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Dunhoping

Listed below are comments made by Dunhoping between Tuesday, 9th September 2008 and Wednesday, 26th November 2008.

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Into battle on tax 00:21am on 26 Nov 2008 #9 regarding what issues you would not like to see your tax spent on

As an English taxpayer, I would like to sever the links that mean that an unfair proportion of my tax goes on subsidising the Scots. It is amusing to note that after the Scottish banks nearly went to the wall and have had to be bailed out by those south of the border, the usual baying for independence from those north of it has suddenly diminished.

I agree with you on one point though - please vote SNP and get this dead weight off England's back at a time when we can't carry any more charity cases.
Crunch: A new phase 10:44am on 13 Nov 2008 Gosh how depressing :(

Is there any good news out there?

Robert, please find a golden nugget of hope in the mire and write about that tomorrow just so I can face the weekend!

Thank you.
'Addicted' to Warcraft? 10:35am on 13 Nov 2008 I don't think I fit the profile of the usual World of Warcraft (WoW) player, but I thought my own experiences might be helpful - I have seen both the bad and good sides of WoW.

I am a married dad of two teenagers, with a full-time high pressure job as a lawyer. In early 2005, I had to have a serious operation which meant I had a month at home laid-up in recovering. I was so bored I asked my wife to get me a PC game so I would have something to do - she chose WoW (the original) much to her lasting regret! I was hooked by the end of the month. Before I go any further, I do not and never have watched TV in the evenings - that is another timesink in itself.

I think I have experienced four stages to the game, only one of which was really dangerous in my view. They are as follows:

1. Levelling the first character to level 60/70(the previous maximum levels). This was huge fun - I made loads of mistakes, but it was fun exploring the game world, dabbling with guilds etc. I faced no time pressure to do things and could play the game at my own pace.

2. Getting to maximum level and joining a "raiding guild". These are large groups of players who team up as raid groups of up to 40 (now reduced to 25) to tackle the tougher dungeons in WoW. This is the dangerous part of WoW so far as addiction is concerned. Flushed with success at reaching maximum level, I was flattered to be invited into a top guild, aiming at raiding on a regular basis. As a dad and husband with a full-time job, I fooled myself into thinking I could do this. The guild initially asked for four nights raiding per week (I negotiated a limit of two), but that was then increased. I neglected my family and was bad-tempered, rushing home from work to be on-line prompt for the raid and snapping at the children. I ended up at the same time slipping behind in the guild and really ticking my family off - and the pressure became too much, so I quit the guild. I did not want the game to impinge on my family life (it never affected work strangely - I never missed work or left work early for WoW - it was family time that I sacrificed rather than work time).

3. I considered deleting the game. What stopped me was hooking up again with a group of "casuals" I had met earlier in the game - dads/mums (yes I have encountered many women who play WoW) in exactly my position - we all faced the same pressures and had decided to opt out of the endgame raiding culture. We would still play at set times - Sunday mornings and maybe one night a week - but there was no "penalty etc" for not turning up "on-line" as there had been in the raiding guilds. We use Skype when we play and we have a laugh. This is the social side of WoW, which can be great fun.

4. As time went on, I levelled up more characters - basically, repeating stage 1 with different classes of characters. Again, there was no time pressure - I could play at my own pace. The difference this time was that all the other dads etc in my casual guild levelled up other characters at the same time, at the same leisurely pace, so we could do quests etc together if we wanted to.

So in summary, stages 1, 3 and 4 have been great fun. Yes, at times my wife does moan, but my son and daughter both now play in the same casual guild and we have a better life balance.

Beware though if you or your loved ones get sucked too far into endgame raiding (stage 2 in my own example). I found that many of the raiders in my guild were complete addicts, either long-term unemployed or students and even those who had given up their jobs and whose marriages had broken up due to the game. A huge number were kids - teenagers who were obviously neglecting their studies. They were "hardcore" - always on-line and always raiding. I found first that I could not compete with them due to lack of time, and then that I did not wish to. My wife gets most of the credit for knocking sense into me.

So if your wife/husband/partner gets hooked on the game, you must not pander to their addiction. Any evening they spend on WoW should be balanced by an evening spent with you/family doing other things. In other words, suggest that they "earn" their WoW time rather than have it as of right. And never allow your kids to have a PC in their bedroom is my advice - many of those kids who were playing all night were doing so in their bedrooms without their parents' knowledge.

I hope the above experience is of interest. In short I have had the game for nearly 3 and a half years. I play less often than I used to but with increased enjoyment when I do. I am really looking forward to exploring the expansion. People just need to enjoy the game, like all good things, in moderation.
Problem for the Tories 4:19pm on 12 Nov 2008 Mr. Robinson,

I endorse some of the comments made above to the effect that you are now so accommodating to the Labour party that it is difficult to see how you can maintain a position with the (supposedly) apolitical and independent BBC.

How you can look at events of the last few days and the Gordon Brown performance at PMQs today and conclude that these add up to a problem for the Tories beggars belief.

The problems are:

1. Gordon has left the country in such a state that is singularly ill-equipped to deal with a world recession. He can blame the rest of the world for the recession but he can't blame anyone else for the fact that the UK was broke when the recession hit.

2. Gordon's solution to the fine mess he's got is into is to give tax cuts (funded by further borrowing) to encourage spending, at a time when the rest of us have realised what prudence actually is and are starting to tighten our belts.

3. Gordon's performance today at PMQ's was shocking and showed just how out-of-touch he is, not just with the electorate but with humanity as a whole. David Cameron (and I am not a Tory by the way) was (in my view) just highlighting the sickening scandal whereby a local authority that messes up on a huge scale, allowing the murders of two small children, was to be allowed to conduct its own internal review.

I saw nothing political in Cameron asking for an urgent independent inquiry, which is clearly the right step. Only Gordon saw this as a political gambit, completely missing the fact that a child was dead because someone had messed up badly and needed to be brought to book fast.

We need an election and we need it now. And Mr. Robinson, you need a new job more suited to your talents and political leanings. How about GB's campaign manager when he is forced to the polls?
The Corfu story 10:53am on 21 Oct 2008 Dear Mr. Robinson,

I have been reading your blog for some months now and have generally found it to be insightful.

However, I am disturbed by the anti-Tory bias which has been becoming more and more evident in your blog. You are claiming that for Osborne to question Mandelson's business links is reprehensible; what is sickening here is that Mandelson and his cronies at the BBC are not denying such links but are saying that the Tories are not in a position to question him given that they themselves had discussed funding.

In other words, they're probably both as bad as each other, except that Mandelson has got away with this sort of thing so often and Osborne was clumsy in his approach. So why then do you come down on Mandelson's side and let him off whilst criticising the Tories?

If you wish to issue pro-Labour propaganda, please refrain from doing it under the BBC's banner.
Back to the future again 11:27am on 03 Oct 2008 I am deeply dismayed by his appointment. All I can think of is that Gordon knows that the nation hate him, so he's taking his revenge by appointing even more people the nation hates. Gordon is really just taking the mickey now :(

Has dear Peter had any prior experience of business? And is there really no-one else that Gordon could have called on?

Mandelson used to hoover up all the freebies going when he was a Member of Parliament - no doubt he'll do the same in his new role.

Desperate, Gordon, really desperate.
Gone 5:38pm on 16 Sep 2008 Who cares whether this non-entity of a "minister" stays or goes? I am sick of Labour's petty internal squabblings at a time when they really should have other things on their minds.

The world is in economic chaos and the UK (and other countries) need strong leadership to weather the storm and to try to rebuild when the storm abates.

Instead, Labour fights among itself and is ignoring the interests of the country and its people. Gordon Brown and his sorry band are obsessed with clinging on to power. Gordon is hoping that if he hides in his bunker for long enough, we will all go away.

I just wish we could wall up the bunker from the outside .....
Class war or not? 1:13pm on 10 Sep 2008 This is a very tired Labour party. A National Equality Panel - great, another quango to pay for just as the nation starts running out of money.

I'm not a particular fan of Teresa May but I think she got it mostly right when she said the following:

"I ... find it surprising that she (Harriet Harman) should raise issues of social equality when she's part of a government that has been in power for over 11 years, presiding over a 900,000 growth in the number of people living in severe poverty and over a country that has the lowest social mobility in the developed world.

"Labour has made poverty more entrenched and returning to the class warfare rhetoric of 20 years ago is neither helpful nor realistic."

In my own view, the Labour Party have actually managed in the last eleven years to create, in ascending order of wealth

(i) a working underclass that is actually poverty-stricken
(ii) a large benefit-sustained, inactive element that is now economically better off than most of those who work
(iii) the working middle-classes, who are being hammered into submission by rising taxes and prices and over-regulation
(iv) the rich who are either exempt from or indifferent to taxation or regulation.

So yes, in an odd way Labour have helped social mobility - they have helped the economically inactive, benefit-sustained element of society (i) to vault those in the working-classes who actually do work, and (ii) to overtake Labour's much-hated middle classes, in terms of money to spare.

Labour, please let someone else have a go before it is too late.
Shock news 4:31pm on 09 Sep 2008 I endorse the pithy comment at #3.

The country is experiencing serious economic decline in a very uncertain world and we need strong leadership to rescue the UK. Confidence in the UK and the £ is evaporating with each fresh clanger from GB and his Darling.

Forget Gordon or Labour's woes - regardless of politics, we are all in the same boat which is sinking fast and so someone somewhere needs to wrest the controls from this inept captain before it is too late for the country, let alone the Labour Party.

Sorry Gordon - you had a go and you just aren't up to it. Please just accept it and return to your manse, and give us a chance at the polls to elect the person we think can save us.

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