Walsingham

As a sort of embittered non-MMO survivalist I agree with an enthusiastc "Yee-ha!" and fire my six guns in the air.

I respectfully disagree on both counts. Firstly and most importantly I am not against political correctness. Indeed it is precisely because I support it that I am trying to suggest it could be made more palatable. For comparison in the UK many consider it political correct to refer to gypsies ONLY as "members of the traveller community", while the derogatory term is simply "gyppo" (pronounced "jippoh"). The politically correct term has as much hope of replacing the short snappy version as a snowman effectively replacing Satan. I agree that dumbing down is a threat. But I fail to see why refusing to accept new terms which are needlessly extruse is dumbing down. I call that being anti waffling up.

I'm asking someone to think through the process. So far as I can see, in the actual polling station it is very hard to forge any meaningful uantity of votes. By meaningful quantity let us say 500, since this amount will shift many marginal British parliamentary constituencies. My first option of being issued with more balllots looks rather dubious. I can't imagine touring marginals with a team of actors. But it just might be possible if we possessed access to the electoral register and market research which gave us some indicator of whether an individual were going to vote or not. Still, a risky business. Stealing/swapping ballot boxes strikes me as wise. Can anyone see a problem with this? I suppose the total number of ballots cast would be recorded by the team sending out the ballot box and checked by the receivers. But would there be any other checks?

I think they should have got Anthony Hopkins to do it. But I say that about everything. what about Marie Antoinette? With enough make-up? Hell, I'd suggest he remake Buffy the Vampire Slayer with him as Buffy.

I've got no beef with him. I only recognise the name. There's nothing in the folder, so to speak.

I just saw The Kingdom actually very taut film, with enough of a plotline and outside significance that I was interested, but no so much it became another Syriana. Eminently enjoyable. 8/10

I suppose if his blood is like sweets then that would make him exactly like a pinata. Children could hit him with sticks until he burst.

Well, much as I am fond of that guy who played him, he was hardly a great actor. I think they should have got Anthony Hopkins to do it. But I say that about everything.

Pipped me to the post.

Yet at the same time an insult which is likely to go unchallenged by anyone not possessing +2 armour?

I'm in the process of buying a new house, and the one I'm keen on has absolutely no security. I have my own ideas, obviously, but I thought it would be fun to kick the notion out to the forum and see what you come up with. We're talking victorian brick terraced house, two stories facing onto main road, and backed by a small alleyway. Let's go!

Speaking as an irascible stumpster myself I for one thought Gimli should have been a lot more dangerous and a lot less funny. But I guess it was 'necessary' for the film to attract the widest possible audience.

u want 2 dumb down the english language? What if they could coopt something shorter and snappier. Like 'Nat' or something from their own languages. It's hardy dumbing down. It's just making politically correct speech more practically correct.

Aha. My mistake. So then why have electronic machines at all? Krezack, I don't know. let's have a think about it and see if can do better! What would you need to do to fake a paper ballot? I suppose points of access: 1. Falsely apply for and recieve ballot papers. 2. Hijack ballot boxes before counting. Any other points of access? Forget how practical they are at this point.

You know, it's that great scene in The Shining. ADULT LANGUAGE WARNING. Skip to 03:18 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_4nKL9smq7c...feature=related don't stress teh old lungs. I'll be right as rain soon enough. Assuming rain is right, of course. Odd sort of saying, really. Krezo, how come you've been handing out samples of your blood? Wouldn't sweets be better received?

I can't blame youf or being suspicious, but duping/forcing innocent third parties to carry bombs taht are remote detonated is a very old tactic. The IRA used these so-called "proxy bombs" in the 1990s. Extract from the book "Armed Struggle: The History of the IRA" An IRA technique used in the early 1990s was the "proxy bomb", a type of involuntary suicide bomb where a victim was kidnapped and forced to drive a car bomb to its target. In one operation in Derry in October 1990, the Provisional IRA chained a Catholic civilian to a car laden with explosives, held his family hostage and forced him to drive to an Army checkpoint where the bomb exploded, killing himself and five soldiers. Another "human bomb" killed one soldier the same day, but the driver saved his own life by jumping from the moving car. This practice was stopped due to the revulsion it caused among the nationalist community. Personally I have long suspected that individuals are being used as proxies rather than true suicide bombers in Iraq, due to the frequency with which operations get botched or the drivers of vehicles bail out on running into patrols. I reckon the offer made is along the lines of "Congratulations! You've won the option of beinga martyr and your family getting paid 5k USD! Failure to accept means we shoot all of you." Not much of a choice. EDIT: I got the above quote from wiki, but I have read the book, along with Peter Taylor's excellent "Provos".

Well, like I say it's always sad, because often they are taking kids of fourteen-eighteen and isolating them, indoctrinating them, and then turning them loose. It's just that using people with Downs is particularly symptomatic of their totally blinkered view of what constitutes 'right'. And that's before you think about the victims.

Not that I expect a fanfare, but thought I'd apologise for my absence. The short explanation is stupidity. You don't want the long explanation. I now have a lung infection, producing chewy chunks of infectious goo. I only mention it because a lump landed on my arm this morning and the patch of skin around it has gone red. this cannot be good.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/7222809.stm Two bits of comedy for me. I don't know if anyone else will share them 1. The increasing size of drug shipments (admittedly not VERY funny) 2. The quote from Monrovia's chief security official stating that if the two and half tonnes of cocaine had hit Liberia's markets it would have destroyed the country. The very idea that anyone, least of all a security officer, could be so naive as to think anyone would be so stupid as to sell cocaine, a 'designer' drug for trendy ***holes to dirt poor Liberians literally collapsed me in a heap laughing. OK, maybe I have a weird sense of humour.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,,2251283,00.html I always feel sorry for the poor saps duped and brainwashed into becoming suicide bombs, but this takes the biscuit. If any of you have worked with Down's syndrome people you'll know how wonderfully trusting and free of hate they are. Interesting that Al Zawahiri said before Christmas that the West was beaten in Iraq. Clearly there are so many fine upstanding heroic male jihadis willing to become martyrs that they instead send people with Down's syndrome as suicide bombers. EDIT: There seems to be some confusion as to how the authorities know they had Downs. I can't be sure in this specific case, but it is very common that suicide bomber's heads remain intact if they detonate a backpack or vest. Don't ask me to explain the physics. Blast wave propagation is barmy. Anyway, although the outward signs of Downs do not always occur in Downs persons they are often present.

It's completely impossible. Religion is a retrovirus left over from paleolithic times and contracted from touching religious icons. It changes the way neurons connect so they flap about in the brain like seaweed at low tide. Which is why fundamentalists should be vivisected alongside other groups with proven lowly IQs like coloureds and poor people.

I think it's a little harsh to force the use of two long words instead of one short one. We need a new word to replace 'Indian'. As a bizarre sidelong view on this, are you sure you want to be registered 'non-white'? A couple of dud elections,a nd you may have to get used to living in some sort of wire enclosure and regular beatings.

Just to throw something in, a couple of counters to the paper ballot: 1. Voters who have to arrive in person to vote are very vulnerable to intimidation. I have seen gangs outside polling stations in South Africa, and 'policemen' peeking into voting booths in Thailand. Maybe this doesn't apply so much in the first world, but if things started sliding, it could become an issue. 2. how hard would it be to fake a paper ballot if you really set your mind to it? I've never given it much thought.

Rat infestation triggered again. Having trouble sleeping. I had a dream last night that I was on death row, and as I was taken to the execution chamber I looked around and saw the priest and the guards and the governor... and although I knew the injustice of what they were doing I forgave them. And I thought hang on, this has to be a dream because why would I forgive these idiots. And I thought in fact how easy it was to forgive them. How I coud see inside them and recognise their limitations alongside my own. How easy it was to forgive anybody, and how if I could forgive men who were going to kill me that I should forgive the many lesser things which had been done to me. ...Why the hell can't I have normal nightmares?