The NSA and other intelligence organizations routinely buy exploits for big bucks. A programmer could make a nice living devising hard to spot exploits, putting them in their projects, and then discretely selling them to their home country's intelligence agency. When and if the exploit is detected the programmer can…

Here is my families monthly budget. Only one of us works (so no child care), kids ages 9 and 2, mortgage paid off, 10 year old car witth no car payments. This is only expenses, I don't list how much we put in savings, but it is well over 20%.

Saying Germany has no speed limit on highways is misleading. I drove all the way across Germany on an Autobahn back in 1997, and it was impossible to really go fast because trucks have a speed limit of 50mph (80 km/h) and there were lots of trucks.

Clearly you've never watched any of the Mythbusters episodes where they repeat the same crash at various speeds.

I have always just assumed that Tor was a NSA project from the ground up. What better way to eavesdrop on people who have something to hide than to create a system that caters to people with something to hide? And if not enough people are falling for it you could have a leaker say that all other communication methods…

He doesn't have anything in there that would draw that much current, so a bank of solar panels would be overkill. To power those LED lights would only need one medium sized panel and a regular car battery.

A few weeks ago I saw one of those old Greyhounds parked along a very strange street in Bisbee, Arizona. The street is almost all vacant buildings from the 40s-50s, and someone has parked vintage cars along it, and put vintage stuff in the shop displays, and put up vintage signage. The Greyhound is parked in front…

Years ago when I was traveling through Central America by sailboat I met a young couple who were doing the same thing. The wife used to be a control system programmer for cell door locking systems for jails. Funny how she could afford to quit the rate race in her early 30s and travel the world in her own sailboat.

The launch codes in the missile silos (PAL or Permissive Action Links) were intentionally set at 0000000 because Strategic Air Command (specifically Curtis LeMay) thought that McNamara's secret launch code system was a dumb idea and could screw up launching a nuclear strike. See:
http://talesfromthenuclearage.wordpress…

I don't print much at all anymore. Maybe two pages a month, including work.

"nothing stands in the way of a future HEL weapon system with a 100kW output."

When Australia outlawed semi-automatic rifles with detachable magazines they outlawed possession of them, and had a buyback program where there was a period for people to turn them in for cash. That makes it viable to outlaw possession of them.

"When analyzing the factors that led to the high wounded v. fatality rate at Sandy Hook, we shouldn't overlook the very sad, morbid fact that children are easier to kill than adults"

"I think that a handgun, in the hands of someone who has practiced with it (even if it's only going to the range for a few hours a month (like less than five hours a month) would be as devastating in a Sandy Hook scenario as the the shooter was here."

Good point. Let's really get on top of it and address it by both improving mental health services and reducing the availability of highly effective tools for quickly killing a lot of people.

I think an assault weapons buy back could be surprisingly effective. I am sure there are a lot of spouses out there who are not going to tolerate an illegal firearm in the house.

I agree with your analysis, with the qualification that I don't think many supporters of a ban on these type of weapons think it would prevent all future mass shootings. I know I don't think it would be a cure. At this point all I want is to break the recent trend towards mass shooters being outfitted like special…

Of course you are right. There would probably be more resistance in the US to a buy back than in Australia. But it still doesn't seem impossible to me.

As I mentioned in another comment, these shooters seem to try and one-up each other, so now that an elementary school has been done I wouldn't be surprised if an even worse one comes along in the next few years.

I believe police in schools would deter regular criminals from committing crimes on school property. However, I am not sure they would deter someone bent on killing a lot of people and then committing suicide.