Sigh.. having lived 50 years I think I've seen enough of these "World is ending tomorrow!" predictions. Manbearpig does not exist and it's not going to eat us all.

I hope that this is not going to be one of those "politically correct" revivals like I've seen in recent years. I'd hope for another episode where Omikronians conquer earth, but I guess that's already happened in real life.

Considering Robinhood's recent actions, all I can say is quote The Wire: Fuck me once, shame on you. Fuck me twice? (..shame on me).

How is Gab far-right? Is Twitter far-left then?

I'm going to build my own internet, with blackjack! And hookers! ...in fact, forget the internet and blackjack.

I still use a Keytronic 2000 (without the Windows keys).. great tactile feel. Works forever. Basically an improved version of the old IBM PC keyboard.

Sigh.. it's not quite that simple. I do agree that Japan was waging a war on China that was brutal and the sanctions imposed clearly were meant to curb japanese agresssion. But they also put Japan's back to the wall, effectively saying "fight, or surrender" and the Japanese just weren't that good on surrender. The diplomatic core should have made that point so clear that Pearl Harbor would not have come as a surprise.

And yes, sometimes America tends to be a bully whose own dogs bite him back. Remember those guys called the Taliban? Or Saddam Hussein? Remember who armed and supported those people? Yep, America.

Though only after US inflicted crippling economic sanctions on them. I'm not a US basher, but large powers (US, Russia) tend to act like school bullies.. they push you and push you, and then when you push back, it's suddenly "a surprise attack". Granted, it was a surprise attack, but it should not have come as such.

Japanese military planning wasn't thinking so much about demoralizing the US, they were thinking about defanging the US. If the carriers had been at port, the war in the pacific would have been different. No amount of battleships could have won the ocean for the allies, you needed carriers for that.

No carriers = Midway taken easily No carriers = Hawaii vulnerable (easily) No carriers = mainland US vulnerable (to a degree, mainly coastal areas) Yamamoto knew Japan could not win a war of attrition against the US industry, but had he been lucky with the carriers, he could have won years to conquer areas and build up the japanese navy, and perhaps negotiate a peace (which is where the demoralization would have come to effect).

New Normal in lobbying:

1. Get paid to lobby
2. Invent supporters
3. Profit!

Correlation does not equal causality. Just because Finnish teachers are unionized doesn't mean unionization is the reason for the good education system. Maybe you should start with a couple of facts omitted from your post: -In Finland, teacher is a very respected position. It's regarded as a calling -Teachers must have atleast a Master's degree -They have to go through rigorous training both in theory and on the job Nordic countries in general have very similar education systems. The wide variety comes from increased migration and non-assimilation of people from backwards countries. Finland has a small, but increasing number of these immigrants, so is slowly sliding down the PISA rankings. Sweden has a lot of these immigrants, so they are much further down. This is a sad state of affairs. As the education system that once guaranteed equal opportunity to everyone, no matter where in Finland you lived, now is slowly being divided into good and "ghetto" schools. /dotters from the US will probably find this very familiar. And at this point it becomes once again relevant to ask "Faced with a ghetto school, what good is a union?".

.. you will end up on a watchlist. -- Now that is a guess, but I guess it's not too far out of considering recent events.

didn't I already read this bit of news about humans?

I was in a conference once where all the big players in the security field were sitting and saying "no way we'll build backdoors into our systems, the best guarantee against that is the fact that if it's found out, we'll be killed in the market, nobody will buy from us". But considering how most companies hit by the NSA scandal are still doing brist business, I don't think RIM has anything to fear from anyone except a handful of Slashdotters, who use other types of phones anyway.

I wish I could issue a DMCA takedown notice on Phantom Menace.

as if millions of fanboys suddenly cried out in terror...