I've known many republicans in my time, having lived in conservative states, and just about all of them believed in evolution AND creationism (that's correct, they're not mutually exclusive, bible says why and evolution says how).

No, the Bible most clearly says why *and* how. It says God spontaneously created all of the animals and Adam, and then created Eve from Adam's rib - this all about 10000 years ago. *That* is creationism, and a terrifying 40% of the US population still believes that story. Yes, that is "strict creationism", and yes, it really is 40%. Before you think about debating that fact, go look up the statistics yourself.

True evolutionary theory starts with the idea that all life evolved over billions of years, starting with simple inorganic compounds that combined into some of the basic organic building blocks (amino acids, nucleotides, etc).

These theories are so far from compatible with each other a 4 year old can instinctively comprehend the contradiction. Unfortunately, society then spends the next 10 years teaching the child the obvious conclusion is wrong...

In theory, Ray Priest is *wrong*. This isn't like a driver's license privilege. There is a lot of current debate on the issue, but plenty of Constitutional scholars consider the right to travel a basic human right (it is Constitutionally protected domestically within the US borders). The right to travel was specifically mentioned in the Articles of Confederation, and one argument is that it is so fundamental that the Founding Fathers didn't even see it as necessary to add to the Bill of Rights.

Historically the only valid reasons for denying passports were for "national security" or criminal activity of the applicant. Of course in today's climate, "national security" is clearly broad enough to deny a child who sat on his passport. It's amazing how in some ways conventional wisdom of the US government (and its citizens and corporations) has regressed to *pre* revolutionary times.

And if you are *citizen* you have just as much (or more?) right to return the to the country as you do to leave, passport or not. You may have to *prove* you are a citizen, of course, but for most people that is not particularly hard (though it may take some time to get all of the documents sent to you).

Of course, an airline is not the government - they do have the right to refuse travel on their planes, and one of the reasons they require valid passports, etc, is that they don't want to have flown someone to a country that will refuse them entry and somehow be responsible for getting them home.

Drones and automated defenses would probably be the first line of battle. If they can do as good or better job as humans without loss of life, why bother with anything else? The US is already doing this in limited amounts today...

In the end wars are about territory and resources, so eventually it will come down to invading and occupying something of value (planet, moon, space station, whatever). Space battles would just be a necessity to get close enough to the real goal to accomplish that.

True. You would hope, for example, that stealing a Toyota would result in the same *criminal* punishment as stealing a Ferrari (civil damages, on the other hand, could be a different story). But in reality if you look at the judge's comments, that's clearly not how he thought about it, which is wrong...

Yeah, I haven't seen any specifics on what it was that cost them $200k or whether that is totally inflated, I just don't think the measure of his guilt should have anything to do with the size of the company hacked.

On the flip side, I think the judge's comment that "you accessed the very heart of the system of an international business of massive size, so this was not just fiddling about in the business records of some tiny business of no great importance" is even worse. If it's a crime it shouldn't matter who the victim is; if he did $200k worth of damage to a small business that's just as bad (at whatever definition of "bad" you may have).

Have to generally agree in this case - I don't see how a jail sentence is going to deter the guy from doing it again any more than a fine would have.

While that may be true, that doesn't appear to be the judge's rational for convicting the kid.

Why does everyone keep calling him "the kid"? He's 26 years old. Just because he's a student doesn't make him some naive, innocent minor - he clearly knew what he was doing...

What does that matter? $200,000 is $200,000, just because the victim "can afford it" doesn't change the crime itself.

By prosecuting the guy all they have done is ensure that in the future people who manage to find these holes will either just exploit them for criminal gain

Or maybe it will make some of those people think twice before they do it in the first place...

Yeah, that's all I was saying... maybe if they called the cops after the first few the next 25+ would have been a bit harder :)