I usually judge someone's mastery or the written word by their correct use of hyphens, dashes, and semicolons. But you're correct, it's not a thesis. Just a blog.

That's why I hope no one gets offended with anything I say. it's just words on a screen from a man whose opinion doesn't really matter. It's not like I have any political power to make anything happen.

By the way, I know that Windows 8 has been around for a while but I have had nothing to do with it until a friend who just bought one asked me to set it up. I've briefly played with them in stores but most of my experience is with Windows XP, Windows 7, and Linux. I am now getting educated about some of the things that is quite annoying about it.

I tried to install the Windows card games, which was standard on Windows 7, but in Windows 8 you have to download it from Microsoft. But before you can do that you have to open a Microsoft Account. But after you open an MS account, I found out that I couldn't log on to the lap top unless it was connected to a wireless (or ethernet) internet connection to Microsoft first. What the heck? I can't even log in to the lap top offline? Once you set up to a Microsoft Account you can't log in offline.

So I found out that you have to be in the Local Account in order to log in to the lap top offline. There is a way to do it, pretty simple really (most things are simple if you know how), but since now they sell lap tops without a manual (and without a backup or recovery disk) it is not easy to RTFM (Read The F----g Manual). I could, maybe, download it from another computer, I guess. But for some people buying these laptops, it may be the only computer they have. There is a "Recovery" partition on these laptops but that is internal. I'd feel a lot better getting an external recovery disc like they used to provide. Of course you can't do that with a backup CD because some laptops, now called notebooks, don't have CD or DVD drives. You could still use USB drives.

I noticed just how strongly Microsoft is pushing "the cloud" where even if you have encrypted your files...they are still not in your possession like it would be on your own private external storage drives. Your files could be, and probably are, being monitored by the government or even hackers.

They are trying really hard to sell "the cloud". You can't even play simple card games anymore on your computer unless you compromise your security. Because they want you to get hooked into a Microsoft Account and expose yourself to "the cloud". They say "but what if your house burns down or blows away in a tornado". What if you download an app that has a trojan in it.

Yeah, right, keep a backup storage drive in your car (encrypted, of course). Bury one in your back yard. But don't be foolish enough to trust "the cloud". Microsoft and TPM 2.0 is a combination for Big Brother to spy on you.

Quote pcworld:Is Windows 8 a Trojan horse for the NSA? The German Government thinks so
The German Government is now deeply suspicious that the Trusted Platform Module (TPM) technology built into a growing number of Windows 8 PCs and tablets is creating a gigantic back door for NSA surveillance, leaked documents have suggested.

TPM has been marketed as a security technology since its appearance in 2006, but version 2.0 would embed a chip on every PC that has complete control over which programs can and can’t run, a setting that can’t be over-ridden under Windows 8.

Major Universities don't teach or use Windows operating systems....they use Linux operating systems.

So, if the sheeple all use, predominantly, Windows spy machines (especially the newer versions like Windows 8) and/or found themselves, unwittingly perhaps, using "the cloud" then what better way of keeping people oppressed. I wonder what Windows 10, that is supposed to come out in 2015, will look like. We'll have Windows 10 monitors hanging on our walls with Big Brother chiding us for not saying our prayers last night or for not doing our morning saluting the flag and reciting the pledge of allegiance. Book burning in the afternoon! Evening decapitations of dissidents in the city square.

By the way, I noticed that cryptome.org is down again...I am wondering if the government put pressure on Network Solutions to take John Young down again as they have done in the past. What juicy thing did John post that the government didn't want us to read or see? In 2010, Microsoft was ticked off that he posted Microsoft information that showed how Microsoft was cooperating with the government spying operation. And they knocked cryptome.org off-line for a while.

I've been amazed at how many times the republicans leek national security secrets as they ride their hate wagon. There really aren't any adults among them. It's like they start their morning in their garage, with the motor running for 15 minutes!

From Plame, to the Benghazi/CIA opperation to this war monger, stuck in the culture of the MIC, shooting off his trap. They got to the maverick. Republicans are like our uncorralled children, in Tiffany's.

We're a 59%/41% majority and they keep cheating us. Yes, they just lost a point over Iraq.

Sorry Matt, I write this from an IPad, no key board, I type with my thumbs...it also does this auto-correct thing, that I don't like, but I can't turn it off. I guess I could check before I hit send, but it's a blog, not a thesis. I agree it's the idea, not the spelling. I feel flattered, attacking my spelling and calling me names is all they have. My ideas are are unblemished :))

Marc - I thought we talked about this already. I can't speak for the other two non-Progressives who frequent this site, but I kind of enjoy the thoughtful dialogue. It's very rare to find online. The thought that someone would hire people to expound right-wing talking points on a Progressive blog with a handful of readers - none of whom are going to change their views anyway - seems egotistical on your part. Particularly if you're not exactly in a "swing state", like me. I know that the righties don't give a damn about me or my opinion while I still live in Illinois.

Plus, like I said before, without differing opinions, it's not much of a discourse. It's just people slapping each other on the back.

And we agree on a lot of things, remember? It's a dangerous standard to set if you start implying that places should only tolerate people with the same views as them. It's only online here, but what if it were like that in the real world? Remember the case of the wedding cake baker who was forced by court order to bake a cake for a gay couple? The righties kept pointing out that there were plenty of other bakeries in the city that were more than willing to make the cake, but the gay couple chose the one who didn't want them, just to make a point. For all of the hot air lefties blow about being all-inclusive, tolerant, big-tent types, they sure look down on people who disagree with them. At least the righties don't even pretend to want everyone in their tent.

I agree, Alice, that no one should die because they can't afford healthcare. Would a single-payer, not-for-profit system also take over the R&D part of medicine? I only ask because I think the profit motive is what drives medical breakthroughs, not the desire to help people. That is secondary.

My father got an extra two years at the end of his life thanks to a new device they put in his heart: an internal defibrillator. The company that created that may be full of good people who just want to help, but they also want to make money. They saw the need for a device like that, and made it.

Sooner or later, I'm going to have to get my left knee replaced. I want companies out there looking for the best possible way to do this - competing with each other - so that when I have to get it done, I know I'm getting a quality product. I don't mind if someone or some company makes a huge profit from it.

I don't understand how that would work in a not-for-profit system. The employees now are highly motivated to create new medical devices, because otherwise they could go out of business. But if it was the government running it, they couldn't go out of business, so why try as hard. Does that make sense?

Quote hartmann:If you made a list of the nastiest people on earth, ISIS would top the list.

The best way to combat this threat may be to cut off their source of weapons and their money to buy them.

Better to do this diplomatically than with military.

So, after more than 10 years squandering trillions of dollars, what have we accomplished? We made millions of more enemies that would like to see us burn. So, you'd think that the military industrial complex and our politicians would hang their heads in shame, tail dragging between their legs (as all Jackals might). But guess what? They, like sly foxes, managed to raid the chicken coop and stole from 99% of the people. They don't want peace and friendly neighbors...they want continuous mayhem and war and continual creation of enemies...the more the better. Because "enemies" are the excuse they have to keep us all very afraid. War makes the prices that they charge at the gas station and the grocery stores at exorbitant levels. It gives the MIC the excuse of ripping off the taxpayers. It gives the politicians more bullshit fodder to keep those donations from corporations from drying up.

The ruling elite would love nothing better than to have a sensational attack on America to keep Americans afraid and stupid. And if they don't get an attack, they will engineer one like they did on 9/11. They can easily get more Muslim patsies to "hijack" more airliners...or carry a "CIA provided" suitcase Nuke into some city where they may either intercept and hoot about their success; or, let it actually go off - if they really wanted to scare the crap out of people for a lasting psycho-manipulating experience. The patsies, if they "hijack" a plane or planes, don't even have to know how to fly them....our high tech remotely controlled hijack and guidance systems will guide those "hijacked" planes to their targets...as they did on 9/11.

If people can't watch 3 demolitions in a row and at least sense that something is not right with the official government 9/11 conspiracy theory, then our corrupt government will surely do it again...in some form.

It just might be a very good idea for people to just stay home, don't go shopping, and above all...stay out of tall buildings or very crowded spaces like football stadiums.

Thom says it will happen again and I think he is right...but Thom's slant was that it will all be because we have ticked off people enough to want to do a jihad on us. I think it will be because our own criminal leaders will orchestrate it... like they did on 9/11. It will be another "inside job".

Quote Aliceinwonderland: Just one heartbreaking example to highlight what happens in a sick and twisted system such as ours, that values profit over life. And to be brutally frank, I think anyone who applauds or condones it is a goddam pig.

Quote DAnneMarc: I often wonder that motivates these selfish, self centered, egotistical people... Makes no sense; unless, someone is paying them to do it. We do it for free; but, the only reason I see for these others is if they are making money....Give them enough rope and they will soil themselves as they have already done so well. Obviously they have no problem wallowing in their own excrement.

Quote theguardian:Revealed: US spy operation that manipulates social media
Military's 'sock puppet' software creates fake online identities to spread pro-American propaganda

The US military is developing software that will let it secretly manipulate social media sites by using fake online personas to influence internet conversations and spread pro-American propaganda.

"pro-American" ? hardly! Rather: "pro-ruling elite" ! Most definitely!

http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2011/mar/17/us-spy-operation-socia...

People who don't even have strong doubts about the Bush Regime's conspiracy theory...ie: that it was all done by 19 Muslim Hijackers and planned by a frail and dying bearded man sitting in a cave in Afghanistan...will never rectify the terrible wrongs that our crooked government and business banditos have done to the rest of us. It's a one way avalanche to oblivion. If you can't even believe your own eyes and some remnants of high school or college physics of what happened to those WTC buildings then you'll never accomplish reclaiming some modicum of dignity through the voting box. You've not only been duped about 9/11 but you have been duped about "democracy", as it currently exists, in this country. So, keep believing all of the crap that you've been manipulated into believing by the "powers that are" and maybe you can be "comfortably numb" when you finally leave this world.

DAnneMarc and Chuckle8: And there are even photos that show that there were just the kind of angled cuts to the main, massive, vertical support beams with the tell-tale molten slag along the edges just like are at other steel building demolitions. Why do you think they were so in a hurry to get rid of the evidence and ship all that steel to China for remelting?

And aside from the dust samples taken from around the WTC site that contained molten micro-spheres and particles of nanothermite and chemical traces that perfectly matched that of a thermitic reaction, all of the vehicles near the WTC towers at the time of 9/11 all exhibited corrosive characteristics of what has been known to happen to other vehicles that have been exposed to the extremely corrosive thermitic chemical reactions.

Molten micro-spheres can only be produced by extremely high heat and hurled at high speeds. The airplane and office fires were not hot enough to even weaken steel, let alone melt it. And if it had been hot enough to weaken steel...what we would have seen was a slow deformation, at the site of the crash, of the steel support members in the direction of where the plane entered the building. The top section would have tipped over to that side and probably would not have even fallen over. The under structure, ie: the rest of the building, would have remained intact. But, in no way would the building have collapsed in it's entirety as it did. There is only one way that could have happened and that is a planned demolition using a combination of normal explosives along with nanothermite.

http://www.ae911truth.org/news-section/41-articles/646-faq-8-what-is-nan...