A couple of months ago Hezbollah took control and landed an Israeli drone that was over Lebanon, so i guess the iranians must have found some trick to do it.

And the weakness might be simpler than the hi-tech kit would have us believe – When NATO used drones in the former Yugoslavia for surveillance the video broadcast was unencrypted – so while the drones were flying about searching the Serbs just tuned into the frequency to watch where it was going and hide accordingly!

Maybe for Eurozone countries – one of the big causes of this particular crisis is that they weren’t on a tight enough reign. I don’t see any particular reason why the UK needs to be on as tight a reign when we have our own currency, so are in a position to make independent economic decisions.

But these economic decisions are only decisions that can be taken within narrow parameters that the market will “allow”. That isn’t independence

Whilst you’re rewriting history, could you just go back to 1939 and get rid of all the uncomfortable stuff about Czechoslovakia and Poland. We wouldn’t want to upset those fragile Germans.

Rewriting history?

Are you disagreeing that a major cause of the current economic crisis was the result of debts which had been graded AAA when they were actually very risky and should have been regarded as junk bonds? Simply collateralising risky debt together with other risky debt was enough to make the credit agencys give the combined debt AAA ratings which made it attractive for banks and governments to invest in as a relatively safe investment. But instead of that it just made the exposure to bad debt far greater than it would otherwise have been. It was a monumental oversight (and that is a kind interpretation) by the credit rating agencies.

These mistakes continue now – this year alone Standard and Poor accidentally downgraded France from their AAA rating and made a $2 trillion error in their accounting when they downgraded the USA. But none of this really matters, nor does their key role in the debt crisis, because they just continue on as before with all this power yet remain accountable to no-one.

Do those that support the decision really think this means we have more sovereignty over tax and spending plans?

This whole crisis should show that states have virtually no sovereignty of their own economically. Countries under speculative attack, unaccountable debt rating agencies (who if you remember were one of the main causes of the crisis in the first place) with the power to change credit ratings at a whim meaning those that want to keep a particular rating have to operate within a very narrow economic policy, democratically elected governments getting replaced by unelected technocrats, hundreds of billions of £/$/€ worth of stimulus packages disappearing into black holes rather than being directed to the ‘real’ economy.

What remains of sovereignty? You are looking at only being able to do things at the margins when radical reforms are needed, but they are going to be almost impossible to carry through in the current political and economic model.

They do look good and the idea of custom made in Scotland appeals.

However generally if i like the look of something and cant find the price of it on their website then that usually means it is out my price range!

i had problems going from the taint to upper arse, was driving me mad for months – eventually worked out it was caused by an allergy to one of the ingredients in moist toilet wipes!

excellent but WTF is going on there? 😀

There will be alot of people convicted of this and other crimes that are no longer on the statute books – crimes that now seem like anachronisms at best and offensive at worse.

But we shouldnt put our morality and laws of today on what happened in the past. It was a discriminatory law which is thankfully no more, but no amount of historical revisionism can remove the fact that the law was there at the time and Turing broke it. A pardon is IMO pointless and an empty meaningless gesture. If anything his conviction should stand as an example of just how bad things were back then and the progress made since in gay rights.

Luther Blisset

http://newsimg.bbc.co.uk/media/images/42668000/jpg/_42668677_light_scienepllarge.jpg

A bit US centric but otherwise a good selection.

I thought these were powerful too

protestor in Egypt

corpes in Norway

really like this one in terms of composition…there was another one in this series of a North Korean boy (maybe about 6 or so) working in a field, that was good too.

In terms of sport the Johnny Hoogerlands injured arse and leg was a great shot too, but a bit NSFW to post here

Other ones that stick in the mind – Gaddafi doing his fist pumping out the car sunroof, an old guy on crutches in Libya or Syria and he was firing an RPG and one of a protestor in Greece setting fire to himself in front of a bank.

For those mentioning There Will Be Blood…i’m sure you’ll like this clip 😀

I thought Shaun of the Dead was pretty shit and nowhere near as good and as funny as the hype suggested. I thought the premise sounded really good but enjoyed Zombieland much more as a comedy zombie movie.

More generally i dont really get all the Simon Pegg / Nick Frost / Edgar Wright love that seems to be around. Hot Fuzz was as shit as Shaun of the Dead.

Waterworld

Got absolutely panned by critics, was considered a huge box office flop (although i believe it has eventually made money now)…everyone seemed to hate it at the time, and most still seem to hate it

However whenever i see it is on TV i’ll happily watch, must have seen it about 5 or 6 times now 😀

I have a blackburn airstik sl – pretty much the smallest one i could find that would work in an emergency (some mini pumps are useless). Small enough to fit beside a bottle cage and be hidden by the bottle or in a pocket without noticing.

However i also carry an airchuck and CO2 so it is very much my back up plan that i hope not to need to use very often.

awesome

I used to think Pandas, while cute, were a bit shit as a viewing spectacle (surely the most important reason for an animal existing) after seeing them in London as a kid and then again in San Diego as an adult. However earlier this year i was reluctantly dragged along to see some while in China and they were like a different animal – very playful and active.

Would be sad seeing them now just sitting doing nothing but eating and sleeping.

i think last year the best money off deals online were in the run up to christmas rather than after it

but that might partly be due to me having spent so much before christmas and not wanting to look too much at the sites incase i saw a load of better prices than i had paid 😀

Felt a bit bad about just joking and not wishing good luck too…so good luck 🙂

If you get a stick and break it up a bit it should flush okay.

Its better than some companies and they seem to have done a good professional job but i’d still be a bit disappointed to be paying probably close to £1000 for a crack in the swing arm (unless it was crash damage then fair enough)

However maybe i’m just cheap and have unrealistic expectations!

Socially her impact on the UK was pretty damning for a large section of the population however there were still alot of winners in this equation and they will still support her and treat the social breakdown as a price worth paying in the belief that she improved the economic situation in the country.

However it is her long term economic legacy where the really damning inditement of her rule rests. Her governments had north sea oil revenues coming online and then the proceeds of privatisation* to play with. It was an enormous windfall, something that no UK government before or since will have at their disposal, and was squandered when you consider that a huge proportion of it effectively went to pay people for not working rather than trying to improve infrastructure, increase productive capacity, improve manufacturing methods and raise education standards – four things that we could still be seeing the benefit of today, these would be the motors of real economic growth and recovery instead of an over reliance on casino banking and all the problems that has brought in the last 5 years.

**for what is worth i think some of the privatisation has been a disaster. For example we are now in the position where the government subsidises a French state owned company to produce energy, with the profits of going to the French company/government rather than being reinvested in improving UK energy infrastructure – which could cut energy costs and in turn help create more wealth within the UK. But we can’t have that sounds too much like socialism, best make a quick buck and who cares about more expensive energy costs and foreign state owned companies owning our utilities. So the long term benefit of this was debatable but at the time it is undeniable that the privatisation raised alot of revenue, it just that money wasn’t invested wisely and was squandered.

In the last year has to be Drive

I have a box of toothpicks in the car now, along with a pair of avatars and driving gloves. I did consider the purchase of a white satin scorpion jacket too, but thought that might be going a bit overboard.

c) but that is what i sort of do anyway.

Clarksons schtick would be much more tolerable if he could actually take a joke himself without getting all litigious about it, to the extent that repeating certain things about him would get this forum threatened with closure like others have been in the past.

A Grade A Bellend who has made a fortune (both directly and from exposure) from work in the public sector. Can someone provide a pistol and he can just shoot himself?

The naked OE hate-fest is just another sort of prejudice or -ism.

Dont be ridiculous. I for one have no prejudice against those who attended school at Eton. Two of my favourite authors went there and i want an economic policy derived from the work of someone who attended school there. So i definitely dont have any sort of prejudice towards them for what school they went to – I dislike them because they are a bunch of cocks and i take that value judgement on their behaviour and actions as adults not what they did as children.

The class war never ended, but it became much more unacknowledged than before and does seem to have just shifted.

Unlike the past however it is now “the Middle” who are being squeezed like never before. I think a big part of it is that the fall of the Soviet Union removed any form of restraint on the behaviour of the elite because capitalism was seen as all powerful with the market the solution to everything. But what is forgotten is that the West did not win the Cold War with missiles and nukes, but because it offered a far better chance of improvement for “the Middle”, whereas Soviet civil society stagnated as wealth and power became ever more concentrated in the oligarchy.

A situation which we now find ourselves in Britain.

The west coast of Scotland is i suspect wetter and windier than most of Europe sp I dont think going along the likes of great western road with an umbrella like that is really a sensible option, although it might be good to use as a sail!

would the better way be to set the retirement age (for both the state pension, and public pensions – I don’t see why they’d be any different) at ‘85% of life expectancy’ for that year? so if one year, life expectancy is 80, you retire at 68. if a couple of years later, it’s 85, you retire at 71, and so on. Then you have a rolling target and don’t need to have reforms which cause these conflicts

Life expectancy varies so much around the country. For example it is less than 71 for Glasgow, compared to about 77 for the national average. 71 is bad enough but there are some districts within the city when it is about 54. It might not get quite that bad elsewhere in the UK, but there will still be a huge disparity in life expectancy based based on social and economic circumstances.

If the Germans had the national mentality for wearing proper gear for the conditions then maybe the Russians wouldnt have kicked their arse on the eastern front.

Seriously though in the winter cycling without cycle specific clothing i dont find pleasant at all. Without sunglasses my eyes water, without gloves my fingers get cold, without a windstopper or similar then the wind just cuts right through. And cycling with ‘normal’ trousers on – and particularly jeans – in the rain is just a deeply unpleasant experience. In the summer this it isn’t problem but in the winter i doubt i’d cycle at all if i had to do it in normal clothes.

Sad seeing people at each others throats on the issue. One sub-section of the workforce might be a little better off, so what do the others want? They want that sub-section brought down to their level rather than have their own lot improved.

However if for example you are in favour of policies like a tobin tax, think that tax loopholes for wealthy individuals and companies should be closed and think that the banking sector should be there to provide services to the real economy not act as a casino where traders gamble other peoples money – then the same people that want public sector workers conditions brought down a level will be all supportive of maintaining the status quo and not reducing the conditions for a very small sub section of the population.

The public sector didnt bankrupt the economy and neither did most of the private sector.

yes

4…but then i’m just someone who uses the internet for p0rn and bike forums rather than a professional

btw in the question about inserting an image, what was the difference in the options for 1 and 3? i must be missing something obvious because they looked the same.

A golfer winning a major, something that other British golfers regular win (or at least regular contend in) is a good achievement but cant really compared with what Cavendish (or Farah) has managed this year. Remarkable achievements which are rare for British sportspeople.

Hope Cav wins this year and Farah wins next year after doing the business at the olympics.

Sad news, always liked him as a player and always came across like a good guy too.

There wasnt any male teachers in my primary school – 2 classes in each years, so 14 teachers, and a handful of assistants / auxillaries

Depute head and head were female too as well as the canteen staff…only guy there was a janitor. This isn’t that uncommon either think it is a similar situation in a quarter of primary schools…not a particularly healthy situation IMO and i wonder if it is reflected in other countries too?

It was a bit cringeworthy to see them like that now…looked the part 20 years ago but now they are about 50, looks completly ridiculous!

Was a big fan of bad company 2 and didn’t like battlefield 3 at first, but now getting into it. I go on for a quick game before bed at 10pm and next thing i know its 2am. Still havent started with the single player campaign, the multiplayer is just too good. Even though i’m shit at it 😀

They have however IMO made a bit of a mistake in the unlocks – those starting out in the game are at a real disadvantage compared to those who have ranked up a bit particularly in the planes – It is impossible to win a dog fight with someone who has all the options available when you only have the gun….those that spend time flying are going to be better pilots anyway but it is so unbalanced towards them due to this and the learning curve isn’t very forgiving.

On a coolish day Alpe d’Huez is surprisingly straight forward* as you can get a good rythym going with a bit of recovery depending how you take the hairpins. Biggest problem i have had with climbs like that is not the gradient, height or length but the weather. A bit of heat and they quickly become very hard.

*When i say straight forward i dont mean easy, it is still going to require a fair bit of effort even in ideal conditions!

They are nerds because they think choosing one brand of mass produced consumer electronics over another brand of mass produced consumer electronics makes them a beautiful and unique snowflake – a free radical and spiritual successor to Martin Luther King Jr. and Mahatama Gandhi.

As a disclaimer – not all Apple users are like this – academic studies have shown that the insufferable gimp ratio is only about 78%, so there is a sizeable minority who are okay.