They're just getting better. It's to the point where I am trying to be frugal just to free up a few more dollars each month to put into the market. By all means, "investors", unload your losers. Om nom nom nom.

(61?) 2016 is not out of the question. She could well run for President at the end of two successful Obama terms. I surely don't see Joe Biden, seven years older, picking up at that point.

Telling you to drop the guy? And go back to school? Give it six months.. a year. You'll still be able to go to school at that point, if you want. Once you walk out of someone's life, especially someone who needs you.. that's generally it.

Is make RU-486 an over the counter medication like aspirin, and let people go right on through self-check. No need for any ethical conundrums then

I'm not directing this at you -- I know you're basically making this point -- but I couldn't believe how Wyden's spokesperson called me all angry and aggressive about how I had misunderstood and distorted his point, and then when I kept asking what his view was, she kept describing it EXACTLY how I characterized it.

Believe it.. we live in the postrational age. The reaction from Wyden's camp is hardly typical and can be translated from politico-gobbledygook thusly: "You said something negative about us! Stop it!". No matter what they say, that's pretty much all the informational content you're going to get.

http://www.scaryideas.com/print/4714/

That is all.

Do we inflate the currency to preserve big hunks of the economy, knowing the people running those big hunks will make stupid decisions? Then everyone loses to some extent, because all our savings become less valuable. Well, the debtors do okay, but their life is already pretty much sucking.

Do we instead let the (giant) companies that made stupid decisions go bankrupt, and drag down whole sectors as the small(er) businesses that supported them no longer have customers? Then large numbers of us lose big, maybe up to 10% of the total population, and the rest do okay. Until the next sector begins to fail.

Do we nationalize these businesses, keep them running, and dictate new contracts for labor? How can we expect the government to do a better job? Has it proven its ability to expertly manage crises in the last eight years?

--I'm not really a pessimist. Honest. Things will get better. They're just not going to get better anytime soon. And there really isn't a solution to these problems that is clearly better than the rest. I guess on balance I favor nationalizing every failed industry, kicking the leadership out (maybe personally bankrupting them as a punitive measure), and just deaing with the horrible inefficiency that will result. At least that way the little guys will keep eating.

Full disclosure: I'm a high earner in a secure job who pays a lot of taxes, so the above is probably not in my best interests. Just sayin'.

That's gross.

And let them all go. Sure, keep track of the ones that seem to be real terrorists. If we can.

First and foremost.. we cannot become the thing we most fear and hate. To the extent we have done so, we need to wipe the slate completely clean. We need to allow these individuals, even if they were once terrorists, to sue the USG under our laws for compensation, because they were in fact tortured in violation of our laws (and basic human decency).

Second, we need to prosecute criminals, which is what terrorists surely are, under the criminal law. If they congregate in armed camps in countries hostile to us (eg Afghanistan), military measure may be justified, and that's Congress' job to decide. If they're just loose nutballs roaming the EU, US or our "allies" (eg Saudi Arabia), we can and must rely on the criminal justice system to act against terrorists, because we are a nation that respects the rule of law, and they are criminals.

40c goes a lot farther than you'd think!

Don't go to Mars (just for kicks).

Don't go to the Moon (just for kicks).

Go to either place to build infrastructure for further enterprises, ones that will ultimately turn a profit. Sell that to the public as a value proposition.

Nobody in this country, me included, wants to waste precious resources on showboating "pure science" missions that don't accomplish anything of near-term value. The reason I don't support them is that we have tons of things we could be doing right now, with off the shelf technology to develop space and start seeing profit from it.

Certain types of high-value chemical synthesis are easier in zero-g. (some) Asteroids contain totally ridiculous amounts of rare raw materials.. we should turn our attention to making money out there. This has been known since the 1960s, and the materials science and computers are finally up to the task. So why are we still wasting time with dog-and-pony shows?!