Anybody who has ever been around a bunch of individuals who consider themselves to be "of the right", "well-to-do", and "powerful" knows better: Mitt was trying to represent himself as "one of them" by slamming as many of the American people as possible.

lolll...that's what those people holding those beliefs do, especially if they're consuming alcohol. You should hear 'em talk about "unions" (one drink), "labor" (two drinks), and a bizarre mixture of "entitlement spending" and "Perhaps there is something to eugenics..." (three drinks).

Can you think of any other field other than IT where being willing to put in the long hours that excellence sometimes demands results in efforts to dock your pay - but not those hours? That is incredible to me...to deliberately attempt to destroy the motivation of some of America's best and brightest. The results are easy to predict: Just project the same miserly approach upon America's research and development...upon American innovation, which an apt analog as so much of IT's efforts are aimed at doing something "better".

The truth is the United States of America doesn't want to be the world's technology leader anymore...our nation's business leaders - and so their pets in Congress - just want to control the world through their control of the dollar.

That goal is, in my opinion, unusually asinine even for a people and society increasingly constrained by greed given that the dollar can be blown to kingdom come with the simple declaration "Sorry, we don't take dollars anymore." (With the caveat that the statement must come from somebody who has the industrial infrastructure and position as a primary supplier in global trade required to back the value of their proposed dollar replacement.)

That goal of controlling the world through the control of the dollar...it is an open admission that Corporate America's leaders and the politicians who represent them are aware that either they're too lazy or they lack the competence and talent to lead in any other way. Or both.

Hard to believe that anything will change. After all, the threat of terrorism was out there and well-known prior to 9/11, but the airlines still shirked all defensive/offensive tactics (even basics like strengthened cockpit doors) in the name of profit - and they got away with it because they liberally dispensed cash to their lobbyists.

I daresay no one will argue an assertion that the liquor industry, as one example of an airport retailer, likewise has a significant lobbying presence in Washington, D.C....et al.

On the one hand, a challenge response...on the other hand, a political response designed to defuse.

I guess they're soliciting a mixed response to their response.

One of the "wishes" was

We had a "free and unfettered internet"...and then the spammers-, virus coders-, and hackers-for-profit moved in.

Which is why I anticipate quite well organized resistance to it. It isn't as if those transfers to the Cayman Islands, Panama, and etc. are made in the form of truckloads of rolled-up quarters.

Depends on who you know.

Exactly! That's why the personal computer and the cell phone failed.

Given the amount of competition there is for the premium jobs and positions, the more states that take their populations out of the running, the merrier!

Well, unless you live in a state like Missouri and so face being culled from the competition before you ever enter school...

True; it is pointless to argue with the followers of Ayn Rand as the way the mass of them interpret and apply Ayn Rand's philosophy is "I'm in it for me and screw [you]!" (albeit "rational self-interest sounds better) where the set "you" contains an individual, a community, a state, a country, all the nations of the world, or the entire human race - whichever is more personally rewarding for the Rand devotee.

That is how they can justify everything from taking government handouts to poisoning you with pollution in an effort to increase their margins to insisting that those who take government handouts are leeches to those who pollute their own air should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law; their entire universe encompasses "Me!" and no more.

On the flip side, if they use terms like "patriotism", "responsibility", or "loyalty", you can either try to figure out how they're going to benefit from your/the community's/the state's/the nation's compliance with the intended behavior associated with those terms or just start laughing.

Yes, I rolled on the floor laughing when I read that...if you really want to destroy the utility/flexibility of Linux/Gnome, call some key part of it "Visual Basic" and before you know it, the language snobs will .NET it up...errrh, make it "better".

Methinks Microsoft is blowing up because it is huge, gigantic Microsoft and the guy running it has let that size and power go to his head to the extent that he thinks he not only can but is driving the consumer. I see that attitude in Windows 8, I see it in Office 2013 where people are actually describing Microsoft's attempt to change Office into a fee-based subscription service as "conditioning" the end-user..."conditioning", as if either the consumer were somebody's pet rat or Microsoft were a cult!!!

Somebody forgot to tell Ballmer that putting on the CEO suit of Microsoft is not equivalent to assuming godhead...

(Although come to think of it, that assumption of godhead has become quite common among American CEOs...)

I tend to agree with you...a consequence of having had to clean up after too many people who believed that the approach(es) they learned in their specialty were applicable to all other areas/specialties.

Ah...so one should infer that - because it is "poor people" who use cash to "avoid taxation" - that the individuals who keep the tax havens in Panama, Lichtenstein, the Caymans, and so forth in business because of their desire to avoid taxes are the poor?

Or would it be wiser to disregard your assertion in favor of the notion that poor people use cash because they don't have checking accounts or debit and credit cards?

What does Microsoft do? "Promote" people who design clunkers like Windows Millennium and Vista into their PR department?