Gringo

Martha & the Muffins - echo beach preceded by the wondrous,Ronnie James and "Holy Diver"

Falling apart at the seams Lies, stealth and a lack of support from the supplying companies or the users.

They're not compulsory unless you want to go to University - Compulsion by stealth The govt can't make cards "compulsory" without a vote in pariliament which they would lose, and so instead are using the "abolition of parilament" powers (see VT passim) gained last year to amend existing regulations to withhold certain services to those not holding cards. A most untrustworthy govt.

Tricky dicky was so far up thatchers arse you would have struggled to see his ankles. Chameleon, whichever colour suits..

Or if you did your own research even, and address the situation from your own point of view, you may find him to be rather lacking in honesty. Some people dislike him because of who/what he is not through jealousy. Manure fans say that everyone hates them because they're jealous, and that isn't true either.

Most of it's quite accurate if you do your own research. As is the fact that when he launched virgin airlines, he promised the company would plant a tree for every plane launch. Not a lazy promise - it was the centre of the press conference launch where he stood there planting a tree, making the claim. Challenged some 20 years later, whether the company had kept to their promise, branson blushed and admitted they hadn't and it was all a bit of a publicity stunt. Brilliant at marketing, not very good at honesty.

Wasn't ripped off - his bid wasn't as good - I'm sure the cost of putting together the bid was more than paid back through the free positive pubilicity he received. Nope he isn't. He is investing the profits into environmental related companies out of which he expects to receive a massive profit as he knows the govt are more likely to favour these areas with tax breaks over the years. He is a businessman, he's not a one man charity. Brilliant entrepreneur, despite the fact that most virgin brands fail, he keeps the ones that are doing well close to his heart, and has protected the brand so that other companies are willing to do the hardword to be able to use the Virgin Banner. Take for example the bid for northern rock, he was willing to put in 200m for a 55% stake, with the other shareholders having to raise another 200m just to keep their hands on their reduced stake, and with the refinancing being handled by the merchant bankers. And as that has fallen apart, the govt have pulled a rabbit out of their hat by proposing 25bn worth of govt backed bonds available to anyone doing the deal, whilst the bear has sweetened his offer, by reducing his take to 45%. The mortgage book alone is worth 2bn, so he would end up owning 900m worth of assets + plus the value of the branch network, which he can relaunch under the virgin brand. Excellent entrepeneurship. He surrounds himself with very smart people and listens to them. On the downside, he's a complete tosser who salts his money away in tax havens and pays bugger all taxes - though you could argue that is the fault of the tax regime that allows such practices.

All running according to plan then! Britons' ID cards 'to be delayed'

I guess the alder hey hospital harvesting of babies might help explain some of that

I don't want to get into a big debate about this, and I feel my views have been presented quite well by others, but I have to say I don't agree that the bit in bold is necessarily true about this proposal. Your rights don't really change at all. Well if you don't want to get a debate about it, why raise the point? But to move from a an assumption that your organs are not goint to be donated, to a presumption that they are going to be donated; would seem like quite a rather drastic change in peoples rights. Of course there are mechanisms made available where people can opt out, but if that operation is managed as badly as the current one, people will be unaware of those mechanisms and over times the presumption takes hold and the rights are watered down, dissappear and effectively removed. So if you don't want to get into a debate, ignore the above and address the actual points raised in my post, ie the requirement for an analytical approach, determin how big the problem is, and introduce sensible measures in order to meet those requirements instead of going from black to white in one big jump. This is not a scenario that requires a "burn it all down" approach but one that requires tinkering with.

Indeed. But some times you need a renewal of the system and allowing the people who want to participate full access, ie the organ donor scheme, and in other cases, for example the failed electoral process you need to adpot a slash and burn approach, and a "burn it all down" type style consideration. If you can amend the system as snowy proposes without amending peoples rights, well thats the way to go. Q: How many organs do we need? Q: How far short are we? Q: So how many more donors do we need to be posititely on the register? A far more analytical approach to the problem may help us produce the best solution.

Not a bad idea but considering the turnout for elections isn't much better than the number registered as donors I'm not sure it would help.Election turnout is a mute point as people still add themselves to the electoral roll as otherwise obtaining credit becomes rather difficult, so I guess you'd get a rather high proportion caught up. Which doesn't address Nick's rather valid point of the govt's inability to manage databases - people who have nay'd have a reasonable chance of being identifed as those who have yay'd. The electoral roll is an existing database, access to it is well managed, and the accuracy is shown to be reasonably proven - otherwise it wouldn't be so widely used by the finance industry. I now tend to agree with with snowy's assertion that we should first try to improve the current opt-in process rather than move fast forward to an opt-out process. An opinion which is completely opposite to that I held before I read this thread.

Good point - why not add it as a tick box to the electoral roll, if you want to donate, tick this box. The companies that manage access to the online versions of this data could then charge a very small amount to check a persions wishes. (would also require the addition of date of birth to the electoral roll, which is currently only held for those who are 17-18, but not overly onerous a task).

Having not read all the thread, but doesn't your body belong to the state upon death?

Yeah and normally left them in a mess. But he would really galvanise the club and give them a boost in the short term just before we play them, would rather that didn't happen. Newcie, fulham and citeh were all in far better positions when he left them than they had been when he joined.

Start of the breakdown - TearsForFears

I guess he does that for most visitors, regardless of religious denomination

He also ruled himself out of the pompey job, only to change his mind. Nearly a million pound traded at less than 2/1 on on betfair, including (apparently) one punter laying 100k at 3/1 on - He'll be having a pleasant weekend now that the price is trading around 30/1 against.

I agree with tony on this one. A smack at the appropriate time didn't hurt anyone. By legislating for the abusive parents it removed the tools that the decent parents had. However, as indicated in my previous link, the problem runs a bit deeper.

(selfish)Capitalism will eat itself

Steve Bruce and he'll take titus with him

Japan - Nightporter

Your first paragraph is quite apt - more people die each week in car accidents than die each year from dropping ecstasy. So why do we make such a fuss about it. Why not regulate, control and in effect reduce the deaths from the drug. The only thing we gain from keeping it illegal is enhanced profits for drug dealers.

Just to note I haven't voted - so that one vote for aspirin must have been Rev

Apologies snowy, missed this DYOR - how the heck would I know - do you think I hang around ER