In the world where Kronos is only 5 minutes from Earth, the Enterprise takes 4+ years to build while a dreadnaught takes only 1 year, and where nobody seems to mind the giant starship engaged in a crash urban renewal project in SF.

You forgot the part where, as the police chief is up for re-election, he is going around citing how much crime has gone down on his watch, and how safe places like Elm street are.  This horrible "incident" was clearly a spontaneous accident of multiple people unsafely cleaning loaded firearms while watching Bill O'Reilly.  Spontaneous TV rage.

Never ever liked DS9, was a soap opera set in a war zone.  Voyager was unwatchable and preachy.  Agreed that TNG probably went on at least 1 season too long, got stale.

On the new films I still go back to this:  if you are going to do a "reboot" can you at least take it seriously?  I don't need cheap homages to the old series tossed in everywhere (the uniforms at Star Fleet Command are clearly drawn from ST_TMP), nor do I need you to recycle old enemies like this is some comic book reboot.  In 10 years there will be another new "Star Trek" with another new Khan and another crew, just like every few years there's a new Peter Parker and a new Clark Kent.

The whole galaxy is your canvas, try something new besides improved effects.

And stop slamming the military all the time.

And Kronos is really only 5 minutes away from Earth by max warp?  Really?  Seriously?

To turn this back to the original point:

1.  Post Office - I think we can all agree this needs to go private.

2.  Ambulance service - should be private, but also needs the stink of our current insurance racket removed so that a 12 block ride doesn't cost $16k.

3.  Garbage - easy call really as just about every business uses a private contractor already.

4.  Fire?  Hmm...  Tougher call.  Privatization necessary, but hard sell to public.  Much cronyism there.

And sending a fire truck, ambulance, rescue truck, and 3 cop cars for every damn fender bender?  Union rules and budget justification.  We triage in hospitals, we should triage accident scenes and squad calls too.

@EstoniaKat - I like your idea of using BC as a different popsicle, would have been much better for the film.

@Tom - can you tell I only got a "D" in Latin? 

Glad you fleshed out Crassus, I didn't have the time.  Interesting life there, very interesting death too.

Ain't sayin' because it was 20 years ago now.

I have to ask, though, if BC is so good why not make him his own villain?

Khan was originally his own man, in this he struck me as a weenie and not really clever.  Physically tough, sure, but not so smart.  I'm sorry, I don't believe a villain to be smart just because people in the move tell me he is.  

BC was a pawn, not a Khan.

I don't try inventing backstories to try to resolve plot discrepancies, I try to avoid plot discrepancies in the first place.  I also take stories as they're presented.  If a story has holes, it's not my job to fill them, it's the writer's job.  I'm not there to do the work the writer was too lazy or incompetent or careless to do.

Which brings up the point, why Khan at all?  If they named him anything else it would have improved the film, otherwise it's a silly sop to sentimentalism.

Khan was a true villain originally, in this he's just a tough tool.  They made him sympathetic.

Your bias betrays you.

This is going to sound mean, but...

I'm sorry, but this explanation reads like a Jay Carney press conference explaining why Benghazi was really perpetrated by the rogue IRS, who were suffering under the Sequester.

I'm stealing this line.

Yup, Spock doing the "KHAAAANNN" thing was gratuitous and hammy.

You got 1 thing wrong, Khanberpatch does NOT have Montalban's chest:

THAT is the chest of Khan.

BTW, cheers back at you!  Always glad to meet another local.  Still trying to actually meet EJ Hill as he's a local too.

I've known too many petty tyrants, you have to have something to use against them, short of selling your house and moving.  

Take homeowners' associations: pure unadulterated evil.

I became president of mine just to make sure it never did a damn thing after (5 years later my neighbors ask, what association?).

My wife is a lawyer and has had to represent friends who have been victimized by HOAs.  The HOA deed restrictions are a sort of "land slavery", and unless forbidden by the state are pretty well impossible to contest.  

Also, the people who run the HOAs or local governments tend to be those most interested in minding others' business (and landscaping).  Unless caught in a major scandal these become lifetime sinecures as local reporting is basically useless. 

Hard to fight the power unless you can bring in bigger guns.

Where do I begin?  Didn't hate it, but...

For crying out loud, if you're going to do a fance "reboot" at least show some originalism!  Egad but it was silly.

I could nitpick the time and space contractions, but what annoyed me most was this:

Why does Hollywood always have an admiral or general gone rogue and trying to start a war as the "real" villian?  This is such unbelievable BS, not to mention done absolutely to death.

Ugh.

Insulting.

Thunderdome?