"...How many times does this have to happen...do people have some inability to know who and what they are dealing with?"

I believe the saying goes, "A fool is born every minute."

"Just because they point to something as their justification does not mean it actually justifies said behavior."

I thought this is exactly what government does and legislation that has passed approval in 2 of the 3 branches, a.k.a. laws, are the thing they point to. Unless a law is amended or repealed altogether then it actually DOES justify the behavior when manipulated against your perceived interpretation.

I missed the part of this particular conversation where "..."pass by reference"...make it impossible to pass NULL..." and the use of typecast are the mechanism for proving the original assertion incorrect; the semantics of passing by reference instead of passing by pointer.

As an aside those are C-style typecast and use none of the C++ typecast semantics specifically made ass ugly in order to expose potentially dangerous characteristics.

"In C++ it's harder to shoot yourself in the foot, but when you do, you blow off your whole leg." - Bjarne Stroustrup

I suppose this is a solid example of why this quote exist.

I believe the point your are making can be succinctly made by Bush:

"There's an old saying in Tennessee - I know it's in Texas, probably in Tennessee - that says, fool me once, shame on - shame on you. Fool me - you can't get fooled again."

"First off, it only costs $1(us) at most to manufacture and ship a CD. Probably more like $0.50 or less, perhaps even $0.25. So they are likely making $11 to $11.75 for each CD after the physical costs of creating and moving them. "

Most insightful comment because we can completely ignore the production cost of producing the actual content that is the master copy to be created in mass. Obviously it does not factor into the equation. I suppose it is the same as producing a microchip for pennies even though the first one subsidizes the endeavor.

I am not defending the record industry however I am challenging that your opening statement was sufficient in me disregarding the rest or your opinion without reading further.