Walsingham

Nevermind being UBER, what is the most tactically challenging combination to play, for the diehards?

Small children are frightening at the best of times, and must be dealt with by rapid belt-fed firepower. Speaking of which, have we heard from 11XHooah recently?

You may have some of my points change since you have demonstrated a skill I cannot master.

213374U, are completely off your nut? Large scale nuclear exchange would precipitate not just a radiation hazard several thousand times what we can stand, but also a dust cloud that would trigger what is jovially referred to as a 'nuclear winter', as heat from the sun cannot reach the planet's surface. Even if we were not cooked, irradiated, or choked every food source we use WOULD be. Ergo, we die. We all die. The survival in vaults idea is cute, but utterly impractical. Actually there's no money in space exploration so longa s we agree to share the proceeds. We need to grant exclusive rights of colonisation to settled areas for nations and private companies. THEN we'll see some action.

Meta is ban on. One reason for us being weenies about your gas (petrol) price obsession is that we pay a gazillion more per gallon, AND any conurbation larger than a village has Manhattan style traffic problems. This is why I almost always walk. On the occasions where I must go by train I budget for gifts when I am late.

Apologies for causing any offence, mate. My comment was really aimed at the original source, and others who propagate such notions in attempts to sound either better educated or courageous than they really are. It's a sore point since I lost one of the family to an ambush by BOSS mercenaries, who had been working to undermine apartheid by peaceful measures. edit: apparently, 67.25% of NO is black, according to a completely unreliable bloke on the net.

"Ask ten different scientists about the environment, population control, genetics - and you'll get ten different answers. But there's one thing every scientist on the planet agrees on: whether it happens in a hundred years, or a thousand years, or a million years, eventually our sun will grow cold, and go out. When that happens, it won't just take us, it'll take Marilyn Monroe, and Lao-tsu, Einstein, Maruputo, Buddy Holly, Aristophanes - all of this. All of this was for nothing, unless we go to the stars." -- Babylon5 And our ability to go to the stars will arise from our relentless drive to dominate nature, not be dominated by it. Without that drive we really might count for no more than tigers.

1) Nobody in S Africa would have been dumb enough to ride through a township on the outside of a carrier like that. Too easy to get hit with a molotov or rpg. 2) Nobody in a township would have crowded a carrier full of cops like that lady is. Too easy to get shot. People shouldn't play games with the notion that the US has an apartheid system when they clearly know jack about the real thing. It's a comparison which cheapens the original, and slanders the nation in question. ~ Having said that there is a racial divide in the US. I think, however, that what we are really seeing here is the indifference of the system to the poor in general. Those folks would be quietly waiting to die without proper medical cover or protection in old age without Katrina. It is just that now they are dying out on rooftops they make us uncomfortable. I'm not going to demand the US becomes socialist overnight. But I'm saying if you are going to be a hardcore capitalist state have the balls to face the reality of it. If you don't care, don't care. If you really care, don't just care when it is out in the open. ~ I'm not entirely clear what you chaps are talking about wrt the Nat. Guard having insufficient resources. I don't see any lack of men, vehicles or similar materiel. I see inadequate planning, preparation and leadership. 'Crazy foreign adventures' actually help prep the armed forces to deal with incidents like this. If I'm wrong help me out by saying which assets in Iraq they need over in NO.

I'm not really interested in this thread anymore but I thought this is interesting. Actually, psychologists suggest that women that sell their body for a living are always suffering from some kind of emotional disorder, often a childhood trauma. The fact that they "appear" normal and "seem" happy doesn't preclude the possibility that they can be emotional wrecks. Don't take my word for it, though. Do some research on the matter and see what you can dig up. Prostitution isn't just another job, and while I'm all for it being regulated (as it's obviously impossible to suppress it), I no longer think it's "okay" and I won't be supporting it by being a consumer of prostitution. Plain ol' smut, on the other hand... " <{POST_SNAPBACK}> I agree, but a possible confounding factor is that only a damaged individual would participate in an occupation with so much stigma attached. Legalise, regulate, unionise, and perhaps the stigma would be removed. Then perhaps non-damaged individuals would participate, and the actual activity would be less damaging.

No indeed, but then your duty under those circumstances is to arrest and or neutralise the people shooting, so that the majority of people who DO want to be rescued can be rescued.

You're seriously disappointing me, Ender. I would have thought over the last coupel of months you should have learned more about me than to suppose I don't see some of th eflaws and weaknesses you describe. Why would I mention the dilemma over pot legalisation if I didn't know it was a problem? I'm not arguing for the sake of arguing. You simply put forward an absolutist statement that freedom of speech was either all or nothing. I'm saying it is the nature of all legilsation to appear that way, where in fact it is not, and what happens is that legislation draws not a line, but a zone, the policing of which is left to the judiciary. What I would like, if you don't mind, is an answer from you regarding the utility under some circumstances of being able to silence demagogues who are organising violence.

Sympathy is never a bad thing, but a commitment to work with the emergency services entails certain sacrifices. Which is one more reason why I respect anyone who does. A regimental soldier is not permitted to abandon his post simply to go home if his home-town is bombed. A fireman cannot just leave a large fire because he hears about one at home. A policeman cannot abandon the force during a breakdown in order, just to get to their family. Sympathy is essential to good leadership in a crisis, but discipline cannot be allowed to suffer as a result of sympathy, nor can the standards of commitment and personal conduct be relaxed, but must in fact be raised. I have to say this ties in with scuttlebutt I heard last year about the poor state of morale and professionalism in the NOPD.

I should point out immmediately that at no point have I mocked you for saying you lived in a Free Society. I can undersatnd you feeling on the defensive, but don't accuse me of doing things I haven't done. I think you are corrrect to point out that there are problems of interpretation. However, interpretation is why we have a judiciary. There was a debate in the House of Lords two months ago lamenting the fact that we seem unable to grasp the fact that we cannot legislate for every possible eventuality and interpretation. They were arguing that new laws should have included in them the spirit of the law which they were intended to serve. We have laws against violence to the person, yet we do not pay any attention to claims by radical feminists that pornography is actually violence upon the women pictured. They attempt to get the law against violence applied in their favour and the judiciary and govt say 'no'. Simple. I am saying that laws about free speech can be applied in a similar way. You are also - as you know - correct about a problem with advocating change to laws. I am in favour of legalising marijuana (though I don't use it). How am I to express the desire to change the law? It is a tough one, and as I say i think it must come down to the judiciary and public opinion. However, I don't think you are being realistic when you say that advocation of a crime has nothing to do with its being committed. EDIT: apologies for all my typing errors. The internet enabled machine has a different 'ergonomic' keyboard to my work machine.

Ah, that would be an ifriit, one of the servants of Solomon, probably summoned by Bin Laden rubbing a lamp.

Ender, I believe that I have made a clear distinction: The law should prohibit any statement which endorses the execution of criminal acts. With steeper penalties being attached to those offences which are unlikely to ever become decriminalised. Namely offences of violence against person or property. You should know me and my views better by now than to suggest I hold the actual perpetrators to be innocent. But it is futile to attack merely one part of the problem if you want it to be neutralised. Moreover you are wrong to suggest that offences cannot be suppressed by prosecution of those who advocate them. There is a very great difference between an ideology being discussed in small groups behind closed doors and being discussed in public at mass rallies.

What I am saying is that inflammatory speech is a critical component in both riots and racial/sectarian violence. And that criminalising people who contribute to both by using their 'free' speech is part and parcel of an effective strategy to prevent such activity. While we are on the subject, why are you not equally absolutist on teh subject of freedom of association? The RICO statutes in the US criminalise membership of certain groups. An abuse of rights, possibly. Yet the RICO statutes underpin every effective move to tackle organised crime.

My favourit editor woudl have to be Heroes of Might and Magic III. Deadly straightforward.

What I am saying is that you are being unecessarily alarmist. thsi is how we have been doing things in the UK for hundreds of years. I am not sitting in a dictatorship as a consequence. Indeed, it was this capacity of the state to force people to shut up that helped us keep a lid on both Fascism and Communism during the 1930s. To draw an analogy, you do not object to the Police being armed, even though those weapons could be used to oppress the masses. You recognise their occasional utility and constantly scrutinise their actual employment.

I've read Fahrenheit 451. You draw the line when someone is advocating an illegal act, and you rely on the police and judiciary to sensibly apply the law. Quite simply, you place an absolute ban on persons advocating violence against persons or property. I should add that people don't realise that English law is baed on Saxon law, not Roman law. Roman law expects the law to do the hard work. Saxon law expects the judiciary to do the hard work. Or, to put it another way, in our system the law is a range of weapons that the state can use, not a set of rules it must enforce. When you do this you make the law cover anything you might want to nobble, and then keep an eye on those using it.

Agreed. It is a learning curve. Also, while I don't have any affection for Junior i do know when it isn't poor little fellah's fault. Moreover, far from detracting from the capability of the state, foreign adventures like Iraq, and earlier Somalia have contributed immensely to the skill and experience of units like the Guard and regular Army/Navy.

I just had a thought: dwarven chainsaw in MW. ...Groovy.

Thanks for all the comments. I have to say that one of the most annoying feature s of the Morrowind editor is that when you drop in new terrain it arrives at different heights. Simply laying down a flat surface takes forever. I'm starting to drift towards NWN. Which is a shame, because I prefer the character system in MW.

I can sympathise, but there's a time and a place. Surely you would not want to abandon your colleagues during a crisis? I don't want to throw stones but surely this is just deserting?

I don't agree at all that freedom of speech is an absolute any more than I believe freedom of action is an absolute. I fail to see how one cannot draw a line. Legislation is always drawing lines in fields where one end is positive and the other negative. Here I would argue one can say that incitement to violence is an abuse of the freedom of speech. Moreover, as I said in the UK we have had laws outlawing the use of speech to advocate violence for hundreds of years. Many politicians over here have opposed new legislation simply because we have existing legislation that should be capable of addressing teh problems we face.

I hadn't fully appreciated how bad things had got on the law and order front. back in the 80s we had 'race riots' in London where firecrews were attacked. Similar principle, I suppose. What's this about cops resigning, anyway?