No, I think it's more complicated than that, as I understand it the world service still recieves FCO funding, however BBC world has to be self funding.
That's not quite true, You can own a TV, and just use it to watch DVDs and play on your Wii and not pay the licence. You only need to pay the licence if you intend to receive television broadcasts on your TV (even if they're not BBC broadcasts)
What about the BBC World Service? It is paid for by the BBC, (i.e. the UK license payer via money provided by the Treasury to the BBC) Just a nitpick, the world service is actually funded by the foreign office, not the licence fee.
The article mentions three towns, two of which just so happen to be in Frank's district.
I wonder what odds the Mashpee Wampanoag tribe will give for their casino plans and Frank's push for legalizing online casinos being completely unrelated? Whilst I'm not American, it seems to me that if he's doing this to benefit his constituency, then he's just doing his job properly. After all we elect our representatives to do just that, represent us.
Quicktime's FF plugin seems to be insanely unstable. I had that problem as well, switching to quickime alternative seemed to fix the bug. if you don't fancy that, make sure it's configured properly, there's a good Mozillazine page on the subject.
You didn't answer the question, why are you proud to be an American? What makes you proud of the random piece of land and associated documents you happen to live on. You are where you are now as a fluke; change any one of a million things in your history and you wouldn't be American. You'd be British or Swiss or Greek or Italian, and you'd probably be telling me how proud you are to be British or Swiss or Greek or Italian, and that would be equally nonsensical. As I tried to say before, by all means, be proud of things your country has done, even become proud of your country, but to be proud of your nationality is absurd.
Why? I'm a Brit, I see no reason to be proud of the fact that I happen to have been born on a small rock of the west coast of Europe. Why anyone would be proud of the place they were born by fluke of nature is beyond me.
Don't get me wrong I'm proud of many things my country has done in it's thousand year history, but am I proud to be British by virtue of birth? No. That's as stupid as hereditary privilege (we still have a lot of that here, but we've got rid of the worst of it thank goodness); I assume you don't think someone should be leader head of government just because they were born into the right family at the right time.
Yeah, I've been following the passage of that Bill, and I fully it to either be drop-kicked back to the commons or stopped by the lords, an incoming Gordon Brown will make sure of that to show that "he's committed open government" or some such. The reason I believe this is because the media will love it, and the bill is very unpopular in the country. He has every reason to kill the bill and look like a hero, and very little incentive to let it proceed, this time anyway.
Whilst we're coping American constitutions, can we add this clause from the constitution of new Hampshire (Thanks to Bill Bryson for pointing this one out to me in "notes from a big country")
[Art.] 10. [Right of Revolution.] Government being instituted for the common benefit, protection, and security, of the whole community, and not for the private interest or emolument of any one man, family, or class of men; therefore, whenever the ends of government are perverted, and public liberty manifestly endangered, and all other means of redress are ineffectual, the people may, and of right ought to reform the old, or establish a new government. The doctrine of nonresistance against arbitrary power, and oppression, is absurd, slavish, and destructive of the good and happiness of mankind. I'll be happy with anything else they put into it if the above clause is there too.
Puh-lease. The evidence is flawed, just like the rest of science. It's all made by man. In just the same way, religious texts were written by man. Indeed, in Christianity they even held councils to decide what texts should go into the bible and what should be left out. If, as you imply, things are flawed just because they are the work of man; then the Bible (and indeed other religious texts) fit right in
I much rather have a legal mechanism that requires them to tell me what data they have about me if I ask, and enables me to have it removed, then not Say what you like about privacy here in the UK, but we have the data protection act, which does exactly that (if I give them aproximate times and places, I can even make people trawl through CCTV footage and show me any pictures of me they have). And if I don't want info x to be on the database of company y, then I can tell them to remove it.
I missed the program, but I've had an unrelated reason to make a complaint about the BBC before, and did so via that site. It basically got ignored, you're probably better off complaining to Ofcom as it seems that the Beeb have violated section 5 of the Broadcasting code. Unfortunately, my complaint was about the BBC online, so that avenue wasn't open to me.
Oh, I agree with the principle of CRB checks, however as you say they are far from perfect. As I've never been caught breaking the law* I don't know what crimes they detail, or how far they go back. What about spent convictions etc. But the layout of the form seems to suggest that if I stole a packet of sweets as a teenager, it would follow me on a CRB for the rest of my life. Personally I think that's unfair.
The section that lets the local police constible put allegations to a perspective employer also worries me, people should be judged on what they've done, not what they might have done.
*AFAIK the worst I've ever done is put 22p of sweets in a 20p mix from the local corner shop when I was 12, or mabybe copying cassettes & CDs for my friends in my teens.
You could say this would be a major coup for whatever terrorist organisation pulls it off but it wouldn't be if you didn't let it and just shrugged your shoulders "So, you killed the president. So what ? Someone else is doing his job now". Bingo, you got it in one, that's exactly what our respnse should be to all terrorist attacks; over here we learned quickly that the best response to the IRA was to carry on about our bussiness, but just to remain a little more vigilant. Unfortuneately in the post 11/9/2001 world, our leaders seem to have forgotten that lesson, and instead are placing ever more draconaian and stupid "security meausures" in place to protect us from a vague threat that's extremely unlikely to affect 99% of the population even if the worst occoured. This is all the more puzzling as the provos (and now the dissidents) made Al Quiada look like amaturs.
but for 99% of the population there is no way such "checking" as fingerprinting, financial records, blood samples or anything else would ever be used, nor even contemplated, in case somebody decided to question the practices in court. Whilst this is mostly true, try getting a job in which you might come into contact with children or vunerable adults without submitting to a CRB check. You can't, to be blunt, the law requires that you have one. I know, I've had two within a few years of each other, and all they were for was working 1) in a library (admittedly primeraly as a children's library assistant) 2) in a college "Learning centre"; as they had some under 16s enrolled at the college, again an enhanced CRB check was needed.
Most people think CRB checks are a good thing, personally I think a clean CRB means that you just havn't been caught;p .
are people not to come to the USA because their fingerprints would be stored in the FBI computers? I don't know about immigrants, but I've decided not to travel to the USA on holiday untill they stop taking finger prints from holiday makers and other visitors.
I live in the UK, I've done nothing wrong so I object to being treated like a criminal just to enter your country. Sorry but various EU countries let me in with barely a glance at my passport, as do many countries in Asia. America has lost my tourist £££s. Your loss is Thailand, India, Spain and Italy's gain. I'm sure I'm not the only one. (though the weak dollar has meant lots of internet shopping in the USA recently;P )
Especially since the U.S. has threatened to invade if any of their citizens end up in the international court (which happens to be here). I'd like to see them try that. They wouldn't have a single ally left in the world; even my own government (British) wouldn't stand for an invasion of Holland by the USA; indeed I hope we'd fight alongside the Dutch army against any invasion, the French, German and almost every other European country would. World opinion aside, I doubt internal American opinion would let them invade another first world, free and democratic nation like Holland. Sure they'd want some heavy diplomatic pressure to be applied, but not even the most backward hillbilly redneck, would seriously think about actual invasion.
but then again I can't remember a school in England being shot up either. Wasn't the Dunblane Massacre the "reason" we banned guns in the first place (Yes, I know that's in Scotland, and not England; but until tomorrow's elections return an SNP government there it's still part of the UK). My personal (minority) opinion is that we over reacted to a one off incident by banning hand guns in the way we did, and gun ownership has done nothing but risen since. We should have put a decent licensing system in place instead.
No one knows the Queens position, she's apolitical (that's the whole point of the Monarchy, the're meant to stay out of Politics.) and dosn't articulate opinions on anything. In theory she still has a veto on legislation*, but I think you have to go back a couple of hundred years before you find a Monarch who used it. Should things get really bad, however, the Armed forces serve Queen and Country, not Government, so hopefully they'll be on our side when the revolution comes.
*In theory she can also sign treaties, declare war and a few other things. In reality though the Prime Minister does these on her behalf using something called the Royal Perogative. Wikipedia has a good article on the British Constitution, it's worth a read if you're intrested
Even if you did create a central list of links, nobody has that kind of time (and as we all know people wouldn't spend that much time even if they had it). As I pointed out in another post, we already have that "central list of links", and AFAIK no political party has yet claimed that it is biased in any way. The reason? They gather data on every single speech that evey politian makes, and then report on the way that they vote (and summerise if they are "for" or "against" a particular measure). The British Government also publishes Hansard online, and you can watch our polititians in action, live and unedited thanks to the BBC. The unbiased information is already out there, and I, for one, use it to help me decide my vote.
Then my issue is with the definition of child soldier; if an indivdual was able to vote, pay taxes, drive, drink, etc. at 16 intead of 18 why are they any more of a child soldier if they join the army? I suppose my question is more along the lines of "What makes somone a child"? It's certainly not age, or at least not age alone; I've met intelligent and mature 16 year olds; and dumb, immature adults are easy to find. Unfortunately, the UN doesn't seem to make that distinction. The British Army, however, does.
People are leagally responsible for just about everything else at 16, and are no longer considered minors by law. The only other things that they can't do are buy alcohol, age 18 for that, drive, age 17, or stand for Parliment, age 21.
Taking these facts into consideration, along with the fact that 16 is the school leaving age*, I think it would be simpler to bring all age limits down to 16 than to raise them all. That way could they even be considered children at all? Amnesty's "problem" would also be solved.
*If you can leave school and enter the workplace, the old, and very important, "no taxation without representation" argument also comes into play.
summaries of opinions and hyperlinks to voting records, speeches... If you are in the UK, then I think that this is what you're looking for: http://www.theyworkforyou.com/
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No, I think it's more complicated than that, as I understand it the world service still recieves FCO funding, however BBC world has to be self funding.
That's not quite true, You can own a TV, and just use it to watch DVDs and play on your Wii and not pay the licence. You only need to pay the licence if you intend to receive television broadcasts on your TV (even if they're not BBC broadcasts)
The article mentions three towns, two of which just so happen to be in Frank's district.
I wonder what odds the Mashpee Wampanoag tribe will give for their casino plans and Frank's push for legalizing online casinos being completely unrelated? Whilst I'm not American, it seems to me that if he's doing this to benefit his constituency, then he's just doing his job properly. After all we elect our representatives to do just that, represent us.
You didn't answer the question, why are you proud to be an American? What makes you proud of the random piece of land and associated documents you happen to live on. You are where you are now as a fluke; change any one of a million things in your history and you wouldn't be American. You'd be British or Swiss or Greek or Italian, and you'd probably be telling me how proud you are to be British or Swiss or Greek or Italian, and that would be equally nonsensical. As I tried to say before, by all means, be proud of things your country has done, even become proud of your country, but to be proud of your nationality is absurd.
I'm very proud to be an American.
Why? I'm a Brit, I see no reason to be proud of the fact that I happen to have been born on a small rock of the west coast of Europe. Why anyone would be proud of the place they were born by fluke of nature is beyond me.Don't get me wrong I'm proud of many things my country has done in it's thousand year history, but am I proud to be British by virtue of birth? No. That's as stupid as hereditary privilege (we still have a lot of that here, but we've got rid of the worst of it thank goodness); I assume you don't think someone should be leader head of government just because they were born into the right family at the right time.
Yeah, I've been following the passage of that Bill, and I fully it to either be drop-kicked back to the commons or stopped by the lords, an incoming Gordon Brown will make sure of that to show that "he's committed open government" or some such. The reason I believe this is because the media will love it, and the bill is very unpopular in the country. He has every reason to kill the bill and look like a hero, and very little incentive to let it proceed, this time anyway.
Oh, and vote Cthulhu; why accept the lesser evil?
In just the same way, religious texts were written by man. Indeed, in Christianity they even held councils to decide what texts should go into the bible and what should be left out. If, as you imply, things are flawed just because they are the work of man; then the Bible (and indeed other religious texts) fit right in
1) What is "the BT"?
there is no "the" BT stands for British TelecomI missed the program, but I've had an unrelated reason to make a complaint about the BBC before, and did so via that site. It basically got ignored, you're probably better off complaining to Ofcom as it seems that the Beeb have violated section 5 of the Broadcasting code. Unfortunately, my complaint was about the BBC online, so that avenue wasn't open to me.
Oh, I agree with the principle of CRB checks, however as you say they are far from perfect. As I've never been caught breaking the law* I don't know what crimes they detail, or how far they go back. What about spent convictions etc. But the layout of the form seems to suggest that if I stole a packet of sweets as a teenager, it would follow me on a CRB for the rest of my life. Personally I think that's unfair.
The section that lets the local police constible put allegations to a perspective employer also worries me, people should be judged on what they've done, not what they might have done.
*AFAIK the worst I've ever done is put 22p of sweets in a 20p mix from the local corner shop when I was 12, or mabybe copying cassettes & CDs for my friends in my teens.
Most people think CRB checks are a good thing, personally I think a clean CRB means that you just havn't been caught
I live in the UK, I've done nothing wrong so I object to being treated like a criminal just to enter your country. Sorry but various EU countries let me in with barely a glance at my passport, as do many countries in Asia. America has lost my tourist £££s. Your loss is Thailand, India, Spain and Italy's gain. I'm sure I'm not the only one. (though the weak dollar has meant lots of internet shopping in the USA recently
World opinion aside, I doubt internal American opinion would let them invade another first world, free and democratic nation like Holland. Sure they'd want some heavy diplomatic pressure to be applied, but not even the most backward hillbilly redneck, would seriously think about actual invasion.
Really? Then why are many of the centre right parties throughout Europe know as Christian Democrats?
No one knows the Queens position, she's apolitical (that's the whole point of the Monarchy, the're meant to stay out of Politics.) and dosn't articulate opinions on anything. In theory she still has a veto on legislation*, but I think you have to go back a couple of hundred years before you find a Monarch who used it. Should things get really bad, however, the Armed forces serve Queen and Country, not Government, so hopefully they'll be on our side when the revolution comes.
*In theory she can also sign treaties, declare war and a few other things. In reality though the Prime Minister does these on her behalf using something called the Royal Perogative. Wikipedia has a good article on the British Constitution, it's worth a read if you're intrested
Then my issue is with the definition of child soldier; if an indivdual was able to vote, pay taxes, drive, drink, etc. at 16 intead of 18 why are they any more of a child soldier if they join the army?
I suppose my question is more along the lines of "What makes somone a child"? It's certainly not age, or at least not age alone; I've met intelligent and mature 16 year olds; and dumb, immature adults are easy to find. Unfortunately, the UN doesn't seem to make that distinction. The British Army, however, does.
People are leagally responsible for just about everything else at 16, and are no longer considered minors by law. The only other things that they can't do are buy alcohol, age 18 for that, drive, age 17, or stand for Parliment, age 21.
Taking these facts into consideration, along with the fact that 16 is the school leaving age*, I think it would be simpler to bring all age limits down to 16 than to raise them all. That way could they even be considered children at all? Amnesty's "problem" would also be solved.
*If you can leave school and enter the workplace, the old, and very important, "no taxation without representation" argument also comes into play.