HeyYou

I haven't been very happy with EITHER party for quite some time now...... The sole difference between the two is the set of special interests the parties represent. From federal court decisions to federal laws to budgets we've been moreless entirely disenfranchised since at least 1971, when Nixon -- without a popular vote -- sold our middle class and labor force down the Yellow River. We didn't even normalize relations with the PRC until eight years after these economic ties were created. And, they were granted 'most favored nation' status without much ado as well. Which seriously screwed the american worker.

I haven't been very happy with EITHER party for quite some time now......

In the US, corporate america OWNS the government.

You are giving too much credit to your legislative body....... Here in the US, "Good Sense", and "congress" do NOT belong in the same sentence.

Any sufficiently advanced technology would be indistinguishable from Magic. :D

And now we transfer files all over the world.... Automatic transmissions qualify as "Magick".... Black Magick at that.....

They are too close to New York.......

Yeah, but, will it ever go back to where it belongs? I hate visitors that over-stay their welcome. :D

I don't think that humans will ever develop the ability to colonize other worlds. There just isn't enough money in it..... at least, not yet. Unless there are some SERIOUS advances in propulsion, we are going to be stuck on this rock till we either kill ourselves, or, something else comes along, and takes care of the human infestation naturally. (a big rock, sun goes nova, plague, whathaveyou) Given our present course, I suspect we are going to do ourselves in long before we can expand to the stars. Mores the pity. I would LOVE to be on the SECOND FTL ship. :D

I think these guys are going to BE the state sanctioned morality police/thought police..... (as you don't actually have to DO anything for them to drag you in on a whim.) I see this as just another degradation of our society, leading to our downfall. Just like the Roman Empire.

Yeah. "Peak Oil".... I have been hearing that one since the 70's..... And supply still outstrips demand, and we still have huge untapped reserves. Don't see that becoming an issue for several decades, at least. In that time, I would hope that we will finally achieve a commercially viable fusion reactor.... something small enough to power our personal vehicles......

I've been hearing "We will have working fusion power within 5 years!" for better than three decades now. I will grant you that we are closer now, than we have been in the past, but, commercial viability within 5 years? I seriously doubt it.

The definition of "success" is a bit low though. I have yet to see a fusion reaction sustained for more than a few seconds. Sure, folks have gotten more energy out of the reaction than they put in, but, that still is a long way from being a practical power source.......

Our government hasn't shown 'responsibility to the people' for decades, regardless of what party was in power. It's all about what is best for THEM, and what will make sure they get re-elected. The american people don't matter any more. Only those folks that provide the big money for political campaigns. And that applies to BOTH sides of the aisle.

Rex is CEO of Exxon..... More than just an engineer. Also, may wanna peruse this article for a bit of a peek at the man behind the name.

Sorry, but I'm just curious, what is great country in your opinion then? What makes it great? Now THAT is a tough question..... What makes us Great? Look at what we were during, and for a while after, WWII. Sometime after that, we lost our direction, we lost pretty much every war we were involved in after that, until our first engagement with Iraq. Which we indeed "won", we accomplished our goals. Get the Iraqis out of Kuwait. We did that. We had no intention of ousting Saddam at that time. Bush senior was obviously brighter than his son..... Senior knew exactly what would happen if we did. Junior didn't believe him... Senior was right, and now, a couple trillion dollars later, everyone else agrees as well. It used to be we had some of the best schools in the world. Now we are ranked somewhere in the low 30's..... We used to be a manufacturing powerhouse, with a strong middle class. Both of which are gone now. The rich keep getting richer, and the rest of us are VERY lucky if we can maintain our current income levels. Most are slipping..... I am waiting for them to add an amendment to the constitution, framing the "RIght Not to be Offended"...... We have become such a litigious society, no one is really willing to say anything at all to get us to change direction. But, in this day and age of "no one is responsible for their own actions"..... it comes as little surprise. I really hate the country we are becoming.......

Not to mention: Arrogant....... :D

Yeah, I was really annoyed when they went with papyrus, and an external script engine. Makes doing a scripts that are timing dependent rather hit or miss. That, and I didn't really wanna learn yet another scripting language..... I think OBSE was the pinnacle of scripting...... you could do a LOT of neat stuff. (and we did.....) Oh well. I don't ever see beth going back to that.

With the advent of the 64 bit engine, ram limitations are somewhat alleviated, now, beth just needs to teach the game engine how to PROPERLY handle memory...... :D

I am not aware of ANY game engine that can actually efficiently use more than one or two cores, or even deal well with hyperthreading....... Computer hardware has WAY outpaced game engine development. For beth games, processor speed is more important than how many cores you have. I suspect that it would run better on a dual core @ 3.6ghz, than it would on an 8 core, @ 2.5.......

What we need is a unifying event.... Alien invasion, or something, that brings EVERYONE together, in a common cause. Of course, any alien invasion would have VASTLY superior technology, and we would probably just get wiped out in fairly short order.... So, maybe not such a good idea. :D

Don't hold your breath on secession. We hear that after every election from a handful of states from the 'other side' of the aisle....... Texas talks about it on a fairly regular basis. :) I am going to withhold my opinion on how trump is as president, until he actually IS president. He may just surprise us. Wouldn't that be nice?

It's beyond stupid imo to believe that anyone goes into politics for the public good. According to history public politics is the final refuge for people with egos too large to be contained by the private sector. It's been true at least since the Roman Empire and probably always has been. So can we please stop with the claims and delusions that some politicians are "in it for the little guy". Nobody is, and the sole difference between politicians is in the groups of special interests they represent. On that, I will most certainly agree with you. :D

Have you been listening to a word I said? If Trump had invested his inherited fortune in a neutral investment like an index fund, he'd have more money. He has underperformed the market. He is, by definition, a below-average businessman, and all his “deals” have been simple exchanges of money for entertainment and to feed his ego. You forgot the Freemasons and the Bilderberg Group. And so are 50% of ALL 'businessmen'. Remember, average is exactly that. The middle ground between good, and bad. Still and all, he is MAKING MONEY, not losing money, as you implied.

Wrong. According to a chart on The Washington Post, a left leaning publication....... His net worth has been on a fairly steady rise since the last recession, and is worth more now, than he ever has been. (please note, there are several graphs, only one of which is 'what trump says'..)