colhint
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Posts posted by colhint
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just doesn't sound right does it. The Crowf turn
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During the war, the Skoda factory on Czechoslovakia was taken over by the Germans to make bombs. The Czech workers sabotaged as many as they could. They made sure they wouldn't explode. Our Bomb disposal chaps would open the uxb to find a note saying, sorry its the best we could do
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I love the 'losing the talent' argument, someone remind me who this 'talent' is?
A lot bankers are dullards and most of what they do is socially useless. One of the other big problems with high salary is that the sector attracts people with good degrees in disciplines such as mathematics, physics and engineering. So it clearly causes a miss-allocation of resources, these people should be building bridges, working in R&D or working in the 'science industries' and not working in derivatives.
Couldn't agree more
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it doesn't work like that though does it. With a bigger population, you need more of everything, schools, hospitals doctors, roads etc. Now you can say just build them. But where. The cities are already dense. So if an extra 100,000 move to Brum, where are you going to put another 5 hospitals. You cant just extend the existing ones. How would people park there? parking is already awful. How many extra buses and trains would be needed. The only way to do it would be new towns. And what would that entail. Your 2 hour trip from Bristol to London would soon be a 3 or 4 hour trip.
As for France being a genteel slow moving yesteryear holiday destination. It has been recognised as being a better place to live than the uk for quality of life for at least 20 years
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I don't think I'm xenophobic but I am worried about the EU and immigration. On the EU, I cant support anything that you can't vote out, nor anything where they will not publish accounts.
On immigration, its just the numbers of people here that is the problem, After Holland, we are the most densely populated country in Europe. If we had a similar density as France we would only have about 29m people. As for ethnicity I couldn't care less. Don't mind if 10m 5th generation English born people move out and then more immigrants move in as long as the numbers reduce.
There is another side to this. It seems if you are worried about overcrowding you are automatically labelled as xenophobic/racist by some people.
Secondly we have reached the point where we do not have enough land to feed the population. That cannot be a good thing. A third thing is, if you look at the best countries to live in for quality of life, of the top 20, only 3 have a denser population. And of those 3, two are comparatively small countries, together they are about half the size of Ireland.
We are not a densley populated country. We are a country where over 90% of the land mass is natural or agricultural with dense towns and cities along the way. There is a massive amount of room left and there is more than enough land to feed ourselves and export food to others.
Take a drive along the M4, from Bristol to London the view on both sides is almost entirely greenery to the horizon on both sides. You drive past Newbury in a couple of minutes, you then drive past nothing but fields for 20 minutes until you get to Reading, which you pass in five minutes and so on. This is the over developed south remember, now unless there are secret towns with no road access that I don't know about, there's lots of space left.
Build some new towns.
Try Driving from Calais to Toulouse, its about 9 hours drive you'll pass 3 cities the rest is farming, Or try Brest Dijon. Again 3 cities, about 8 hours the rest are fields. Or Bordeaux Strasbourg, 2 cities 9 hours driving, fields everywhere. Puts our 2 hour drive from London to Bristol into perspective don't you think
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I don't think I'm xenophobic but I am worried about the EU and immigration. On the EU, I cant support anything that you can't vote out, nor anything where they will not publish accounts.
On immigration, its just the numbers of people here that is the problem, After Holland, we are the most densely populated country in Europe. If we had a similar density as France we would only have about 29m people. As for ethnicity I couldn't care less. Don't mind if 10m 5th generation English born people move out and then more immigrants move in as long as the numbers reduce.
There is another side to this. It seems if you are worried about overcrowding you are automatically labelled as xenophobic/racist by some people.
Secondly we have reached the point where we do not have enough land to feed the population. That cannot be a good thing. A third thing is, if you look at the best countries to live in for quality of life, of the top 20, only 3 have a denser population. And of those 3, two are comparatively small countries, together they are about half the size of Ireland.
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A cool £5,170,000,000 loss for RBS in the past year. Un-be-lievable.
Thats nearly £20m down the drain on every working day for the year
But the boss says it's been a chastening year, so that's ok. It's clear that lessons have been learned.
Of course the losses were after the massive implicit subsidy which all banks receive through having the state stand behind them; a subsidy which the Bank of England estimated as equivalent to about £35bn a year (from memory).
And RBS still managed to hand out £679m in bonuses, of which £287m is to investment bankers.
And there's the small matter of the LIBOR fine (£390m, with further fines expected as other countries probe the criminality which has taken place), the PPI scandal (costs £2.2bn and counting), interest rate swap misselling (£650m), the computer system fuckup from last summer (£175m, possible litigation to follow).
And that's just RBS.
Yes, I can see why bonuses are in order. After all, we desperately need to keep these fine fellows, it would be a disaster if they went and worked somewhere else. Still worse if they ended up in jail.
To be honest Peter I just think some of the traders have just been unlucky. So what I propose is to shoot 50% of them at random, That way you will be certain you have only kept the lucky ones
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Seems that more and more people now don't trust a political figure to tell the truth - no real surprise I susppose
Pretty much agree with that list
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Drat I think the easy way to stop it, and claim tons of votes is for one party to announce that within 1 year of the next election it will be banned, so they all have 2 or 3 years to get used to it.
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Peter, without wanting to drag this on too much, the only point I was making was the expenses side of things. To me It seems no different to MP's voting on war if they have no family on the front line.
PS i think it would be close, but I reckon Buddha would edge it
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No offence taken, right what's next on the controversial scale. Who do you think would win in a wrestling match. Jesus or Buddha.
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The problem with where you have taken this is that Peter wasn't pointing out the employment circumstances of Mrs Duncan Smith as something separate but as part of the criticism of the policies Duncan Smith is fronting (and his presentation of them).yup I read it. And I mentioned the fact that if he didn't like his policies that's fine. Did you read that bit. As far as I can see Peter was having a go about his policies, then pointed out his expenses were dubious. I agree. But I also think there are far worse. Just because of his position shouldn't single him out, should it? Do we only check the claims of people who deal with poor people. That doesn't seem logical
I understand all of that, and this originated from my original response was one line about she should leave him and move to Tom Harris where she would earn nearly 3 times as much. Others have then jumped in and argued the point of how he shouldn't employ family members whilst making decisions about the poor.
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Never met the guy, Only know him from what i have seen on TV. Can't really make a judgement if he is loathsome or not.I don't know which are the most vindictive cuts.
Are you suggesting that other parties including the ones in senior positions and that the previous administration cabinet do or did not employ family members
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no not at all, doing wrong is doing wrong. But the debate was about IDS. And as most mp's are still claiming beyond what is morally right, why single out this man. Why not post about the others claiming far more. Or why not mention it when discussing other mp's. Like I said why not finish every comment about every politician with .. and his expense claims are dodgy..
If the expense claims are the issue why not tackle the top 50 or 100.
Because he's the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions?Now I'm wondering why he deserves more scrutiny than others...
and?
He as head of department leads a concerted campaign to target unemployed and disabled people, to portray them as feckless scroungers (no doubt a percentage of them are but does that justify tarring everyone with the same brush) and systematically attack their ability to afford to live under the guise of protecting honest hardworking taxpayers from their scrounging ways, By using changes to the regulations and down right corrupt systems to administer those regulations, whilst happily exploiting a situation to sponge another 18,000 quid from those hard working taxpayers, of course the obvious difference is he believes he (or rather his wife) deserves it. surely if he's so in favour in helping those hard pressed taxpayers he should take the equivalent of jobseeekrs and other benefits he's be entitled to in remuneration for his work for the government. after all if he and his department are to believed, via the planted storied in the press you can live a life of luxury on JSA, why would you need more.
I agree, could do more maybe If you are in the cabinet and have no kids in the military, you shouldn't be allowed to vote on whether we send troops into action, after all it doesn't affect you. Or maybe if you live in Scotland you shouldn't be able to vote on English only issues. I'm liking this
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Did you fail to read the post you replied to and quoted?
and?
Because he's the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions?Now I'm wondering why he deserves more scrutiny than others...
As far as I can see Peter wasn't making a point about expenses per se in that post but about Duncan Smith and his position on public policy, e.g. getting on the bus to Cardiff and jobs don't come to you (unless, of course, you're a relative of a politician).>He should tell the blighters to get out and find work, like his good lady wife does.
She earns £18,000 a year, paid by public funds, for managing Ian's diary.
It's an object lesson to the idle paupers who can't be bothered to get out and compete for work in the marketplace, and just shows that jobs are there if only you can be bothered to look for them.
yup I read it. And I mentioned the fact that if he didn't like his policies that's fine. Did you read that bit. As far as I can see Peter was having a go about his policies, then pointed out his expenses were dubious. I agree. But I also think there are far worse. Just because of his position shouldn't single him out, should it? Do we only check the claims of people who deal with poor people. That doesn't seem logical
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no not at all, doing wrong is doing wrong. But the debate was about IDS. And as most mp's are still claiming beyond what is morally right, why single out this man. Why not post about the others claiming far more. Or why not mention it when discussing other mp's. Like I said why not finish every comment about every politician with .. and his expense claims are dodgy..
If the expense claims are the issue why not tackle the top 50 or 100.
Because he's the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions?Now I'm wondering why he deserves more scrutiny than others...
and?
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Its definitely not Ahh but Labour (cant stand that phrase by the way, it suggests comparison is invalid). As you said its across all parties. and there are over 100 of people from both parties claiming more for their family members. Now I'm wondering why he deserves more scrutiny than others why not mention Peter Bone or Tom Harris. Both claim far more. If its because , you think he might be on the fiddle, well you could put a few lines at the end of any comment about any politician.
David Camaron, ya de ya de ya, and he's on the fiddle
Ed Milliband ya de ya de ya and he's on the fiddle.
Like I said before, If Harris and Bone are the Man utd and Chelsea of nepotism, IDS is fighting relegation
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you may not like him, you may think he is useless. That's fine. But I don't think its fair to have a go about him on this, when as you say 136 other mp's do it, some employing more than 1 family member at least 6 pay about £25,000 more another 40 claim about £15,000 more. and IDS pays his wife about 60% of the median. Now I think there should be no relations employed by mp's at all. There should be a set wage for each job to eliminate these wide pay gaps for the same job title. But in terms of nepotism, if Tom Harris is manchester united IDS is probably norwich
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I'm surprised IDS hasn't just told them to "Get on your bike and look for work".
He should tell the blighters to get out and find work, like his good lady wife does.
She earns £18,000 a year, paid by public funds, for managing Ian's diary.
It's an object lesson to the idle paupers who can't be bothered to get out and compete for work in the marketplace, and just shows that jobs are there if only you can be bothered to look for them.
She should leave and get a job with Labour mp Tom Harris, she would get an extra £27,000 a year
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http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2013/02/thousands-of-spiders/
Last week, spiders descended in droves upon a town in southern Brazil — literally.
When 20-year-old web designer Erick Reis left a friend’s house on Sunday, he saw what looked like thousands of spiders overhead, reported G1, a Brazilian news site, on Feb. 8. The large, sturdy spiders were hanging from power lines and poles, and crawling around on a vast network of silk strands spun over the town of Santo Antonio da Platina.
Reis did what many of us might do: He pulled out his camera and shot a video of spiders seemingly falling from the sky.
As creeptastic is it may be, “The phenomenon observed is not really surprising,” said Leticia Aviles, who studies social spiders at the University of British Columbia. “Either social or colonial spiders may occur in large aggregations, as the one shown in the video.” The reason, she and others say, is simple: This is how they hunt.
An early report suggested the swarming spiders were Anelosimus eximius, a social species of spider that weaves communal webs, lives together as adults, and shares childcare duties.
However, it appears that initial assessment may be wrong. The spiders in the video are more likely a species of colonial spider that aggregates individual webs and lives in groups only temporarily, dispersing before reproducing, Aviles said.
“The spiders I saw in the video are not Anelosimus eximius,” said Deborah Smith, an entomologist at the University of Kansas who specializes in social spiders. She notes that A. eximius is a bit smaller than the arachnids Reis filmed, and may not live that far south. “The spiders in the video are very large and robust,” she said. “It might be worth looking at Parawixia bistriata, a large, group-living orb weaver, to see if that one fits the bill.”
Arachnologist George Uetz agrees. “This is definitely not Anelosimus eximius,” said Uetz, who studies spiders at the University of Cincinnati. He notes that the spiders appear to be spread out on a colonial network of individual orb webs (rather than building a communal nest) and resemble big, orb-weaving spiders — perhaps Parawixia bistriata. “This colony is quite large,” he said, noting that the spiders aren’t actually raining down. “The web is fixed, although it is very fine and mostly invisible,” he said.
Cornell University arachnologist Linda Rayor and Aviles also agree that what’s probably being filmed is a massive P. bistriata colony. That species lives in South American savannas and spins colonial webs. A bit of good news is that their venom is not believed to be harmful to humans, Uetz said.
If this is Parawixia, or a similar species, there’s a reason the spiders may have appeared to come out of nowhere. “At night, they all collect in a colonial retreat, probably out of sight in a tree,” Uetz said. ”Then they build the colonial framework early in the day, and build individual webs upon it. They sit on these webs and capture prey.”
Whether the spiders are setting up camp or dispersing is an open question. It’s possible that Reis caught the conglomerate just as they had moved in to a new home — in which case he’ll see spiders in the sky whenever he visits his friends. At least for as long as insects are plentiful and the neighborhood is safe from birds, or until it’s time to reproduce. P. bistriata colonies dissolve before the spiders make more spiders, Aviles said. When they are clumped together, the groups tend to comprise single families.
“I suppose those can be quite large,” Aviles said. “Or, in some cases, multiple families may remain aggregated, giving rise to a colony as huge as the one shown in the video.”
It’s also possible the spiders were caught in the act of dispersing, and that the massive web overhead is temporary, though that’s more likely if the spiders are, in fact, Anelosimus eximius. An easy to make a determine which species they are is to look for the presence of an orb web, which would point towardParawixia, Aviles said. Or better yet, snap a close-up photo of one of the spiders. Any volunteers?
he's going to make a fortune
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'pon my word, tis right. my Lord Limpid. He's not a naughty boy, he really saw the future. Now after my sins he sends thunderbolts from the sky,(wise men may follow the star) One to crash into Russia. But if I say 10 hail Mary's could you make the one coming in about 40 minutes miss the earth by about 17,000 miles. If you can do that I will believe.
Man Utd v Real Madrid Champions League 2nd Leg
in Other Football
Posted
Guys I can't believe we are debating this. Whether its a red card or not is irrelevant. When you have players like young diving. Obvious form of cheating, and when you have Nemanja he's lucky to still be on the pitch Vidic pulling players back then flapping his arms to show the ref that he reeeaaallly did'nt pull him back. When you have the whole team chasing the ref after a penalty given against you. When you have Respect banners in the dugout and the manager comes charging out to have a real go at the 4th official, and the former captain is clapping in the refs face(loads of respect there). When you have the manager commenting on referees before and after matches. Well if you live by those rules, you die by those rules. If they get an iffy decision every game next season and have a man sent off in every game, they will just about come up to the average for pretty much every team in the prem over the last 25 years.