When I was your age, we knew that you started out at -1 as an AC. And we liked it.

Kids these days.

No idjit. It's in Alaska. Now, if you ask most Alaskans, we'd rather Alaska be part of Canada (except for the guns). We are patiently awaiting an invasion of stealth snowmobiles.

Please.

More like ten or twenty million years. We need some more global warming, much more plant matter growth (think algae mats meters deep for millions of years), then significant tectonic activity in just the right way.

So definitely renewable. But time lines matter.

Go ask them.

You might want to wait until after Christmas, they're a bit busy now.

If you're THAT much of a coward, they win.

Grow some balls.

If you can get enough 'normal' people to live in a smallish area, you can carve out a small niche of humanity from the giant wasteland of Texas. It works for Austin, Richardson (near Dallas) and, to a lesser extent, the region near the Johnson Manned Space Flight Center south of Houston.

Besides, Texas has some real advantages. Guns, Country Music, err, and a couple more, just drawing a blank at the moment.

What's really interesting about this tale is that is was designed for Steve Fossett, a friend of Branson's for a single dive into the Marianas trench. It was bought off of his estate (along with a catamaran mother craft) for a measly one million dollars. At that price, one of the oceanographic institutions should have picked it up as it would be pretty useful for shallower dives - lots of interesting places in the ocean not quite as deep.

But Branson, the PR hack that he is, wanted to take it down repeatedly to abyssal trench depth, something the designers had hissy fits about. Seems silly. Not much to see at the very deeps. Much more fun at a couple of hundred feet. If you want to scare yourself, you can just book passage on a Nigerian ferry or similar foolish stunt.

Republicans have been popping up in large quantities all over the country. I'm betting that has altered the wind patterns.

It's Bush's fault!

That's really pushing the definition of 'art'.

Yes. This is exactly what we should be doing. The National Wildlife Federation is not a credible institution as far as climate change is concerned. They are a very pro statist organization with more emotion than science. They're pissed that humans are over running parts of the planet and any bit of information that supports the 'bad human' posture is good news to them.

A significant problem is that this is complex issue with many unknowns. You can't feed that sort of thing to the media providers and consumers. It's just too hard. So it has to be broken down into something very, very simple.

"Four legs good, two legs bad."

Your view of the American system is hopelessly naive. It is already a complicated mix of public / private - so complex that there are literally tens of thousands of people involved in figuring out the minute details of how to actually deliver care. CMMS (Centers for Medicare / Medicaid Security) is a government entity that both pays money - directly to providers and to other companies and, simultaneously, regulates payments AND sets standards for 'private' companies to pay.

Medicaid (a government entity paid for by both states and the Federal government) IS the 'insurer of last resort' for complex, very ill patients.

There is nothing 'either / or' about this system. In fact, one of the biggest complaints about the system is in fact, that it is so "OR" - so friggin complex that nobody can figure it out. This leads to administrative waste, poor care and job security for those tens of thousands of people. Just about the worst system you could have come up with.

Seeds?

You're doing it wrong.

Yes, and Star Trek had FTL transportation, transporters, a post scarcity economy and uniformly attractive women.

It's all very nice for an hour or so a week, but most of us have to deal with this annoying concept of reality. Hell, I'd settle for just one of those.

A turkey posting on Slashdot? Maybe you should just visit with vegetarians.