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Clodhopper

<r>Ok, let me make it clear that getting information out of me is like playing a slot machine (that doesn't need money): sometimes the cherries come up, mostly they don't. I've got a rag bag of it from all over, but often I've forgotten where, or the exact details or it's out of date (always open to...

Clodhopper

<r>It's entirely fair on them, they volunteered and thereby gave the politicos the option of killing large numbers of foreigners. It's the fault of the volunteers down at the root of things, beneath all the layers of argument. I'm a huge admirer of our current monarchy and I'd hate to see...

Clodhopper

<r>I do think - and if you like I'll even go and fetch figures - that the average UK serviceman is safer in Afghanistan than a man of the same age group is in the UK. I'm not trying to hedge, it's just that those are the only easy figures to find for comparison. Would they be meaningful? ...

Clodhopper

<t>Fair enough. To come back onto topic: He's young. Young people do stupid things. I did. Bet you did too. Fortunately the press weren't interested in us because of our Mums and Dads, and the pictures of me or you aged 20 after a heavy session aren't plastered all over the tabloids. ...

Clodhopper

<t>Jester: Sounds like you know what you are talking about in terms of active service. Well said, especially the half a face bit. I'm relieved to say I've never had to do that. Would have gone if called (bit old now), but I'd be a rotten soldier. Too much imagination. Went into the close...

Clodhopper

<t>As you pointed out this was at one time primarily a French company and it still has more French employees than any other European country. The number of US jobs that have been exported over the last 10 years is staggering, I would hope that we could keep some of them here at times espe...

Clodhopper

<t>Do you not think we practice what we preach already? Sheryl: Well, your record is a bit patchy. Didn't you protect your steel industry recently by charging tariffs (sp?) on imported iron and steel a year or maybe two years ago? You might still be doing so, since I haven't heard n...

Clodhopper

<t>YZGI: If it was a French company, then the irony would be a bit more explicit, but it's not, it's Pan-European, as gmc correctly said: the Italians are involved as well as the UK, Spain, France, maybe Germany. The company is based in France - near Toulouse if I remember correctly - in part at lea...

Clodhopper

Should the US export all of our jobs and just fold up tent?

YZGI: Nope. But since your economic boys preach the free market so enthusiastically to everyone else, they probably ought to practise it!

Clodhopper

gmc: Sorry, should have said the UK, not England. Mea culpa. Grin. Still in 6 Nations mode!

Clodhopper

<t>I may be wrong, but I thought that Airbus was a European Company, and that England and Spain (maybe Germany, not sure, have a feeling they pulled out) had major shares in it. I believe the thinking was that we could not produce a military industrial complex of the sort you have because individual...

Clodhopper

<t>Spot: "Ten thousand pounds of education drops to a ten rupee jezail." Though I may have misquoted slightly, the intent is there. Kipling was well aware of the dangers of fighting "unbalanced" wars in Afganistan. British troops are fighting in an area NO-ONE has managed to subdue since the Mongols...

Clodhopper

<t>I thought the effectiveness of the low tech insurgent against regular forces had been pretty much settled since Vietnam. Whatever you may think of the issues involved, William has proved he's got what it takes to lead men under fire. For someone from his protected background, can't you see why th...

Clodhopper

<r>Hi Chezzie, Always had a soft spot for Snowdonia, and indeed Y Wyddfa :-4. If I may, though, I'd suggest Cader is a better mountain for kids. The tourist routes up Snowdon tend to be a bit crowded in summer and are a bit of a slog. I went over Crib Goch last time, and even that was a b...

Clodhopper

<t>Good for Harry. I felt very sorry for him when it seemed he wouldn't be able to serve as he wanted to and well done the MOD or whoever for sorting it (even if they can't equip the army properly). It's tough for the young royals to do something for themselves that can't be dismissed as ...

Clodhopper

<r>qsducks: Don't really know much about him, but old Mr Penn sounds an interesting chap. Thanks for the welcome. sunny104: Hello. :-6 Nomad: I read your post forward, then backward, and then I stood on my head and read it upside down, but I still couldn't work out what you mea...

Clodhopper

<t>I have no great desire to discuss any of this, but when you say that Barack Obama not saluting your flag is an offence to US values and traditions and Guantanamo Bay isn't then I feel it is very necessary - and relevant to the thread - to point out that whatever traditions and values you say are ...

Clodhopper

<t>Chuckle. Old Isaac definitely has a point. There are many different types of intelligence, as I understand the psychologists are beginning to realise. I'm supposed to be intelligent, but my maths ain't great, I could never be described as streetwise and my DIY skills have people like yourself in ...

Clodhopper

<t>That first was about "people being held without trial, away from the protection of your [our] court system", not about torture The line from gmc to which you responded was: Just out of curiosity are you equally outraged about people being held without trial, away from ...

Clodhopper

gmc: Thank you. All useful info. I don't suffer especially badly from midges, but I have a nice, succulent Townie friend who is a midge magnet, so we'll just stake him out as bait and bring his dessicated remains back south for resuscitation.

Clodhopper

<t>Are the people prisoners of war or are they in some other category? Doesn't matter. Torture is not under any circumstances justified. One of the major differences when our fathers or grandfathers fought the Axis in WW2 was they they used torture and we did not. It was a differen...

Clodhopper

gmc: I was referring to both Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib.

Clodhopper

<t>gmc: Abu Ghraib was not our finest hour. :-1 Leaving aside the outrage to humanity, what annoyed me about both cases is that there is plenty of literature relating to the Milgrim (sp? - it's been a while) experiments showing that untrained people put in to "prison guard" roles frequent...

Clodhopper

<t>Spot: That's exactly what it is. Sorry. Adequate for me but not for anyone else, if only because my friend was working in the area fifteen or so years ago and I can't remember the arguments, only the conclusion. Chuckle. In an area where logic is of limited assistance, I don't really think it mat...

Clodhopper

Ted: grin. Yes. Well put. It's where this poor soul has trouble: Accustomed to make decisions on the basis of rational thought (I try, anyway!), I find myself in an area where rationality does not apply and a leap of faith is required. Interesting, if difficult.

Clodhopper

<t>Chookie: Chuckle. I may have had a pint or two, but mostly because I was doing different things at Uni: like climbing the Castle walls after a heavy session in the pub opposite whose name I forget, arriving at the top and thinking, somewhat unsteadily, "Now I have to get DOWN again...:-3" managed...

Clodhopper

<t>Having accepted the reality of a person called Jesus - though I haven't studied the issue myself, someone I trust with decent academic credentials has and I accept her conclusion - the matter then becomes whether a God exists who refines his word, as expressed in the Bible, through its various ev...

Clodhopper

<r>:guitarist Yaay. Found where the other messages are while I'm answering. Phew. G#Gill: Was she a midlander, your Mum? I suspect that's where I picked up the word. Have walked on Skye and is beautiful. You'll love it. Walked round the base of the Black Cuillins, ...

Clodhopper

Everyone: Gosh. Will have to come back and answer individually when I can either see or have just re-read your posts.

Clodhopper

Spot: Well done you, for giving up the car. Bit surprised though: Public Transport round here is pretty good, but outside the M25 it's not, generally speaking. Don't know where Brigstowe is...do you have a horse?

Clodhopper

How ture. Raed yrous wohtiut polrebm. Suspect that the shifting of vowel sounds within the word might cause a few difficulties, though...?

Clodhopper

Spot: I'll have you know that I wash at least once a week. Whether I need to or not.

Tramp, indeed! Grrr.

Clodhopper

<r>Galbally: Good Morning to you! I suppose I could add that my Mum was from Eire and I have family in the North, one of whom pulled on the green shirt at Lansdowne Road! (No prizes for guessing my "second" team in the 6N <E>:)</E>) Rode my motorbike round Ireland a few years back - an interesting e...

Clodhopper

<r>Hope, Omni Skittles, Good Morning and thanks for your kind responses. Never terribly good at intros, but felt I had to say something so highlighted an issue I feel is important. Also somewhat nervous about giving out personal info when I know no-one and am new to the site. However, wit...

Clodhopper

Not from Virginia, but am a Virgo. Does that help? (New today as well. Does that make us twins?)

Clodhopper

And your point is...?

Clodhopper

These things run and run. We only paid off the final installment of Lend/Lease last Christmas!

Clodhopper

<r>Hah! It starts out innocently enough, and next thing they're holding up post offices. Why do we allow these people to hang around our city centres when they should be in day care? Are our police doing nothing? Oooh. You won't get me risking a visit to Darlington anytime soon. I just wo...

Clodhopper

Why thank you! What a beautiful flower. I shall plant it in my garden at once, dark, rain and randy foxes notwithstanding.

Clodhopper

So the human race needs to co-operate to save the planet as a viable environent for advanced (if we can be called that) life.

We're all going to burn.

Practise random kindness and senseless acts of beauty. It's all we've got.

Welcome to the introduction.:-3

Clodhopper

The President respresents the USA. Enough people hold contempt for us without our top leader promoting it.

Then why the **** did you elect Bush? TWICE!!! (ok, one and a half times)

Clodhopper

Durrr. It was jelly babies. Why did I read "jelly beans"? No doubt some weird perverted psychological wibble.

Clodhopper

spot: Why thank you! Any jelly babies snuck in there? Allows me to satisfy my sadistic impulses as well as my sweet tooth.

Clodhopper

<t>The truly crazy thing is that positive intervention IS possible - Australia did it in PNG and the UK has done it in, for example, Sierra Leone. What made it a complete disaster was the WAY it was handled. We are all suffering because the USA doesn't have a President worth the name who...

Clodhopper

<t>The price of the death penalty is that sooner or later the innocent will be killed under it, whether as a result of human error or human malice or some combination of both. No system is perfect, but at least under our "no death penalty" system we don't kill innocent people. I'd like to keep it th...

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