That would certainly deter me from buying products that were manufactured or contained parts that were manufactured abroad. People would be determined to buy domestic products (assuming they even exist these days). That said, it was clear that I could sell my car without permission when I bought it - changing the terms after the sale seems very wrong. If they implement this rule, they should specify that it applies to sales after a point in time in the future.

Why stop with obesity? What about other risky behaviors (sunbathing, dangerous sports, promiscuity, alcohol, etc.)? I think we'd all love to have the government monitoring our behaviors and sending us a monthly bill for every deviation from what they deem "good and normal".

For what it's worth, I don't think this health plan will work (i.e. I think premiums will go up).

I upgraded from a Samsung Galaxy to a Lumia 900 and I haven't looked back. Let's just say it is very easy to use and I don't have to constantly tweak it. The apps also seem much more polished (not to mention I have all the apps I had on my old phone with the exception of certain games). I also like it better than my wife's iPhone 4S but that doesn't mean it's a better device, I just never got used to that one button does all concept (I really like having a back key and a way to lock the phone).

I'm sorry, but the technology was very different back in 1990. I remember a world with gray-scale gameboys and $2000 386 machines with 40MB hard drives boasting a screen resolution of 640x480. Phones were mounted to cars or carried around in bags.

Imagine a hand-held touch-screen device using technology from 1990. It would be bulky and heavy. It would run very hot. It would have terrible graphics capabilities and you wouldn't have a popular market place for developers to share their work.

It would have failed miserably.

I've telecommuted before, one day a week, and I found that my presence as a valuable employee was diminished. Things would happen at the office that I couldn't be a part of. My contributions to the team were less evident - especially that immeasurable contribution you make when you participate in discussions and help your peers. If you are competing with your peers for advancement (or simply to keep your job) then you shouldn't be working from home. If you are satisfied with your current role and pay rate, then it's a good deal.

So I've been submitting audible search requests on my Android for over a year now. Every time I do it, my wife (an iPhone fan) would comment about how stupid that feature was. I wonder if her tone will change now that the almighty Apple is telling everyone it's hip and trendy.

But what about those who don't trust Obama? Charisma != Honesty.

I'd be all for the government taxing the top 5% in that manner. The problem is that I don't trust any of our current politicians to enact such taxes. Republicans are obvious - not so much liars as they are pathetic in their justification for tax breaks for the wealthy. Democrats appear to be more subtle in that they advertise it one way (i.e. increase taxes for people making more than $250,000 per year) yet implement it in another way (i.e. people making millions can afford to exploit loop holes, people making $100,000 per year have an increase because they own a small business or have assets exceeding a certain amount or something like that).

Just consider Reid's debt plan. On the surface, it appears to be a legitimate compromise. Yet in the details, it is obviously a clever ploy to give the appearance of making cuts without actually making cuts (i.e. the cuts were already assumed to be made).

I would just like to see someone step up and announce a clear and concise plan that is truly a compromise. Raise taxes on the top 5% of individual incomes. Publicly ensure that the other 95% will not be impacted. Fix the entitlement programs to prevent/discourage abuse (and simultaneously cut costs). Stop throwing money at unnecessary wars.

the less you earn, the higher the tax rate you want

This isn't snarky / sarcasm - I am not familiar with this concept. Can you explain how a person might benefit from paying 30% taxes instead of 25%?

I had to work with ASP.NET for a few years and I always found myself fighting against it (coming from a Web background). If you have a chance, I would suggest trying out ASP.NET MVC - it respects Web concepts while giving you access to .NET libraries with C#.

I hope their mobile games allow you to compete without having to spend money.

"Okay guys, listen up. All of you start this round with pitch forks. Except for Dan over here. He paid $50 so he gets a rocket launcher. Have fun everyone!"

Think about a car. You can install an alarm, tint the windows, deploy the Club(tm), lock the doors, and point a camera at it. However, no matter how many security precautions you take your vehicle can still be broken into and/or stolen. Security is about deterring criminal behavior. There is no way to completely eliminate that risk - it can merely be reduced. The same concept applies to Web application security. I'm not saying you shouldn't bother encrypting (that would be unwise), but you shouldn't assume that encryption will protect you.

Maybe one could reply to their request for money stating that you charge $1,000 per minute of your time when it comes to responding to legal inquiries and that they now owe you $10,000 for services rendered (i.e. you reading and responding to their request).

A number of years ago the question was whether or not to use Flash. Flash may have become more ubiquitous since then but those arguments are still relevant. Do you favor pop/sizzle over accessibility/compatibility. Should you have valid reasons to go with pop/sizzle, then the question becomes one of Flash or Silverlight.

My hope is that HTML5 will render the pop/sizzle question meaningless as you could have sufficient pop/sizzle with something that is both accessible and compatible.

As it stands, if you need something richer than HTML/JavaScript, then you would want to go with the toolset that you know or that is easiest for you to learn with your current skillset. Microsoft developers would likely be better off with Silverlight. Everyone else...?