So... it'd be okay now if Russia and China sanctioned say, Microsoft and Oracle for improving the capabilities of the CIA/NSA?

Think cost of the GRID. It's going to take a hell of an energy transport, storage and switching infrastructure to keep that stable.

Remembering the Armenian one is politically inconvenient because referring to it as one offends the Turks, and the dictator currently securing his position there is a convenient 'friend' so we'll just keep our mouths shut.

The Darfur one we'll occasionally mention as Sudan isn't a 'friend' directly, but Sudan's far away and hey, they're useful to China and Russia both. We don't really want to piss those off so we'll just ignore it and hope people will stop mentioning it.

It didn't happen when the caliphate had vast standing armies because we had vast standing armies of our own. It's not called the Battle of Vienna because everyone got together and talked about their feelings and sang kumbaya.

What you're saying about asylum is how it's SUPPOSED to work, not how it's working NOW. Which wouldn't be a problem if the EU was actually trying to fix the situation, but they seem to be as dangerously naieve as you are being.

What needs to be done is the removal of all the content and accounts of the artists on that list from YouTube, because they obviously don't want to be on there... That will make them happy, right? RIGHT?

So upgrade your tinfoil hat to a hardhat when at a concert or in some other crowd someone may want to film, because there's going to be a good risk of untrained idiots flying 2 kilos of weight around. Likely high enough that it's going to really, really hurt when it falls down and you're under it.

Yep, so you'll just have to destroy your crop. And buy from Monsanto in the future. So sayeth the judge. I'm not even kidding. I wish I was.

Looking at the story on Obama about the 'next Hearthbleed', this is where we can only conclude that the US government is taking out the competition...

Not particularly. The cost of natural disasters as a percentage of global production is remarkably stable. We're mostly taking notice more because increased populations means the absolute number of people getting hit at once goes up, which makes for great television.

No it's bloody well NOT dependent on continued application. The yield loss is small enough that it's perfectly manageable if implemented sanely. Sweden decided to curtail antibiotic use over a decade ago.

They used a nuke ;-)

No. I'm pretty sure being a happy Europhile would require quite a few more things. Just minor ones, really, like stopping the complete waste of money that is the monthly transfer to Strassbourg, the rampant corruption, the GENERAL waste of money, curbing their drive to make large numbers of rules on just about any subject... Maybe even toning down on shouting how good a job they're doing while everyone can see the results of said job, and not liking those results at all.

Though it might be that easy to be a happy europhile if you don't have to, you know, LIVE there.

Theoretically, QA as well as a large distribution network (which one no longer truly NEEDS for indie titles due to a nifty invention called the Internet ).

Of course, much like Microsoft themselves, the publisher wants their cut...

Living in the Netherlands, I did see the sheer idiocy of propaganda the last time they were willing to let us say anything about the EU. Whenever said EU is trying to increase its power - again - we're blitzed with a wide variety of warnings that if we don't do this, the sky will fall on us (or whatever the economic or political equivalent is at the time).

We could make it work so the bombs don't start flying again by NOT trying the exact same thing that has set it off every time before, namely trying to unite Europe under one rule. Though I suppose the bit where making that one rule a Common Enemy to everyone living in Europe is a new approach.

Sadly, I have to admit he IS just that stupid.

He's been busy trying to kill privacy while turning a dozen bureaucratic police corpses into a single grand paper mill with vast investigative powers and near-zero investigative ability. Percentage of crimes solved is historically low. Priority appears to be crimes that aren't (example: 440 man DAYS burned on a single 4Chan message of a schoolkid threatening to set his school on fire), as well as traffic violations (effectively turning the police into an extended tax collection agency).

Sadly, he's not going anywhere until the next elections.