Well, the NPT itself is a carte blanche to US, USSR, UK, France, and China. The NPT gives carte blanche to all nuclear powers prior to 1969 and India tested in 1974 and many /signed/ the NPT in 1992, like China and France. That said, like any legal document the NPT has loopholes, or at least ambiguous wording, and just like the wealthiest lawyer wins, the wealthiest country wins. The U.S. decided to re-interpret the NPT from "not collaborating with nations outside the NPT on nuclear matters" with "not collaborating with nations outside the NPT on /military/ nuclear matters" and gave a green-light for selling nuclear fuel and technology to the civilian sector in India (which consequently frees up India's domestic nuclear resources for military use if they can import nuclear fuel and tech for civilian use). And once the U.S. gave that interpretation, Russia, France, and soon Canada and Australia will also adopt that interpretation and begin exporting nuclear fuel and tech to India for civilian use. Australia and Canada are big since together they have 80% of the world's uranium deposits.

In the end, it's all big chess game. What was the point of the NPT? Choices like "world peace" and such are nice for elementary school kids, but the reality is that the NPT like everything else is done to win, and in this case to maintain status quo for the major powers so they remain major powers. Then why be flexible and allow India? Because rigid structures are more prone to break than flexible structures. India became the 3rd largest economy ahead of Japan this year on purchasing power and by 2050 both the economies of China and India will independently surpass the U.S., and combined surpass the U.S plus Europe. Moreover, the U.S. doesn't see any long-term conflict with India, and in fact sees India as an ally which has a democracy, a liberal society, and a focus on business and economy rather than military. While India has nuclear and missile programs, its military budget is tiny, at only 2.7% of GDP, compared with 2.6% for England, 3.9% for Russia, 4.7% for the U.S. and 10.4% for Saudi Arabia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_military_expenditures and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Military_expenditure_by_GDP_2008.png

All that said, it makes sense to slowly induct India into the status quo than risk a change in the global order. Every exclusive club has to occasionally induct new members to keep from turning irrelevant. That said, while a country club may accept a rich black man with the changing of the times, it's not a free-for-all where it accepts a homeless man. So the nuclear status quo will

You do realize it was Catholic priests, and the statue was of Jesus? The summary is misleading, instead of the summary writing "When a statue in Mumbai ... The entire investigation was caught on tape. The priests were outraged and demanded an apology." it should have written "When a Jesus statue in a city ... The entire investigation was caught on tape. The Catholic priests were outraged and demanded an apology." For some reason the submitter decided to point out the city name, but not the statue or priests.

How dare you infringe on my trademarks of facebucks and starbook!

There are also laws against doing things like shooting an unarmed person in the head, aka assassination, but if a soldier hears his superior yell "fire", he shoots, no questions asked. In theory, the govt. abides by its own laws, in practice, 'national security' trumps all laws, and even the courts have agreed, allowing the govt. to withhold evidence on the basis of national security. Govt: "He's guilty!" Judge: "why?" Govt: "We'd like to tell you why, but that harms national security." Judge: "oh, okay, he's guilty."

Smartphone = WiFi. If your phone can do WiFi, all the big service providers, Verizon, Sprint, ATT, etc. require you to get a "data plan" because they're shit scared you'll be happy with just WiFi and never subscribe for a data plan. It doesn't matter if your phone can crack 128-bit encryption in a minute or has a pico-projector to play 1080p 3D on 80" screens, an integrated deep blue and that IBM bot that won jeopardy, if it lacks WiFi, you'll be able to avoid paying for the data plan with service providers who'll deem it a dumb phone / feature phone and not a smart phone.

That's always been my view as well. The best post-9/11 security measure has been psychological. Every passenger is psychologically trained to refuse to believe they will land safely if they 'cooperate' with hijackers. That was the only real weapon a hijacker had, not boxcutters, not a gun, but the illusory promise that all will be fine if everyone just cooperates. That weapon, the psychological stranglehold, has been screened out, and that "solves" the problem of 9/11 ever repeating again. Case in point, flight 93. It never flew into a building. All it took was some passengers to have learned that the hijackers will not release them safely.

The Taliban are based more circa-1700s, whereas the "golden age" for the Middle East was closer to 700-1200 AD (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islamic_Golden_Age) Whenever a group looks backward and tries to be old-fashioned, they never pick a particularly advanced, progressive period. None of the right-wing "return America to how it used to be" folks want the 1960s with hippies, civil rights, and space exploration, even though 1960 is definitely old-fashioned as it was a half-century ago. They rather have the 1980s wall street 'greed is good' or the 1940s 'white man in charge' eras. In essence, the folks who look back always pick a very rigid, uncreative era. The creative don't look back, they just create and build anew.

Microsoft never prevents you from running software you purchased outside Microsoft's store.

Most cars go 45mph in the 15mph zone nearby.

Most people hit the "up" or "down" buttons for surfing. I don't know why devices don't just prefetch the adjacent channels' streams.