And for all the brainwashed suckers (aka libertarians), who say they're all the same, and nothing ever changes:
            unemployment insurance
            Medicare (or don't you have parents?)
            Medicaid
            The Voting Rights Act of 1965
            NASA puts a man on the Moon, 1969

Oh, that's right, if it doesn't involve you getting rich, and screw everyone else, it's not changing, and they're all the same....

And we keep reading of countries where they finally get to vote, and stand in line for a day or more, and then there was the in-all-the-media disgrace in France 10 years or so ago, when they didn't even have 72% turnout.... and you little shits think that tweeting's all you need to do, and not put your body where it matters....

Why, yes, I *do* vote, so if you don't, SIT DOWN, SHUT UP, and listen to me - if you don't vote, you ain't got no right to open your mouth. Voting is my license to bitch.

                    mark

Vint Cerf, when he gave a presentation where I work, mentioned that the latest version of Google's self-driving car didn't even have a steering wheel.

Allow me to present my two arguments that they're complete idiots:
          1) It's now a few years from now, and half the self-driving cars on the road are 5-10 years old. Many, if not most, were purchased used.
                            How do you feel knowing that many of those cars' owners have never seen a safety recall, much less had one done?
            2) Pull 11705 Dewey Rd, Wheaton-Glenmont, MD up in google maps, go to street view, and rotate to the left, to look at the road. One two
                                  parking lane, directions, no lane markings, and, oh, yes, the bus uses this road, and if I drive to work, I usually drive on this
                                  road. Tell me a self driving car's going to handle it...

Oh, and argument 3: I can go most places without driving. I use this thing called "public transit". If I really, really need to get somewhere faster, there are these things called "taxis". Consider how much a self-driving car costs, and how long you'll own it, and how much maintenance will cost, and then how much you'd spend on public transit, with or without taxis, and tell me which is a *hell* of a lot more money.

                mark

I've been complaining for a few years now - the last five or so, google search returns a much worse signal-to-noise ratio. And they keep taking away search tools, *and* theyve begun ignoring search criteria. Just last year, I was looking for high leather men's boots, with criteria of -"ladies" -"womens"... and among other things, saw a sponsored ad (a *complete* waste of the advertiser's money) that had "womens/bold" in the text.

So much technical computer info is buried in rubble....

                mark

Mostly, our laptops are Dell Precisions or Lattitudes. NOTE:: DO NOT BUY A CONSUMER-GRADE LAPTOP.. Spend more, buy the "business grade". They'll last longer and have better support and warranties.

I'm not happy with HP warranties. Don't even *think* about Sun....

Does she want to work on computers, or physics? And how knowledgeable is she? A Windows box is a bad joke, spending most of it's CPU cycles on eye candy. Ditto with Macs. For real work, run Linux, which will use the system much more effectively. I'm not a fan of Ubuntu, but if she does go with it, she should *only* use the LTS (long-term support) stable releases. Here - and we're mostly on workstations and servers, we run CentOS (same as RHEL, but free). System software and libraries are "older"... but *VERY* stable. You don't have to debug the o/s....

                  mark

PS: Dell's OMSA, their maintenance disk, boots... CentOS, so if a saledroid says "huh?", ask for someone who knows something. I believe Dell also offers RHEL as an alternative o/s.

And one of these days, I'll take a picture of a road I use going to or from my home on the occasions when I drive: 3 lanes wide, parked cars in one lane, no center stripe, oh, and did I mention that buses use this street? No, a self-driving car will have smoke coming out of its ears....

On the other hand, self-driving. They're going to be *really* expensive. For less money than that, couldn't you use existing methods of getting somewhere without having to drive? There is this thing called "public transportation", as well as this business called "taxis", and all your fares, over the estimated lifetime of a self-driving car are probably a *lot* less than you'd spend on the car.

Oh, and how safe will you feel knowing there are 5 and 10 year old self-driving cars, some years from now, many bought used, whose owners may, or may not have had the recall upgrades applied?

                    mark

No, you didn't read it correctly. Did you read the *article*?

Fine, I really do want NASA to look outwards... but I also want it to look down.
Excerpt:
Throughout the session, Cruz downplayed Earth science, claiming that NASA has lost focus on exploring space. It’s clear everything he was saying came from his stance of global warming denial.

And that is utter nonsense, to be incredibly polite. Pure and simple.

Bolden shot back, saying, “We can't go anywhere if the Kennedy Space Center goes underwater and we don't know it—and that's understanding our environment.” In other words, we must study the Earth and its changing climate. Studying our planet is at least as important as studying others.
--- end excerpt ---

In other words, Cruz, who has openly denied global warming (or "climate change", if warming gets your knickers in a twist), doesn't want NASA to even try to look for data.

The real answer, as the article notes, is GIVE NASA MORE MONEY. They've been cut over and over again, just like everything except the vastly bloated US military.

                  mark

As an American, let me say this about that: you got that right. Freakin' winner in the "Most Hypocritical Country In The History Of The World" contest, more Victorian than Queen Victoria (who was known to run around the Palace in the altogether).

                  mark

I'll have a necromantic ritual, bring up the shade of my late ex, and let her go kill them messily wherever they're hiding.

And if you think that's extreme, go find a fire ant nest and investigate it, preferably with bare feet.

                mark

Just from what's in the another post I read, I'd say that they were not "merely" racist, but threatening. I mean, that is the South, home to the KKK that murdered a hell of a lot for the "crime" of being black. That makes them dangerous.

And, of course, it's the kind of crap I'd expect from the majority of Greeks - classiism, racism, you-have-to-be-worth-money-to-get-in.... They've never had much of a rep beyond party, drinking, etc, and this goes back to my first time in college, long before most of you were born.

I see no reason to make Greeks part of the official college landscape. Most of 'em have nothing to do with actual learning... which is, allegedly, what you're paying that money for.

                      mark

For all of you 20-yr-olds...

Bush & co did it first.

                  mark

Letting Krebs know is a good idea... but email support at the bank, or even send the bank snail mail, with the info. Send it with delivery confirmation. And, at the bottom, add
cc: SEC
so they know you're serious. And really and truly, contact the SEC, which regulates banks, and esp. with all the bank problems lately, I'll wager they're really, really interested in this.

Oh, call them back, and ask for "their legal service address". That will get someone attention, for real.

Last option: get a lawyer to write a lawyer letter to the bank. This will also get their attention.

              mark

Congress cutting funding for non-military basic science.

ObDisclosure: I work for a federal contractor, civilian sector, doing that, and we keep seeing budget cuts. So do other folks I know who work in the civilian sector, so I have direct evidence of my suggestion. I can also email friends who have friends who work there.

                      mark "but the Free Market really, really wants F-35's, they're *so* much more important than space, or
                                                    biomedical research, or basic physics...."

Let's see, it *is* a crime to lie under oath, esp. to Congress.

Next, it's a "witch hunt" or McCarthyism, when it's discovered that someone testified under oath to Congress and didn't tell them that his "deliverables" were funded by the climate-change deniers whose wealth - oil, coal - needs it denied.

So the anti-global warming crowd here is defending biased results based on income... oh, that's right, the Invisible Hand of the Free Market (tm) will show that global warming's not happening, and so it's hunky-dory to build new oil and coal-fired power plants, and prevent solar, wind etc technologies from helping change the field... and take money away from the companies. Presumably, they're investors in those companies, too.

Too bad the Real World doesn't see that Invisible Hand. And how many of them live right next to coal-fired power plants?

                  mark

St. Vidicon of Cathode (go look it up, kiddies).

              mark

Here I was afraid they were analyzing the webserver logs. This makes it look like my habit of *NEVER* even temporarily allowing google analytics in noscript is a good one.

                mark