Like me, another SF native, I think they got fed up with the usurious taxation, onerous regulatory environment, and self-important yuppie transplants.

Maybe they'll join me here in Texas.

I'd like to see more women of that .... caliber?

Kim was an inspiration, so was also his incredible father Fran who stood by him his entire life. I'm not particular religous, however I recognise what I call an Angel as I'm presented to one. I wish him peace and joy as he travels among us a little bit further in life.

So sorry for your loss Fran. You and your son both inspired me deeply!

Let them eat cake!

"What would have happened to all these unique cultures, I wonder, had they been left alone and encouraged to bloom?"

Aww! Upper-middle-class white guilt!

Your culture can be so adorable sometimes.

Cultures do not bloom in isolation. Every hot pepper found in all of Asia had its roots in Mexico, and was brought over by the Spanish and Portuguese. Every tomato in Italy has roots in North America. My culture has gained much from the west - a sense of openness, individualism, and respect for human rights.

I'm sure you hate this though. You'd rather take us and throw us in little static exhibits in the zoo, so you can coo over us "authentic" minorities.

My brain can't handle the simultanious overload- the levels both of WTF and Awesome are off the charts.

This is the exact same argument made about Cheney and Halliburton - except Cheney had already pledged over all his Halliburton investments to the University of Wyoming.

There's a clear conflict of interest here when a politician uses his public position to advocate for policies that benefit his private investments. Journalists have been sent to jail for less.

Quick, someone call Al Gore!

The Gulfstream is standing by!

Instead of paying fishermen not to fish, why not pay fishermen to do many of the valuable non-fishing jobs available?

DrDan: Swing and a miss!

This article isn't criticizing the Yankees for charging what the market will bear - he's criticizing them eating their own seed corn, burning their brand value and their future for cash now.

He specifically mentions "harvesting", and how some companies do it and some do not. He praises companies that provide a quality product.

Fact is, sports teams are selling more than mere spectacle - they are selling a connection. They're selling a community, a sense of belonging, and a tradition. Fans would invest themselves emotionally in a team, and in turn invest themselves financially in that team's merchandise. In order to keep this goodwill, teams would invest in their fans. This relationship, this brand value, is worth billions of dollars.

Now teams are charging exactly what the fan is willing to pay today - do this long enough and fans won't care about the teams anymore.

Once upon a time twelve year old boys put posters of Cadillacs on their wall. Cadillac pissed away all that brand value, sold sub-par cars, and told customers to "suck on that" - and after a few generations, even older people don't want Cadillacs anymore, causing GM, the great Colossus of industry, to fall.

What happens when twelve year old boys don't care about the Yankees?

Edward: A very stupid comment. The primary task of a fireman is to enter burning property, possibly smashing through it, in order to rescue people from fire. The second task is to prevent the fire from spreading, which may involve further smashing, or soaking the property in water. Only after those two are done do firefighters worry about preservation of property.

While the original use does come from the HIndi, the more common etymology for "coolie" when referring to Chinese is the homophonic representation in Mandarin, which means "bitter strength".

Nauseated.

Nauseated!

If the evidence against him was that thin, why didn't he fight it out in court?

There are two schools of thought in this country.

One says that the rich and famous should be allowed to ply children with drugs and rape them, get drunk, crash a car into a river, and leave a woman to die, stab your wife and her friend to death, or bomb a US military institution, and get away with it, because they are rich and famous.

The other? We believe that all men are created equal.

Here's some possible explanation for the gremlins:
1) it's circadian; it's midnight whenever its biological clock tells it's midnight.
2) they're sensitive to subtle gravitational shifts, such as the sun being further from their location (Earth's diameter).

The only real question then is, how long after midnight is it not 'after midnight'?