I was just going mention She Said She Said as a great drumming performance. A Day in the Life has some great drumming too.

You're in full-on Atlas Shrugged mode now, eh? **Yawn**

They are the most egalitarian western democracies. Maybe I missed it, but did someone argue for a pure economic egalitarian society. It is always a matter of degree.

I am not young, at all. Attempts at an egalitarian society of pure economic equality would tend toward political centralization; I agree with that. But we can have much more equal societies than the current U.S. and, well, Westeros, without worrying about totalitarian regimes. There is plenty of room to move toward…

Darn. I just wrote that. Sorry. Good point though :)

But Julian Fellows (creator of Downton) is major Tory and has admitted he has a fondness for the aristocracy. And the two options are simply a monarch vs. god-ordained free-market capitalism. There the social democracy route of Germany, France, and the Scandinavian countries. There is whatever North Korea is. There…

Yeah, this must be what Alana meant.

Yeah… I don't see how most monarchs are efficient at all. The English monarchy had a terrible amount bureaucracy… and everything essentially *did* go to a "committee" of sorts because of the different clans, etc.

You could have a super efficient monarch and ineffective republic, but you can have vice-versa. Many of the English monarchs had as much red-tape as modern republics. It depends on how it run.

Certainly protection was a key aspect of it, but you underplay how loyalties to banners, clans, and names shaped identity. It is was more than a simple transaction. It was about self-identity.

Honestly, this is some dumb Ron Paul idiocy here. Norway and Denmark are the most equal countries in the whole industrial world. (They have lowest Geni co-efficient.) Norway and Denmark are totalitarian?

If the rules are fair, and it is chosen by the democratic process, it is not coercion, even if it is not what *you* want. A key aspect of democracy is you're on the "losing" side of things and sometimes your resources are put towards things you voted against. That is the nature of democracy. We dont live in Galt's…

Norway, FInland, and Swedan have roughly the same economic freedom as the U.S.. Switzerland and Denmark are freer than the U.S. All of these countries are among the most free in the world. And these rankings are from the Heritage organization, an organization not sympathetic to the Nordic left-wing systems.

According to the right-wing/market-oriented Heritage rankings, the socialized countries mention here—Norway, Denmark, etc—are "free" or "mostly free.

democracy and personal freedom are not the same thing. And, by "personal freedom," I guess you mean "negative rights" as opposed to "positive rights." In fact the Scandinavian countries have the most democracy: http://democracyranking.org…

MIB appeared to Locke, and said "help me" as part of this plan for Locke to be "special." That was crucial too his "loophole."

yes

Yeah, the intro article makes the book. Best book about Beatles' music.

The best pop song of all time is "Midnight Train to Georgia," which edges out "I Say a Little Prayer" by a hair. But "A Day in the Life" is great too. It's not the best Beatles song—that is either "Ticket to Ride," "Here There and Everywhere" or "She Loves You,"—but it is great.

It is one of my favorite. Great guitars, bitter vocal, and cool harmonies. Too bad John hated it.