The reason the US has, and will continue to have, a two-party system isn't because of political apathy, or voter ignorance. It's because of the way the math works out. A single vote system like the US has will always funnel everything back down to two parties. It's basic games theory. Any third party which manages to claw their way into power will invariably replace one of the existing parties rather than join them (thus why there is no longer a Whig or Federalist party), leaving you again with the eternal choice between a turd sandwich and a giant douche.

And even if that weren't the case, the sad fact is that the vast majority of people who make it onto the ballot (and you can't cast a meaningful vote for someone who isn't on the ballot), with the possible exception of local (city/county) offices, are beholden to the corporations who donate the big bucks to their campaigns, and not to their electorate. It's not difficult to figure out when their campaign contributions are so closely predictive of their voting records.

>It's a sad state. Bad for the people of the US, worse for the people of the world.

"The best thing to do with a grade school bully (assuming I'm talking to someone the same age) is to hit them in mouth. Hard."

I totally disagree. You should punch them in the throat. It's more effective, and way easier on your hand.

Well, they have this amazing new gizmo called a "freezer" now. Apparently it lets you transport perishable food items over long distances without spoilage.

And actually, whether you eat tuna sashimi in Tokyo, or Toledo Ohio, that fish was frozen on the boat that caught it. Some companies in Japan actually stockpile their tuna catch, and sit on it for up to seven years or so, for sale in more advantageous market conditions. Quality tuna is an extremely high-value commodity in Japan.

"Fox News is the only network that is critical of the Obama administration."

What are you talking about? Even The Daily Show regularly criticizes the Obama administration. Fox is just the only network going full-on Joseph Goebbels with their coverage. And while I'm happy that the Bill of Rights exists and allows such free speech, Fox news perpetually fails at even its self-stated goal of delivering "fair and balanced" news coverage. But if by "doing its job" you mean going above and beyond to create a manufactured atmosphere of bigotry and fear, then yeah, I totally agree.

But all you really need to launch a full-out wireless attack on a pacemaker is a microwave oven. D'you think they're working on a patch for that?

Whether they have some kind of intrusive metering software or not, what I'm wondering is how they think they can pull off paying out per-play royalties to artists from a flat-fee, unlimited-download subscription model. The maths, they don't add up.

Criticism from one blogger constitutes "impossible working conditions?" Really? I mean, really? If he calls them all doody heads, maybe he could get them to cry in public.

I wonder if the NBC, ABC, CBS, SyFy, WB, etc. websites are going to jump to a subscription model too. That's where Hulu gets the vast majority of its TV content, including its classic shows. Hulu even adds and removes their content on the same schedules. So far as I can tell, the only real service Hulu provides seems to be the convenience of having all of that in one place. I can put up with the ads for that convenience, but I don't think I'd care to pay for it, especially if they keep the ads.

Also, considering all the many articles I've read over the past year proclaiming the epic scale of Hulu's viewership, and how an episode of The Simpsons is now worth considerably more advertising dollars on Hulu than it is on Fox, I have a hard time seeing how advertiser-supported content (AKA the tried and tested model of the last sixty years) is suddenly no longer viable. Considering the scale of their audience, and the fact that they're not too far from the only game in town for centralization of that type of content, Hulu should be able to push its ad revenues up to a "sustainable rate" pretty easily without dinging its viewers. But then, I guess this is News Corp. we're talking about...

The music business actually died a long time ago. What we have now is the *record* business. They're only concerned with moving plastic, and view the artists who supply the music only as contract labor hired to make that physical product. The artists are the only people in the record industry that actually care about the music. Everyone else is only concerned with slapping a price tag on anything that will give them a nice turnaround to bump up that figure on the company's quarterly earnings sheet, and it doesn't much matter what that is (as will be obvious any time you turn on your radio).

Speaking as a musician, and as a fan of music, it brings me no end of joy to know that technology has made these dinosaurs superfluous in nearly every regard. From recording, to distribution, to promotion, musicians just don't need them anymore. And that's a beautiful thing, especially considering how shamefully artists are generally treated by the big record houses.

Also, Lilly Allen is a hack.