did you forget that it was invented more than 30 years ago (and not by Apple)? It predates both .NET and Java, and is almost as old as C++.

Objective C isn't the newfangled replacement; it's the thing that ain't broke!

What better name would you suggest for the GNU Image Manipulation Program?

GNUImage?

Or, what's the Zulu word for "Photoshop?" ; )

How is Blender (English for "food processor", referring to a 3D modeling app) any better than Ubuntu (Zulu for "humankind", referring to a Linux distribution)?

1. Artists blend colors and shapes. 2. Blenders and food processors are not the same appliance -- the former liquifies; the latter dices. 3. I agree that Ubuntu isn't a bad name.

Xfce (XForms Common Environment) used to be descriptive

Any new user: "WTF does 'common environment' mean, and why would I want one made out of 'Xforms' (whatever those are)?!"

Aside from that, you could do a lot worse than a random unpronounceable but short acronym when trying to come up with a name for something these days...

Then why did they appear before the Commission at all? If they truly do not operate in Canada, then nothing the CRTC does affects them and they could blow off the whole thing with impunity.

This is also a good argument that applies to the United States, too. It explains why the 17th Amendmennt was a mistake.

Second, the issue is not space. We don't want to cramp people into the empty Midwest, we want to cram them into cities.

Indeed: at least in the US, the problem might eventually be bulldozing the suburbs and returning them to farmland (and/or nature preserves, to maintain food webs).

Take the greed of the 1% down a few notches, and sustainability might be far easier than previously thought without tactics like disease or bloodshed thinning the herd.

How do you accomplish the former without the latter?

Hmm... I thought it happened more recently, with the Southern Strategy?

Slaves really weren't that expensive, that was why the South in the United States was literally the wealthiest society in the world right up before the civil war

Well, that and the fact that slaves probably didn't count in the "per capita" part of "GDP per capita."

No, it's not an exaggeration. Rather than rehash arguments from the previous thread, I'll just link to some of them.

(Note that that is far from an exhaustive list of the arguments explaining how that politician is indeed trying to ban teaching science in general. I just can't be bothered to go re-read through and pick out all the good ones.)

Social Conservatives are less than 25% of Republicans and are probably less than 20% of the total.

Then why do they get more than 50% of the vote in the primaries?

Being religious does not equal being a social conservative.

Sure, some people are religious but not socially conservative... but they're usually Democrats.

But Gary Johnson and others are/were pretty damn close to "coming out."

Sure, Gary Johnson was pretty great (I voted for him)... which is why he lost the Republican primary by a landslide. The Republicans are incapable of electing a reasonable candidate like Johnson precisely because they're overrun with authoritarian theocrats!

It's too bad, too, because unlike the rest of the Republican candidates, he was socially-liberal enough to have a chance of beating Obama in the general election (had he run as a Republican instead of a Libertarian).

Go to Red State and Legal Insurrection and you'll see that many are opposed to the leviathan state.

Maybe some people on those sites say that, but they are either A) a vocal minority, B) fail to actually vote, or C) claim to be for small government, until they realize such a position is a detriment to their pet special interest (usually Social Security or one of the talk-radio "rile up the dumbasses" issues, such as any involving religion, race, evolution or climate change) whereupon they vote for the authoritarian candidate anyway.

most republicans are not social conservatives

This hasn't been true for at least a couple of decades, especially when you consider which Republicans are capable of actually getting elected (rather than losing the primary due to lack of support from the social conservative faction of their party -- clear evidence that it constitutes a majority).

If you can show me an atheist Republican in Congress, then I'll show you a flying pig. We can hold the show-and-tell in Hell (but make sure you bundle up, because it'll have frozen over)!

The key divides between republicans and democrats is over the size and scope and purpose of the Federal government.

No it isn't; they're both in complete agreement that the Federal government should be huge and authoritarian. They only differ in which departments they prefer the bloat to occur (e.g. war vs. welfare). Even the Tea Partyists who claim to be fiscally conservative hypocritically support Social Security, just like the Democrats.

Well, let's see... just a few weeks ago, we discussed how they want to (effectively) ban teaching science by gutting all the actual scientific reasoning from it and doing only rote memorization. (And even then, omitting the rote memorization of certain theories deemed inconvenient to their religion.)