If I hacked into Michael Moore's computer, and then found and leaked a lot of embarrassing private material revealing Moore to be a hypocritical douche bag, and then I got arrested for this, would Michael bail me out of jail?

Of course I wouldn't need his bail money cause there would be a million or so other people ahead of him, but -- you know -- just asking.

I use the conventional definition of socialism, which is where the means of production are in the hands of the government. By this definition the Scandinavian countries are not particularly socialist (although highly distributive). Venezuela is fast becoming a socialist country, particularly as the rate of expropriation seems to be increasing.

Democracy can come to resemble two wolves and a sheep voting on what to have for lunch.

That's why democracy must be balanced by individual freedoms that the government can not easily override. Thus the term "liberal democracy".

Unfortunately Chavez has most (but not all) Venezuelan judges in his pocket.

That god my connection is still in inta

I would define Colbert's "truthiness" as true or wise in a philosphical sense, independent of whether the facts actually support it or whether it has anything to do with facts at all.

Thus a statement can be manifestly false, and yet contain considerable truthiness. Its veracity transcends reality.

The very complexity of the world means that you need organizing principles (that is, ideologies) to help make sense of it. To believe in one's ideology too completely, and to never questions one's ideologies, are serious mistakes. On the other hand, to be a complete political pragmatist without ideology to give structure to this complex world is likely unworkable.

One of the most critical skills in satire are knowing where the boundaries are. Exceed the boundaries and you go from respected to despised.

Colbert's genius is that even those who he is mocking can go along with joke, perhaps ignoring or not understanding that they are being mocked.

To pretend to be organizing such a rally is funny, but to actually hold such a rally is ridiculing the rally participants too directly. The offense would be impossible to ignore, and that's not Colbert's style.

Wouldn't it be easier just to travel at night?

Venezuela's forces are 130,000 strong, and they've been buying a lot of military equipment lately from oil revenues. Colombia's armed forces are 145,00 strong, not counting police, and is also well equiped.

Reminds me of Europe in 1913.

You, sir, have too much time on your hands.

Marshlands. I forgot marshlands.

Even before the modern era, man had spread throughout the planet save Antarctica. Mountains, prairies, woodlands, sea coast, jungle, desert, arctic, we were there. I can't think of a another land species (apart from microorganisms) that was so wide spread.

This suggests that mankind is spectacularly adaptive in comparison to other species.

I've never been impressed with the ability of SF to predict the future, either technologically or socially. Just read the old SF (of which I have a substantial collection). Not much there I would call prescient, despite some authors' obvious attempts at it. The issues of today are poorly reflected in the SF of yesterday.

As such, I am skeptical of SF's ability to help us deal with change and avoid mistakes.