As a feminist minded male raised in a southern household, Miss is a tricky one. All men (who were not doctors or Military officers) were referred to as "sir". All women under about 30 were "miss" and all women older were "maam". I've since learned that many women object to "maam" because "it makes them feel old" while many of the same women object to "miss" because it makes them feel young and powerless. "Miz" (ms.) seems very awkward, so I'm left with no eqivalent to "sir" to respectfully refer to a woman who's name I do not know.

So, if I'm in a restaurant, and need to call the waiter, what are my options? I can refer to someone by their occupation "oh waiter", but how would the waiter refer to the customer? It's all very tough for a normal person just trying to communicate.

You guys have got to lay off it. David Brooks' core philosophies may differ from my more liberal ones, but to act that he's somehow trying to blame Obama or get Bush off the hook with this article is reading way too much into it. He's writing an article about culture, and his position is not crazy. People do treat credit and consumption differently now than 20 years ago. There has been a cultural shift. Say what you will, but the man rarely comes across as disingenuous or petty.

"No country today has the power to impose its will and values on other nations. . . . Bogging down large armies in historically complex, dangerous areas ends in disaster."

So what exactly is China's relationship to Tibet? Iran's to Iraq? What about Iran to Iraq without a US presence in Iraq? USSR to Georgia? How are we describing nations? Is the North Korean "state" imposing its will on North Korean "citizens"? Maybe the whole nation-state model is bunk, ya think?

We're not fighting Afghanistan. We're fighting the followers of a radical murderous cult that we have some complicity in establishing, but nevertheless is a true threat to the modern civilized world (directly but not ideologically). A bulk of this group happen to be physically operating out of a lawless, largely stateless physical location in the nominal countries Afghanistan and Pakistan. It really is much more like law enforcement than war.

Stupidly bureaucratized to protect existing interests.

90% of medical visits do not require the skills held by an MD. Flu, respiratory infection, stomach bugs, etc. can all be quickly and safely diagnosed by someone with less and cheaper education in medicine. Second level issues--broken bones, pneumonia, etc. can be quickly and safely diagnosed/fixed by people with just slightly more education/training. Chronic conditions (diabetes, hypertension, etc.) are probably best diagnosed by an entirely different set of people, who would combine basic medical understanding of the conditions with training in psychology, life management, budgeting, motivation, etc. Most of the things that bother us in america are well understood and easily treated, but we can't afford the hundreds of dollars that it costs to have an overtrained and overpaid "expert" confirm our often correct self-diagnosis, especially when that expert is surrounded by an unnecessary and expensive bureaucracy. The traits that we value in the medical field are all wrong. I don't give a rats if my GP has 10 years of the best medical training around @ $100k a year. I care that he can be reasonably accurate about what my condition is, and know when to pass it up to the real expert. Otherwise, my primary concerns are access, which is a function of cost and convenience, just like in any other business. In America it's like we have Michelin trained chefs working at every waffle house.

You're posting a report on nuclear viability from an admittedly "anti-nuclear" agency? Interesting they note that nuclear as percentage of power generation is in decline, rather than overall nuclear production. The % declines because China is building dirty new coal plants as fast as possible--the % attributable to hydro and wind are probably declining too in the face of such massive coal generation coming on line. And it's my understanding that there is plenty of reason to expect existing plants to last longer than 40 years. Many nuclear plants in the US are currently operating well past their expected closure date and there isn't any indication that they will be closing any time in the future. If they still run and are still safe, they can continue operating indefinitely.

you so crazy...

Looked absolutely terrible when I saw the trailer too.

We have an apple TV. My girlfriend is a film studies major and I'm a movie buff. Together we hold a large library of mostly foreign, independent, or old movies. We move a lot, and decided years ago to digitize our media. The appleTV serves as our only video device--the only TV we watch are the whole series DVD type things, and those rarely. It's a good fit for us, but I'm shocked at how poorly the device has evolved to fill even the holes in our usage.

1. Can't sort films by year or director. You can do theme, but you can't even alter this directly with Apple software.

2. Live sports is unavailable. Without this, you're missing a HUGE chunk of the TV market, even if they had a VOD model up and working well.

3. Back catalog. The device is almost exclusively focused on new media. I understand that this is where the big $$ lies, but couldn't Apple offer a huge back catalog of older movies at $0.99? The sheer number and availability would impress the market, and I could recommend it to older folks.