It occurred to me the other day that "terrorism" could arguably be applied to both the people who blow up cars/buses/buildings, and to the people who make hyperbolic posts on the Internet about how voyeurs from three-letter agencies want cameras installed in your home bathroom. (Or, in the case of one of my friends, that a NWO cabal wants to eliminate 90% of Earth's population.) Both groups want (or don't want) something, and attempt to inspire fear in other people in order to cow them into supporting (or opposing) something.

As the stated objective of al-Quaeda and such groups is to push the US into withdrawing its support from Israel and its troops from various sandy countries, no, they haven't succeeded.

Not to say that civil liberty activists are terrorists, but the perspective is something I found interesting.

"Banned" is a bit of a stretch.

"The Federal Mafia is a book written in prison[18] by Schiff. In the book, Schiff contended that the income tax system and Internal Revenue Service were illegal. On August 9, 2004, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals upheld an injunction issued by a U.S. District Court in Nevada under 26 U.S.C. 7408 against Irwin Schiff and associates Cynthia Neun and Lawrence Cohen, against the sale of this book by those persons.[19] This prohibition does not extend to other sellers of the book. The court rejected Schiff's contention on appeal that the First Amendment protects sales of the book, as the court found that the information it contains is fraudulent.[20]

Schiff, Neun and Cohen are currently barred under the preliminary injunction from selling or advertising material advocating nonpayment of tax, preparing a tax return for others, and from otherwise providing assistance or encouragement to others in violating tax law. Schiff and his associates are additionally required to provide a copy of the injunction to each of their customers, to post it on their website, and to provide the government with a customer list.[21]

Schiff and his associates have responded by giving the book for free on their website.[22]"

There's another aspect to be concerned about when more people get nuclear weapons.

I am an Air Force missileer. The US nuclear arsenal has an unbelievable amount of safeguards and fail-safes - procedural, physical, and technical. I dislike saying that anything is "impossible", but for anyone unauthorized to get access to one of our nuclear weapons and manage to use it (that includes us) is the closest thing to impossible that I can think of.

I am not nearly as confident that the rest of the nuclear world has safeguards anywhere nearly as good, and that's what worries me.

I used to work for a mid-sized drugstore chain that's since been bought out. I have a lasting memory about this very subject...

At my store, it was practice for us that if someone was buying an item and didn't know there was a weekly coupon out for it, we would tell them about the coupon and scan it for them. (This, despite guidance from our district management that "coupons are intended to attract new customers, not lower prices for existing customers, coupons should not be offered to people who don't know about them.")

One time, when I did this for an elderly woman who was shopping with a friend, she turned to her friend and said "That's why I love coming to this store. They look out for you here."

Verizon might take a hint from this.

I seriously wish I could mod this higher than 5.

Solution: Gay rockets.

Just in case, you know, somebody was confused about whether "California" referred to the US state or the city in El Salvador.

"social networking sites"

"private"

Yeah?

It has nothing to do with "the cloud", other than that the datacenter affected happened to host one. It could've been a dedicated server and it would've had the same problem.

At least once a day, I see a commercial on CNN showing IED attacks in Iraq, and warning that our gas money eventually ends up (by way of Iran) paying for EFPs (Explosively Formed Penetrators) and other such things, but I haven't seen all that many people switching to bikes.

If you're going to argue uninformed points of view, I suggest arguing them with someone who hasn't spent the better part of the last year studying airpower. :)

The Army is incapable of establishing air superiority; their aviation assets consist entirely of cargo, recon, and rotary-wing aircraft. While the Navy and Marines operate fighter-type aircraft, the Marines focus more on close air support of Marine units, and the Navy focuses more on fleet defense. (The Navy has the capability of performing SEAD missions, but it's not one of their primary functions.)

By the way, I take it you've never heard of USAF Combat Controllers? The guys who go behind enemy lines and set up airfields?

I'm not sure what airman ran over your dog, but you seem to have quite an axe to grind. I would certainly like to hear you tell Curtis LeMay or Robin Olds that they weren't in a real service.

By the way, when you say you can "deliver payloads anywhere in the world" - I assume you mean, after the USAF has achieved air superiority? And while the USAF provides your information through AWACS/JSTARS?

We ALL have a job to do; people need to get over their service rivalry and realize that.

(In the interest of full disclosure, I should say that I'm an officer in the USAF.)

I don't know how you're defining "the best," or why. Certainly, taking off from a carrier is more difficult than taking off from a runway, but after that what's the difference? Each service's air branch has its strengths and specialties.

USMC pilots support USMC ground troops, USN pilots support USN missions (and fly against ground targets, when it's practical), the USAF does, well, everything else. (Airlift, refueling, global strike, air superiority... etc.)

Well, put it this way.

If I stand in front of a room full of people and talk for 7 minutes, with no outline or visual aids, people's attention is going to drift. (It may do that anyway, but I'm not going to help it along. :P) In my experience, as a listener, there's no organization to a stream of words coming at you - you have to break down and organize the message on your own, which provides additional strain on the listener, and many people would rather just think about something else. By providing a visual representation of the points you're discussing, a listener can associate the details of what you're saying with the listed main point. Also, you can throw related graphics up to keep the audience's interest.

Plus, it helps keep you on-track as a speaker.

When I was in USAF officer training, all the trainees were required to give several briefings throughout the program. We were told that we could use any visual aids we wanted (to include whiteboard, PowerPoint or... who knows.)

All 144 of us used PowerPoint, simply because it was the easiest way to complement what you were talking about.