Considering how Europe currently has problems getting rid of its food (due to the Russia embargo), I doubt they'd be all too unhappy to step in should the US decide to stop feeding China.

'cause it's the same cheap crap that you pay lots of money otherwise just 'cause it has a silly picture and/or a certain name on it?

China circumvented that by arriving already at where the US is still heading: A rather small sliver of rich people oppressing a mass of poor ones, while at the same time ensuring that there is little upwards mobility, but just enough to create the odd success story to keep everyone believing in the dream.

That way you can effectively eliminate a middle class. But don't worry, the US is working hard to get rid of what's left of its middle class, then the two countries will be on par again.

So? Neither are our democracies anymore.

It's a victimless crime. Or rather, a crime where the victim deserves it. It kinda cancels itself out.

Then are you offering the correct premise or should I keep guessing 'til we both lose interest?

XP also tweaked the VM subsystem in a way that was quite noticeable if you had more than about 256MB of RAM (better performance), but the main feature it added was remote desktop (although only in the Pro version). I was quite tempted to upgrade from 2K for the remote desktop stuff.

I actually find that Ghostery is quite nice.

I'm not a huge fan. The goal of D was to produce a better C++, but if you're designing a new language then C++ really isn't where I'd choose to start. It's not as bad as Ruby (I can't imagine the kind of person who would look at Smalltalk and say 'what this language really needs is Perl-like syntax'. Actually, I can't imagine the kind of person who'd say that about any language. Including Perl). Rust is probably the modern language that I like the most.

Somehow this sounds a little bit more expensive than just using existing arable land or existing potable water

Of course. My post was meant for people, who'd claim, that "Earth can not sustain" such a big population — by listing the vast areas, where the new billions could live in comfort even if those existing parcels of arable land and sources of potable water were exhausted.

I refer you to Project Orion

The method could allow us to reach other star systems, but not practically — not within reasonable time. For that, we'd need faster-than-light travel and that is, what I had in mind.

Because that [ping times -mi] is the main downside of the Malthusian catastrophe.

It was a joke, relax...

The CRTC implicitly threatened to regulate the company by taking away its ability to rely on the new media exception if it did not cooperate with its orders.

Statists rejoice...

"A government big enough to give you everything you want, is a government big enough to take away everything that you have."

— Thomas Jefferson

22 trillion dollars over fifty years is 440 billion dollars a year, which is quite affordable for the US.

That we were able to afford it (sort of — the figure exceeds our current national debt), means, it is indeed affordable, no big news. The points you chose to ignore were: a) the cost of it exceeded the costs of all real wars of the Republic combined; b) the "war on poverty" is a flop — despite spending so much money, we have not achieved the goals Lyndon Johnson spelled-out, when he launched the program.

BTW, the answer to James Madison is Article

Oh, sure, david_thornley from the 21 century knows the meaning of the Constitution better, than the man, who wrote it...

provide for the common Defense and general Welfare of the United States

The interpretation you are proposing here is so wide, you can drive an air-carrier through it — sideways — and affords government limitless power. For example, NSA can claim, that their eavesdropping is for "general Welfare" (and great justice!), abortions can be banned — anything.

Or are you, perhaps, confusing the generic term "welfare" with the Welfare Program — and claiming, the Constitution's authors envisioned the program for the poor 200 years before it was (finally!) implemented?

I've got a solution that will make everyone happy:
Have NetFlix partner with the NFB to distribute NFB content... globally. Nothing like providing global access to Canadian content. NetFlix could even provide it for free to everyone in Canada with an account but no current subscription. Under this setup, the CRTC wouldn't have a leg to stand on, as at that point, they will get their Canadian Content on NetFlix (not sure about the French/English ratio though).

HOWEVER

I'm pretty sure this really has nothing to do with NetFlix and EVERYTHING to do with the new consortium raising a Canadian NetFlix "competitor" (Shomi) whispering nasty things in the CRTC's ear. Yes, blame Rogers/Shaw for this fracas, as they're likely where the blame really lies.

Ah, hubris! One of my favorite old-timey sins.

You are of course correct. The signal must become analog at some point to make it into your head, and we have had the capability to capture analog signals since the dawn of the television age. You can crack open LCD panels and intercept signals for a more modern high tech version of this concept, of course.

But you are forgetting the other side of the equation. When when someone makes that statement - "THIS CANNOT EVER BE PIRATED" - you are throwing down the gauntlet. And invariably some bored teenager will say "oh really is that so?" and make them eat their words. Usually by the following Saturday. Yes you can do an analog capture but by the time you warm up your soldering gun some kid in the Netherlands will have already got the torrent up.

Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go watch a Blu-Ray movie on my Linux box.