Walsingham

Alas, these days the big brain says 'No', and means it. Mad as a cogwheel souffle. The lot of them.

Those monkeys are quite clearly as high as chimpanzees. Lucky bastards.

Lions give you a manly scratch. I shan't go into detail on what you get from a house cat.

Rupert Smith's Book "The Utility of Force" has some useful stuff to say. Also check out Conflict Theory, by a chap named Gibson. Nice fellow. Dead now, unfortunately. But good system.

I smash inanimate objects. I just realised that makes me quite girly. LOL Amazing the things you learn on this forum. ~~ Today I have mostly been fielding angry exes.

Well, I'd forgotten about the old truck bomb option. I'd have thought that a nation whose navy is basically speedboats is probably up for that. But I was after all thinking about the cachet every tinpot loon dreams of: the tumescent missiles in their silos...

Not clear what you mean by proving Iran is working on a bomb. I don't think it's credible that Natanz is purely domestic. Unless as you say it's a case of it being cheaper and easier to bluff. But that sounds like a bluff I haven't got the stones for. I'm afraid I don't believe that even advanced nations can just whistle up a weaponised nuke. Look at the money the UK has to spend on ours. And that's just maintaining the bloody things. It's a very very complex system, from design to disposal. I do agree that Israel isn't actually the most obvious nuke target for Iran. Nukes are a weapon for defending raw existence. That threat is more likely from Sunni extremist movements seizing power in Saudi or Pakistan. Not to mention pointing at Europe if the USA gets too interested.

The Ritz is the ONLY place to get decent ****tails in central London without opening a new mortgage. The Randolph is in Oxford, but it's a short hop on the bus if no-one would feel cheapened.

For realsies? I'm talking how they sell themselves, you goon.

It's OK. If we ever have an Obs tour of England we should stop by.

LOL. The last time I actually went there was around the time they were filming.

It's an interesting one, really. Logically if you vote him in with a mandate and he does something else then how can it be your fault? But yes, I think it comes back to this neo-tribal notion. You didn't mandate Obama. You joined his neo-democro-tribe. Maybe because the two main parties are so 'big tent' now that they are almost meaningless. I mean what is the GOP, if not privilege and advancement? What are the democrats, if not intellectualism and progress? And really what is the presidential candidate in either case, but a spokesperson? Like the face of L'Oreal.

LIke hell I will! It's ****tails at the Ritz. High tea is consumed at the Randolph in Oxford.

But not even as closely as fun as to what today's Anglo-Saxon axis is propagating. You ****ing love it. Muahahahaha.

Why in the name of incredibly aggresive neurotoxic death would you mither a black mamba? I ****ing hate videos like that because some poor fool is going to see that and think it's safe to poke venomous snakes with a stick. EDIT: I just realised that my heart rate jumped and is only just subsiding after watching that.

I met a young journalist a couple of weeks ago. I honestly thought for a while that I was talking to a chap with a mental disorder.

I'm currently wearing merino wool bridgedales with about 15 patches of special macguffin on them. It's like having my feet in the mouth of God.

What I don't really understand is why we'd send guns. Surely a more media friendly and all round more economical option would be to send things to improve their survivability. Body armour, bandages, hand sterilizer. Keeping the rebels in the fight is a force multiplier, and it;s one they don't have currently. Whereas they seem to be armed to the teeth with guns already. Plus, it occurs to me that the jifs would enjoy body armour the least, and that's always pleasing.

I think it's a bit naive to suggest we should intervene. Turkey's a NATO member and very long term ally. Plus the man was freely (so far as I know) elected. We're perfectly entitled to think the man's a douche. We can even say so. But changing what's going on is really something which should happen at the Turkish ballot box.

Well, Zor, thinking about it some more I don't think it's detestable to maintain some loyalty to the candidate you voted in, as a form of credit. But I personally always thought crap like this would happen. Obama's too weak personally not to try and appear strong administratively. Ultimately, Obama didn't have the courage to lose his first term, making all the moves he said he would. He would have been blocked, and lives would have been lost security wise. But he'd have done the job honestly. Which is surely the 'change' he sold to the public.

To be fair, as much as there are Republicans who're up in arms mainly because it's Obama and who defended Bush for doing similar things there are also more than a few Democrats who would have been incandescent with rage had this come out during Bush's term who are either quiet or defending it under Obama because he's their guy. If it had been Bush bugging reporters and having the IRS 'independently' decide to investigate his political opponents the internet would be replete with Bu$Hitler's and the like every bit as much. Looking at the poll results on the issue, it was only about a 10% switch for either side. The rest of repubs/dems stuck to their guns. Of course, since both parties were at least within 10 percentage points of for/against, to someone without an understanding of statistics, it looks like dems and repubs completely switched positions on the issue, instead of only 10% switching their opinion. Whichever way you slice it, it shows how far we've moved from reasoned politics to neo-tribalism.

He has stated that he is considering to call in the army if things don't quiet down. With the unions joining the protest this week, things don't look to be doing that though. And the police union is unhappy as well, with six suicides and apparently a thousand resignations. Source on those resignations? I don't know enough about Turkey to guage the significance of the unions either. My feeling is that Erdogan's supporters are likely to be non-unionised. This doesn't threaten his power directly, surely? The man may have claws but he always seems to prefer wits. Just my ill-educated impression. And I think he can weather this storm easily enough with a degree of firm restraint.

Too late I hardly think so. It's serious unrest, but i don't see Erdogan wanting to push for bombs and bullets, and tbh I don't think the protesters have the manpower or the mentality to force it from their end.

Sweet jesus. Can't you get hepatitis from human faeces? Not to mention seven kinds of exploding intestine. I can shut off squeamishness about poop in a good cause, but sleeping in it? It's the kind of thing I'd do to my worst enemy, but no one else. Come to think of it, isn't there a buddhist hell a lot like your festival? Being boiled in crap...

I'm a fan of Mr. Darwin. I should be careful saying that if I was you. He may seek to meet you in person to thank for your support.