Walsingham

Weird, when I say this everybody cries their eyes out. Ah well, such is life. That's because Rosti is generally polite and has a variegated agenda. Actually, I would have thought you'd be the first to point out that ALL governments have arms aimed at their own populations. Anyway, Rosti, I see your point about the religious apartheid. Like I say: complex.

Good lad. You may count on us for support.

I hope you're wrong, Rosti old man. But I see your line of reasoning. I do think it's fair to point out, in my de facto role as zionist ( ) that there was a peaceful resolution on the table in 1948 which was rejected by neighbouring Arab states who 'invaded' in an attempt to impose their own solution which was resisted militarily by the zionists. Since that time I think to a certain extent the Palestinians have been used as a political tool to kick about between various entities, passing from local rulers to the Soviets to the jifascists and iranians. It's no doubt true that the US keps one side going, but there's a bunch of people keeping the other side going as well.

Discovered I had lost my watch. Finally set out at 23:30 Managed the run more or less OK. I think I planned 18 mins running time on my music player. Good pacing, even uphill at the end. Felt pretty good. Pressups and situps less successful. ONly managed three sets of 15 for press ups and 33,23,20 for situps. I just don't understand how the hell you are supposed to do your maximum possible total three times in around five minutes. :( I need to speak to my PTI.

OMGZRS what happened to your character?

Saudi Arabia is quite the tyrannical exception among countries in the Middle East. Is that why they get so much military aid from the US? Or was it the other way around? I saw a major of Saudi police in London earlier this year describing the constant threat of death he and his colleagues live with from jifascist extremists. His heartfelt remarks moved all those present to express their thanks. You can make comedy of the serious, but you should remember the truth behind it while you do so. Saudi has a lot of problems, and I can't pretend to understand it very well, but I draw the line at accusing the entire nation of being the problem. Stevethaibinh would probably have a more enlightened perspective if he's about.

I though the plague infested blankets were given them by the British army? That's hardly the fault of the yankees.

True. Which is why i would regard sharia law as incompatible with liberal democracy. BUt being a muslim does not necessarily mean you expect shria law to be applied any more than being a christian means you expect all that guff in Deuteronomy about stoning people to be carried out.

It's late, but I'm going to ignore my own learning curve and go out anyway. The joys of living in a big city with all the street lights. ~ 18 min steady run 3x max pressups 3x 8 squats 3x situps max 3x 8 dorsal raises 30-90 secs rest between sets. ~ Incidentally, can anyone suggest good training music? It needs a steady impressive rhythm.

I agree, but the problem with legalization it'll be easier for kids to get hooked, ruin their lives, and become a burden on society. I don't believe most heroin addicts can hold down a job, so either they'll turn to crime or someone else will have to pay for all their needs and wants. As Gfted points out, we're talking controlled, not a heroin faucet in the street. And also having clear warnings on the damn things. I'm also against legalising stuff like crack and meth because they are so completely destructive, and I suspect that legal free options would draw users away. I'm also ready to prevent subscriptions being given to people who aren't already users. I'm not sure if that would help or scupper the whole point, but it seems to make sense prima facie. The debate rather reminds me of the debate on suicide. Suicide used to be illegal in this country (until 1961) and some people genuinely argued that legalising it would make lots more people commit suicide. It turns out that there wasn't a massive increase. Although it is only fair to point out that I just discovered that suicide rates for boys have doubled since 1985. I would try to argue that this increase, as well as the urge to turn to drugs is down to a general change in society which has caused people to be more stressed and dysfunctional. I hope its clear that I'm hardly disinterested in what happens to people, and don't like the thought of people being addicted. I simply can't add up the facts any other way.

This is very true. I didn't interview, but I did research a heroin addict who was an heir to several billion. He took pure heroin whenever he wanted (obviously), was a total c*** but did manage to hold down a standard life in most respects. To further your point, of the four recovered heroin addicts I interviewed, three of them quit when their supply became so stable that they didn't have to spend much time securing it or paying for it (they became involved in supply). The fourth guy quit through enforced rehab, but admitted that - unlike the others - he would certainly take any if offerred to him.

High quality drugs are cheap as chips and easy to manufacture. High quality hookers? I don't know. WoD, you're missing the point, which may be down to my poor powers of explication. I'm not saying there won't be more addicts. Im saying - after talking to addicts, and recovered addicts, after years of research and study, after talking to organised criminals and police officers, that the current system does not prevent addicts. Capice? The current system emphasises criminalisation, with incarceration of offenders. Incarceration has been proven not to deter offenders due to the huge sums of money arising from drug dealing, and the comparatively few law-enforcement officers available to investigate and prosecute offenders. It has also lead to record criminal populations. The current system also supports the notion of interdiction. Interdiction doesn't work because it's mathematically obvious that it won't. The total drug shipment system revolves around maybe a few thousand tonnes of material being transhipped with literally billions of tonnes of safe material. Which might not be so bad if it was irradiated or something which was easy to sense, but it isn't. Moreover, because the drugs are naturally so cheap and easy to make, any losses can be pre-planned for and compensated for by over-production. For example, many gangs which use human mules will put so many mules on one flight that they know they cannot all be stopped and searched, and the profits from those which get through pay for any which are lost. this is why you always see news reports of seizures in street prices. "Police report seizure with street price of 100 million" rather than the wholesale price which would be a fraction of that. Both approaches do serve to prevent the market from being overrun totally by amateurs, which is handy for organised crime since it neatly keeps their competitors down and inflates the price. Organised crime, and their 'buddies' in international terrorism (who are often involved in production) corrupt whole nations, murder and oppress. They can do so because they can outspend virtually any of the producer and transhipment states. And the longer this continues the worse things get. Or hadn't you noticed the nosediving security situation in Mexico? I cannot stress this enough. this isn't about some moral point of order like a townhall fish supper. this is about the future of hundreds of millions of people worldwide. And as harsh as it sounds I'm prepared to let people choose for themselves if they want to **** up their life with drugs the same way they are free to **** up their life jumping under a train, drinking alcohol or joining the military.

*30 seconds later* http://islam-west.com/2007/11/christian-ch...-countries.html

I hope you made it, man. I really like all my uncles.

Firstly, the drive to prohibit drugs originated in the United States, and sprang from a drive to find jobs for all the Federal agents involved in trying to prohibit alcohol after it was realised it did nothing but foster organised crime. Having failed to prohibit something which had to be carefully manufactured and transported in large volumes they then tried to prohibit something which requires virtually no manuifacture and only the vaguest transportation restrictions in tiny quantities. The greatest harm is not done by addicts, it's done by the supply chain and corruption which the illegal trade fosters. If one assuems the trade cannot be halted by attack, then it must be destroyed by other means. It is simply childish to continue investing in the fantasy that drugs can be policed away. Maybe legalistaion isn't the way forward but where we are now is destroying whole nations.

And that, boys and girls, is why you tabletop.

The point at which I changed my mind was when a friend's father, who worked in the prison service pionted out that we can't stop people in maximum security prisons from getting drugs. What hope do we have of stopping regular people from getting them? They're too small, too easy to hide, and too valuable (so long as they are illlegal). For christ's sake, a hit of heroin now costs less than a pint of beer!

I'm quite surprised to hear you say that, Rostere. Jews have been the subject of discrimination since the diaspora. As for settling in the holyland have the jews any less right to return than the Palestinians? When is the cut off point for it being one group's homeland rather than another's? I strongly suspect that since the theoretical judgement oevr right and wrong seems so tangled and the practical solutions confused and undeliverable that we will continue to see the problem extending. Which is why I think world attention is wasted on the region, and would be better spent helping the sick of Africa or the far more amenable crises in Afghan, Burma, Samoa, New Guinea....

Everyone makes political demands. That's the point of democracy. I draw a very rigid and fierce distinction between muslims who argue moderately for their conservative values - which they are entitled to and who can say if they're wrong - and fascists who happen to also be muslims. If only more people would draw the same distinction.

I do. Because I don't want to be bothered by drug addicts on the open streets, bars and wherever else. How decadent must you be to allow legalizing hard drugs? Come on.... Why not legalizing guns to kids? Who cares huh? ...Because banning them means no drug addicts, doesn't it?

I have to say I recently got picked a copy of a very similar article recently to look at. It seemed to go under the radar at the time. I agree it's a good idea. Needs to go further, in my opinion, with addicts everywhere given totally free access to their drug of choice. The addicts probably get shafted under my plan, but they stop committing crime, and their criminal 'bosses' lose 80% of their revenue. Then we cut funding to our enemies worldwide, and countries like Mexcio, Brazil, Afghanistan and Colombia get a much needed break in their struggle against corruption and criminal violence.

It demonstrates nothing more than the fact that Israel does not respect the Palestinian people, their government, or their sovereignty. If Israel engaged in honest negotiations with Palestine (pfft), there would be a non-zero chance of things coming together. But when the entirety of Israel's policy seems to be "stop shooting us, even a little, or else," that creates an atmosphere where nothing will ever be solved without depopulation of one area. And we're back to where we started. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_count...ry_expenditures Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, and Jordan all spend more GDP on their militaries. I had to look it up. Per capita, not by % of their GDP. You can't give me a nation with a higher per-capita spending than Israel, because there isn't one. You actually sit there telling me that the failing in negotiations is Israel honesty? Their interlocutors in hezbollah and hamas* have as their stated driving principle the extermination of the state of israel. Of course even if Hezb did negotiate, as Fatah have done, people seem to migrate to other violent parties. I'm not saying the Israeli parliamentary system doesn't militate against non-colation governments with a clear mandate for change, but then I'm not the one trying to blame just one side. In any case I'm curious yet again to hear your alternative. Because as usual you are happy to try and undermine but short on solutions. I'm not _happy_ about how things are, I simply don't see how the solution is all in Israel's court. Case in point, your bonkers insistence on military spending as a measure of warlikeness. Yes, it turns out that Israel is top by capita. ...Followed in direct descending order by Kuwait and NORWAY. And in any event, given Israel's recent history of wars per year of existence it seems rather proportionate. I think Norway's only been in one war since inception and that suggests they are a fascist behemoth. I suggest an alternative hypothesis: Israel can be over-run in a single day of fighting, if that day goes badly. Consequently they have to put all their military faith in a first rate military, and to exercise pre-emptive force, and aggressive action which gains ground and time. *btw, thanks Gorgon for pointing out my error earlier.

For a chap who proposes genocide on economic grounds as the route to human happiness I'm not sure of your foundations...

I can't agree, sluggo. I think it sends a revolting message of anti-Islam. If they don't want sharia law and parties which are anti-democratic that's fine. But refusing to permit minarets is outlawing a perfectly inoffensive part of a perfectly inoffensive religion. It's like trying to outlaw nazism by banning marching. On the other hand I take a certain grim pleasure in the fact that the vaicillating bastards of Switzerland have come off their neutrality high horse in such a ridiculous way. They've had a free ride defence wise on the sacrifices of other nations, and perhaps now they will have to do their bit with the rest of us now they are likely to become targets.

There would be diplomatic consequences - quite serious, I imagine - if British militants fired rockets into French territory. However, barring some sabre-rattling, there would be no serious voices calling for an actual war. There is a very big difference from "people who live in Palestinian territory," and "the government of Palestine (i.e. Hamas)." Either we are talkinga bout hundreds fired over a period of time, or we are talking about the handful which were fired in violation of a peace initiative. Personally I feel the Israeli response was excessive, but I can't agree it was evil. The rationale was simply to demonstrate that provocation would not be tolerated. I don't happen to think that logic works, but I'm equally not convinced that sitting still and doing sod all works either. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_count...ry_expenditures Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, and Jordan all spend more GDP on their militaries. I had to look it up. China routinely violates the territorial integrity of Taiwan, and Japan. India and Pakistan are constantly in a barney over Kashmir. Britain is accused by some of violating the terrotory of Eire. The United States is accused of stealing from the Natives. The Bantu peoples stole South Africa from the bushmen who now number a few hundred and have to live in the kalahari. Spain 'occupies' basque country. Russia 'occupies' Georgia. Need I go on? I'm not saying we should have a massive free for all. I'm just saying that sometimes you just ****ing lose. That's why you have an army in the first place. Fail to defend your turf and it isn't yours any more. And conducting a massive pointless insurgency only delays the inevitable and hurts generation after generation. It sucks, it really does. But you might as well hate gravity.