Ever looked at the assembly produced by a for loop? It uses jmp calls. jmp is the exact same thing as goto. If your professor is telling you that gotos are bad, they're either not very good professor or you're in a 100 level CS course where they don't want to confuse you too much.

You forgot to write the predicates for like half of your sentences. Also, don't forget Kevin Bacon.

That's all true, but for as inefficient as it may seem, there are reasons for all of those. IAAAMO (I am an American military officer), and I can attest to the nature of the American military; we are an incredibly capable organization and almost unstoppable at the tasks we are equipped and trained for, but we were never designed to be agile or efficient. I'm a naval officer, so ships are what I know, and ships are damn expensive. Not just building, but designing, testing the designing, reworking requirements, testing requirements, adjusting for how much training would be required for the equipment vs how much we can do, ammunition and fuel consumption rates vs. supply capabilities, etc. The ships on the water now were on the drawing board twenty years ago (some of the tech in them is newer and could be installed on them because of the long dev time). We (the Navy) have fewer than 300 ships. Imagine an army of 300,000, each one with a set of gear. You want to change one piece, it's not one piece, it's 300,000 pieces. You want a new tent? It's not a new tent, it's 50,000 new tents. You can call it waste in government if you like (I know you didn't), but it's really just the nature of operating an enormous organization. You think lean, corporate giants where profit is king are different? They are not. Ask anyone who works at Raytheon, Microsoft, Apple, Maersk, etc.

Oh, of course. I write games myself for recreation, and while there are still substantial technical differences in indie and AAA games (there are some really, really smart people working on AAA games coming up with really clever programming techniques), the primary difference is level of effort. If you have the money to pay a lot of artists and programmers to hack on something for 8+ hours a day for two years, you're going to get an amazing product. With three(ish) guys working on something for two hours a day for however long they maintain interest, you'll probably get a fun game that you would have paid $30 for 10 years ago.

Thank you. The real reason Java is preferable to C++ (not always, don't jump down my throat) is the same reason that C++ is preferable to assembly (not always, don't jump down my throat): the less efficient code is more than made up for in the faster dev time. The dev time gap between Java and C++ is much smaller than C++ vs assembly, but the principle is the same.

Lucky for you, they're free to try:

http://store.steampowered.com/

Good man.

The word dynamic here is perfect to describe this; the equilibrium of the world is such that if any entity (country, state, politician, military force, etc) won't take unfair or aggressive advantage of something, there will be another equal entity to fill that void. That's why it's silly to point out any one country for doing this kind of thing, because even if a country isn't, given the chance or risk:reward ratio, it would.

But that attitude means it will never change. Sure, no blood for oil! I'm against foreign wars! Oh, but I'll also blame the government or big business or whomever if gas prices rise any higher. If you're against something, be against it. I'm in the military, so if someone gives me an order I don't like, I can either deal with it and follow the order, or I can decide I can't follow the order legally or in good conscience and refuse, but like everyone else I'd have to pay the consequences.

I'm not saying it's fine to kill foreigners to keep a higher standard of living, I'm just saying that it's silly and hypocritical for people to make the kind of arguments I mentioned. The response after yours puts it more accurately; it's very Faustian, but it is in fact the way the world works. See my response to that for more.

You should use QBASIC. You don't have to LET it do anything :)

It's a round number to a computer.

And that's why you're not some sort of government agent doing those things. This attitude bothers me for the same reason the "No blood for oil" types bother me. You don't get how important that sort of thing is. No blood for oil? Then what will you shed blood for? Losing oil supplies will so vastly change your way of life that you would argue it impossible if someone accurately showed you. If you think shady goings-on are an endeavor unique to America, you need to wake up. Every country (EVERY country - if you're not an American, believe that your country does it, too) does that. Even if only to stay in power and not out of a desire to provide for the people, every government strives to provide a certain lifestyle or quality of life to the people, and this is the price. If you don't like it, stop doing anything that requires oil (drive a car, use electricity, buy processed foods, etc). Don't get upset at the government for doing what it has to to provide you with something you'd complain about losing (probably here).

You're right, I do feel pretty embarrassed. Except for the fact that I said it's a document to aid in safety of navigation and it has all kinds of rules for safety of navigation, I'd positively die of embarrassment.

The legal issues are what make counter-piracy hard (there are other factors, of course). That's setting yourself up for failure, though, if you have to work through the rules of engagement for three different countries. The Navy works very hard to make sure its actions are in line with US and UN law, hence the JAG presence. It sucks from a warfighter's perspective, but the fact is that legal conduct goes a long way toward enabling what the Navy does. It's pretty easier to ignore the idiots that like to chime in on subjects like this when I can clearly connect what the US military does and the laws governing the actions, whether they're US laws or international. Having been in operations that face such sticky legal issues, it's easy to see why we care; ignoring just a few laws makes it very easy to slip into indiscriminate killings or outright aggression. Laws hamper operations, but are important, perhaps because they hamper operations.

US does nothing, people complain that we can't do anything with our super-powerful navy. US does something, people complain that we're sticking our noses into blah blah. It's getting hard to give a shit about generally uninformed opinion in the face of piracy.

Somali MO: Attack unarmed vessel, capture crew, demand ransom, kill crew if no money transferred, steal ship, sell cargo.
US MO: Approach armed hijackers, negotiate first, offer to pay ransom, honor ransom negotiation if accepted, escort rescued ship's crew, even if not American.

Oh yes, I see the hypocrisy in using different terms for what amount to basically behaving the same way.

As for your last point, maybe you should do some research into the operating cost of a single destroyer vs. what percent of shipping is affected by piracy. While you're at it, check out the legal ramification of attacking pirates. My guess is since you haven't yet, you won't do it now.