Walsingham

Excluding oby's lazy trolling it sounds like a good place to go. So should I definitely go to the capital then, or would it make sense to headquarter outside it somewhere?

My point wasn't the pathos. You asked to understand. Speaking from my perspective I'll take my chances with teaching my kids not to be halfwits with deadly stuff. Better bet than someone else teaching their kids not to be rapist fruitcakes.

Running with a hunch, quite interested in maybe living in Estonia for a couple of years. I've been UK bound too long, basically. IIRC we have some Estonians on the forum. Anyone care to do a quick country brief?

Home Invasion More recently, two paroled criminals were each charged with three counts of capital murder during a home invasion into the Petit family home in Cheshire, Connecticut on July 23, 2007. During the invasion, the mother died of asphyxiation due to strangulation and the two daughters died of smoke inhalation after the suspects set the house on fire. The men were charged with first-degree sexual assault, murder of a kidnapped person, and murder of two or more people at the same time. The state attorney sought the death penalty against the suspects.[25] The first defendant, Steven Hayes, was found guilty of 16 of 17 counts including capital murder on October 5, 2010 and on November 8, 2010 was sentenced to death. His co-defendant, Joshua Komisarjevsky, was convicted of all 17 counts against him in October, 2011. Both men were sentenced to death. (See Cheshire, Connecticut, home invasion murders.) ... Many U.S. states (particularly those that endorse the Castle Doctrine) include defending oneself against forcible entry of one's home as part of their definition of justifiable homicide without any obligation to retreat."

A thought occurred to me that a lot of fantasy bad guys/monsters have motivations we can understand. Even if it's something like "chew people's hypothalamus". In Iain M. Banks' Culture books he makes a big deal out of having aliens whose motivations are pretty bonkers or seem nonsensical. I find the approach disconcerting, but thought I'd throw it in there.

I've been scrolling for the entire National Anthem (I had to amuse myself somehow) and I'm still not at Mars. I believe that exploration will require some sort of half way rest stop. EDIT: Still going. You know, maybe if we had a competitive approach to Mars we could have a war with China over it. Which would make the trip more interesting. EDIT2: Or maybe we could just tell the people on the trip we were at war? EDIT3: OK. Done now.

Is anyone else imagining Nep in a setup like Northern Exposure?

Well, Berenice, welcome to the forums. Can't say I agree. You may find it less annoying to look at the attitude differently. A planetary ecosystem is a Bloody Big Thing. By which I mean that while I don't doubt we could **** it up, the odds of doing so by carrying on as we are, are pretty slim. And even if we did the consequences would be reversible by virtue of the damage we'd do to ourselves in the process. Personally I have enough to worry about with religious genocide, nuclear war, and meteorite strikes without worrying about climate change. Indeed, the solutions to most of the former directly contradict the latter.

And we love you too. You racist bastard.

Geez, if I'm going to commit a crime, I need to do it in Norway. I've stayed at hotels worse than that. It's a bit of an aside, but organised crime definitely 'shops around' for countries with weak state power and 'good' jails. It's one reason why so many drug smuggling routes go through Holland.

If I may say so I think you have hugely underestimated the changes in Japan since the 90s. My understanding is that the 'faith' of the new generation has been sorely tested by all the scandals and economic **** ups. I'm certainly no expert. What little I know comes from studying the yakuza. But I think refusing a dime wager is more than a little pessimistic.

So, OK. What did I get wrong? Are terrorists not going to get drone bombed and detained without trial if they are US cits, or is there some quality to them which makes them different that I didn't list?

Even if somehow the US stopped being reliant on the Mideast for energy, they'd still be supplying China and Japan. You rely on both China and Japan for production and capital flows. Just like Europe, Africa, and the rest of Austral/Asia do. So by extension you'll still have to watch the Mideast like a hawk. I mean this in a kind way, but you chaps really have to stop pretending the rest of the World is going to go away.

OK. I see what you mean, then. I'd say there's a distinct difference between denying an event occurred (however well established it is) and denying the quality of an event you accept occurred. Or to put it another way, it's worse to deny that Auschwitz was bad than to deny Auschwitz happened. This fellow seems to be denying the forced rapes were bad. This makes me sad. If anyone would care to do something beastly to him it would certainly improve my morale; and I therefore declare it 'necessary'.

Gentlemen, central to the perspective of the OP was the notion that there are crimes and criminals which go beyond what I would call 'cosy notions' of respect and tolerance.

Understood.

Field Marshal Montgomery got into terrible trouble with assorted vicars when he attempted to regularise brothels in North Africa... *snipped for gibberish* Bottom line for me is that until this guy gets significant votes in anything I'm not looking down my nose at the Japanese.

I use Steam despite hating the concept because I can see the way the wind is blowing. Overlays and intermediaries are the future. Chiefly because of DRM, in my opinion. The fact that I get a chat overlay and community gubbins, and access to old games just sweetens an otherwise bitter pill. Using Steam has also trebled my yearly spend on games (estimate). And dropped my Amazon spend on games to zero. Which is always good.

OK, so my checklist for info in order is: - CPU motherboard socket details - Memory module RAM socket details - I've always used Intel and I'm enough of a dumbass not to want to jump ship - The layout of the sockets for additional things like soundcard and gfx. Are there 'stock' layouts I could be alert for? ~~ I've been planning to upgrade the CPU and maybe the GFX. Budget ideally ca. £300. My rig is nearly three years old, so I'm guessing I can do better without breaking the bank.

I just realised that I could convert my entire library to just an empty room, with a wooden scriptorium on which sits my ebook reader. Not sure if I like that idea, but it would be amusing.

I'm thinking that it's about time I upgraded my PC a bit. The power, housing, storage are all doing well, so I don't want to have to go through the expense and hassle of migrating to a completely new rig. Plus I can't be bothered with Windows * - especially when MS are squirming over its lack of success. Ignoring budget for the moment, what information do I need to gather in order to intelligently assess the scope for an upgrade? I am assuming it will have something do with the motherboard and slots...

I don't know why you're so nervous about the beer!

Sounds to me as if a) You already lean towards taking it b) You need to establish what keeping the new hours and commitments will do to your existing commitments c) I'd prefer to work for you than one of the hard working simpletons Nepenthe describes d) It might help if I give you this imaginary hat. The basic hat is a Napoleonic war shako, but I've glued sparkles to it, and a model of you stamping on people - made of scrunched up tinfoil - above the legend "Eat My Firesome <sic> Leadership".

I told you stop filming me in the nude, man.

Malco, baby, flailing around like goddamn mentalists is not 'acting in self defence'. We do too little, of the wrong thing, in the wrong places, far too late. IMO a big part of that is because we point blank refuse to address our security needs as if we were educated adults, and instead dance around them like teenagers at a school disco.