Ginger_Warrior

Football thread. And it matters little, Hammers boy. We won 42. ;)

Today I gave blood for the third time, meaning a full year's worth. Now a piece of me is inside someone else... can someone pass me the cool whip?

Waiting times have fallen in the UK over the past decade despite our use of national public health. Stop slinging mud.

I don't think he's denying that America had a right to defend itself. I think what he's highlighting is that when 9/11 happened, it was seen an atrocity (and it undeniably was). When thousands of innocent civilians die in the Middle East during the subsequent War on Terror, it's seen as collateral damage. Either way, thousands of innocent civilians have died. It's just the perspective has changed. I'm not making any moral judgements there, but the attitude towards civilian deaths does change depending on circumstances.

Yeah but if the opponent figures the Conkeldurr is using Iron Fist then the game of bluff ends there, surely.

Start of the week Obama wasn't even American. Now he's the most popular war President since Teddy Roosevelt with the public crying for "four more years". The ups and downs of politics, but I'm a little disappointed. I was waiting for Donald to claim he was Bin Laden but that theory's gone up the proverbial with this news. I'm not particularly comfortable with the scenes in Washington and New York and I know there is a significant minority in the non-American world who feel similarly but at the same time I can understand why it's taking place. 9/11 is a wound in the American psyche that the country has never accepted and 'moved on' from, because the War on Terror is still ongoing and because successive administrations have told the public they are under imminent threat. What we're seeing on those streets is the tone found at a wake after a funeral: closure. We shouldn't forget the cold hard facts though. This hasn't ended terrorism, some would say it hasn't even harmed al-Qaeda since Bin Laden's involvement with the organisation whilst in hiding was minimal. The Afghan-Pakistan border will continue to be a breeding ground for anti-Western ideology, and the death of one man certainly hasn't stopped that. There will be serious questions about the competency of Pakistan's security forces given their lack of involvement in the operation, their congruous surprise at the news with the rest of the world, and the hideout's proximity to an elite military compound only thirty miles from the capital. I'm sure last night was an emotional occasion, and an important stage, but I hope Americans and people elsewhere in the western world realise that this doesn't really change much and is largely symbolic.

I think it's more to do with teenagers being at a stage of their life when they're searching for identity. The easiest way to gain identity is to appear unique from everyone else, so they like things that purport this. Being unique is seen as the antipathy of following the 'mainstream', and further somebody is from this hell-riden place, the more identity they have. Of course, the whole thing is a fallacy, since being maintream is by definition to be liked by more people. Yes, Miley Cyrus has more fans than Tool, Twitter and relative media coverage say as much. Gaga has in all likelihood sold more records than whatever new band the NME happens to be fancying right now and will probably continue to do so. More people are bothered about Bieber and Selena dating than the new artist you think is the Next Big Thing. Deal with it--it doesn't diminish your liking of alternative metal or indie pop/rock at all, unless of course you never liked it in the first place and where only listening to it to remain 'different' somehow. On a more light-hearted note, I think it's Fool that has an amazing link in his signature for this kind of stuff. EDIT: It's Mask actually (A Local Guy).

FPTP currently has a 12-16pt lead over AV, depending on how you ask the question. Turnout is the thing I'm interested in. It won't say much about the state of our politics if only a fractional amount can even be bothered about how we vote.

I know right? They're disabled from birth... it's so damn funny.

Already been answered and:

Sounds like clever business from the PoV of someone on the outside. Give the Network customers a free trial on Plus. Makes them happy again and also there'll be some who continue subscriptions after the free period is over.

There were political motives for both of those: * Anti-Semitism - provided a scapegoat for most Germans to direct their anger over the Versailles Treaty and the subsequent financial fallout Germany suffered during the peace years. Also gave an easy target the NSDAP could use to whip up the kind of emotional frenzy they thrived off. If some Nazi policy wasn't working, they would always just blame the Jews. * Lack of Vatican opposition - The Vatican was petrified that, after looking at how communism was going in Stalinist Russia and how much religious organisations were being systematically persecuted to create his Cult of Personality, the same would happen in Germany, Europe's most populous nation. The Nazis promised they would not harm Catholicism in Germany so long as the Vatican shut up about its more honest opposition to what Nazis were doing on the international stage, and didn't try to disrupt the Party's actions in Germany itself. Also, the doctrines of Catholicism were more in-keeping with the Party's stance on social politics than full-blown liberal Atheism. Divide the Jews from everyone else in Germany, and isolate the country from the Pope's influence. Neither of which requires much religious enlightenment to work out really. Both of them are fairly simple political decisions for autocratic dictators wanting to maintain control over a country. This is brought out even more with the fact that Hitler himself had many Jewish friends during his pre-Nazi life, but suddenly wanted to persecute them as the political need to do so grew. They were political decisions, not religious and apparently not emotional ones.

So you're happy to vote for a system which all but kills the debate on PR which, by your own admission, is better than what you're campaigning for? Talk about the turkey voting for Christmas.

So they'll all now just put Labour second and Labour will keep the Tories out on second preference anyway. Only the difference is that those Lib Dems or Green Party members will never feel obliged to challenge the Labour Party over its policies because they'll feel they've "had their say" at the election, and so the Labour Party itself would become more insular and disconnected from the non-Labour electorate. Again, I'm not seeing the progressive element of this voting system or how this trumps PR. What I am seeing is the systematic destruction of grassroots politics and the encouragement for parties not to nail their colours to the mast.

OK well if you can't see how it's unfair that a part of one person's vote is counted, but another person's isn't, then I can't really make it much more simplier than that.

Fairer? If I vote for the Labour Party, chances are my second preference won't be counted. If I vote for the Green Party, chances are my second preference will be counted. I'm baffled as to how that's fair. Someone else's vote has been given special treatment.

Onc common observation I have about cheating is that it's a particular problem in RPGs or any other game with 'levels' since the act of farming is made to be more rewarding. If RPGs, particularly MMOs weren't using level up systems or ridiculous wealth creation to artificially extend the game far beyond what it would normally live for, there wouldn't be this problem. Cheating only happens because there is a benefit for doing so. It's simply unfair to expect individuals to take complete responsibility for a problem that really lies in the game's design, and that's a criticism of WoW just as much as it is for RuneScape. Cheating obviously occurs in other genres and even other walks of life, but this type of cheating should be treat seperately to botting (etc.) since the motivations are fundamentally different. Using an aimbot in a competitive slayer/deathmatch on Halo/CoD respectively is different to having a macro chop yew trees all day while you go to the park with friends. The first is in an environment of direct competition where the whole point of the cheat is to lessen the other side's chance of winning. The latter is a lifestyle choice.

In gambling I think it's called 'Hedging your bets'. No appeal to fairness arguments will convince me that that's a particularly good way of choosing someone to represent me.

To be honest if you type "Hot <noun>" into most search engines, you'll get results like that especially is SafeSearch is off. Hardly anything about RuneScape or Google there. In fact for "Hot Russia" I had to Enter for the results to show--whodafunkit?

Yeah, you're reading it wrong, but you're half right. It's from one year previous from the date of the OP, then two years previous and then three years so it's not EVERY year but it has fallen in the last year: Two years previous on Attack was 90885 whilst one year was 39355, so 51530 gained 99 Attack between that period, whilst only 39355 did in the next year so yes it fell but you're interpreting it wrong. The fall could be blamed on there being less new players, but it could also be blamed on the current players having gained 99 Attack the year previous which in effect lessens the number of people who could potentially max out that skill. EDIT: Just noticed the time periods aren't strictly years either but I can't be bothered working it out on a players/day rate so that might also explain it.

I thought it was actually because the companies themselves were commiting fraud, so the FBI got involved and it wasn't anything against online poker per se. That's what I heard anyway.

Experts in three countries, you mean? And this expert doesn't.

60 and a few bad eggs compared to just three is still a pretty good vote of confidence in any situation. Of course, not agreeing with that would be to show severe ignorance to the world we live in.

So why do only three countries in the world have it, and at least one of them wants shot? Everyone in a democratic society wants better representation--why do you think AV campaigners have had so much trouble elsewhere in the world?

On the one hand, we have a loosely affiliated bunch of relative strangers who yes, make up the majority of a constituency's electorate but are rallied in no common goal apart from the desire to oppress one particular party in that constituency and have no agreed direction or policy, or even a general consensus on where they fit on the political spectrum, backing a candidate (probably Liberal) who's desperately making wild promises in an attempt to appease all the various parties that ended up supporting him/her despite being pulled in four or five different directions. On the other hand, we have the most popular candidate in the constituency, backed by strong grassroots support with a clear direction and policies they want to see debated in the Commons. I know which one I'd rather have representing the good folk of Preston and making sure my local hospital receives its fair share from Westminister and, oh look, so does my MP.