Much love for Baen. E-books cheaper than paperbacks, no DRM, been reading them for years. I am particularly enamored with their bound in CDs that have a rather permissive license, and of course that are hosted on multiple servers not controlled by the publisher because of the license. (The license is that the CD and its contents may be copied, and given away, but not sold) Oh, throw in a substantial free library, and free books for people with reading disabilities, and you realize that someone "gets it".

It's called an exchange rate. You seem to be assuming that 1 euro= 1 dollar. where as the exchange between the Euro and USD is non-unity. Thank you, have a nice day.

Hanged. Not beheaded. Hanging doesn't get blood all over the executioner's nice black robe, or the front row of the audience.

Funny. I thought there was. it's called *gasp* file transfer protocol (FTP). It's not THAT hard to set up. It is admittedly client-server in that one host runs a server that the other host connects to with a client, but here's the cool thing, the server can be turned on or of. It's a little geeky, but it's efficient, not usually blocked, and almost all computers built these days (as in I don't know of any counterexamples) have software to allow you to access it.

He did. The "Bikeies" as they are called down under are running a candidate against him. The gamers are stalking him and leaving personal threats. Yes, I actually did RTFA.

Please look at the context. American liberalism and conservatism aren't the same as everywhere in the world. In fact, calling the ideas "liberal" or "conservative" is quite misleading. There are certain "Pet Rights" of each side of the political spectrum in the US, but that doesn't mean that they will be the same in all countries. Links to American politics therefore do not apply.

The Nazis conquered quite a bit of Europe because of professional pride. They were defeated by Russian blood, and US industry. Sometimes it's not enough to be good, you have to be quantitativly better than anyone else. Despite being evil bastards, they produced some damned fine guns, tanks, and planes. It is a mistake to think that just because someone has beliefs you think of as "evil" that they are not competent. Unfortunatly history is full of quite competent evil. Now, if my attitude constituted "evil" in your mind, to be honest, I don't care. Because someone who thinks like you is to much of a coward to do anything about it.

Oh, but it is so satisfying when you find out that the system killed the people it was intended to kill, or the building, or the other missile, or whatever. There is such a thing as professional pride.

A bit off topic, but Baen has a program to make all its ebooks available at no cost to persons with reading disabilities. The books are in a number of formats, including lit, html, word, rtf, and Mobipocket. I'm not sure if Science Fiction is your schtick, but I thought I'd pimp my favorite publisher.

Um, it's front wheel drive and there are two wheels on the front. Yes the rear wheel steering caused some trouble, but not actually that much. It was a concept car, and yes, there was an accident, caused by someone else, that caused it to not go into full production. We'll never know if it would have worked as a production car or not.

That would be Pro "Choice". For the most part this is limited to while the infant is still inside the mother's womb, but there are some who support "abortions" within the first 6 months after the infant as left the womb.

A 401(k) is not a pension fund. It is an individual retirement account. A pension fund is money that is owned by the company that will be paid out to you at retirment. the 401 (k) is a tax defered investment account. There is no raiding of the fund going on, the fund IS stocks, bonds, and mutual funds. Thus to many Americans the economy matters. Yes, there are times when individuals suffer, that happens under any system, but it happens less in a system where there is 5% unemployement than in one with 10% unemployment. One has 2 times as much dead weight slowing it down, and more people supporting that dead weight, by whatever means, be it charity, government programs, or whatever.

Well, where I come from if it's 5 acres we call that the "back yard" and it's ok to have someone else fix your fence. But if you have a FARM you'd best know how to do it yourself. And yes, I have honked cattle back in before. And goats, and sheep, and even the occational dog. But the fact that the animals get out, or deer get in, or foxes, or coyotes, or feral dogs... that's why if you are going to farm, you'd best learn how to handle at least one fencing technology.

The friend of your friend who can't fix a fence. If he owns a farm, and owns the fence, and he doesn't know how to repair it, then yes, he is stupid. If he lacks the hands or tools to fix it, he may not be. Some types of fence are harder to repair than others. For example chain link requires taking down, repairing, and restreching. picket type fences require a lot of hammering. Chicken wire and 4x4 wire both are simply patched. One of the consierations when putting up a fence is "Do I know how to put up this type of fence, and repair it if I need to." Just like if you're writing a program, when you decide what language to use you think "Can I maintain this if I need to"

Economic growth is how unemployment gets lower, which means more jobs, which means a better chance for me to get a job, or to move to a better job. That means better pay for me, and more beer, pizza, and better clothes. It means I can afford to put gassoline into my car, and have money left over for shiny toys. That is why Americans are all so focused on the economy. The better the economy is doing the better EVERYONE does. A rising tide lifts all ships. As far as the stock market goes, many Americans have a 401k or other investments as their retirment plan. When the stock market does well, it means that they will have a more comfortable retirment. If the stock market does poorly, that means a less comfortable retirment. Social security is a joke as far as the payout goes. Our education system is getting worse and worse, but it's not because of how much money goes into it, but rather because of idiodic policies like "No child left behind" Honestly, we'd be better off leaving some behind, and working on making excelence be rewarded. As far as healthcare goes, the biggest problem is paying for care once people get it, not getting it in the first place. People may not seek care because they can't afford it, but hospitals and doctors will provide it regardless of ability to repay, and the laws are written so that any effort to repay medical bills is acceptable. This does raise the costs somewhat because of writeoffs. Just because some people don't like our system doesn't mean its inherently broken.