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JPSLotus79

Listed below are comments made by JPSLotus79 between Monday, 16th November 2009 and Tuesday, 24th November 2009.

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Introducing green cuts 12:08pm on 24 Nov 2009 When I was at school I can remember coming in one warm May morning to find the classroom sweltering because the radiators were running at full blast even though there was no need for them to be on. When we asked our teacher why the heating was on he replied that the school was given a heating allowance for the year and if they didn't use it all up it would be cut so they kept running the heating when it wasn't needed.

Surely this is wasteful in terms of CO2 emissions? Why not allow schools to carry over this allowance to the following year so they use it up when it would be most needed, i.e. autumn and winter?
Reasons to be careful 12:09pm on 23 Nov 2009 #3 Yes that's what I thought too. I think Mori have been very unlucky in that the random sample caught a disproportionately large number of Labour voters in this region and it's skewed the headline findings. Apparently at least 2 more polls are due this week so we should n't have too long to wait and see if this is a one off. Something else to bear in mind was that this poll was conducted immediately after the Glasgow NE result and it's publication is a bit late.

Something very noticeable was the way the BBC dropped it's editorial policy of not mentioning individual poll results on yesterday's evening news. The newsreader was almost ecstatic in crying "Tory poll lead shrinking!"

Impartial my ****!
Not living in caves 5:41pm on 22 Nov 2009 This was the sort of speech that David Trimble was making 8 or 9 years ago, I've been laughing at Peter bemoaning the "wilderness years" when Unionists were isolated and had no influence over direct rule minsters.

Errr Peter the reason why Unionism was in the wilderness was because of the rabble rousing tactics of the DUP in thwarting any attempt at agreement, (please refer to "Sunningdale" and "Ulster Workers Strike!"). Unionism would be in a much stronger position today if Paisley hadn't ellicted the support of loyalist paramilitaries to topple a democratically eleceted Executive that wouldn't have been as chaotic and dysfunctional as the current model! Also Unionism would only have had to deal with the SDLP and SF may never have been able to make the sort of gains it has over the last 15 years. It's incredible to think that Unionists once thought of Gerry Fitt and Austin Currie as the sort of bogeymen they now paint Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness to be!

Oh how they must rue the day when they toppled Sunningdale! The ultimate pyrrhic victory!!
Britain lands key EU foreign policy post 1:00pm on 20 Nov 2009 A regular theme in the comments above is about the EU's lack of accountability and transparency. That is endemic to the EU and is indeed one of the reasons why it came into being.

The 3 countries which were behind the creation of the Common Market in the 1950's were Germany, Italy and France, the first 2 had suffered huge damage in WW2 which had been caused by their fascist regimes while the French were experiencing the chaos of the Fourth Republic with weak and unstable governments which almost resulted in civil war over Algeria. This made the political classes in all 3 countries suspicious of the people and they resolved to create a technocratic, supra-national organization which would manipulate the governments of it's members so as to ensure that they would never again turn to extreme forces.

Accountability is therefore anathema in EU-land, the opinions of the people don't matter.
End confidential donations? 12:18pm on 18 Nov 2009 #6 Don't be so hard on yourself! There's so much to keep up with it's like drinking from a firehose!
Our Next First Minister 12:13pm on 18 Nov 2009 I think Alasdair is completely underestimating the scale and intensity of the hatred between the DUP and the UUP. If the CU's make significant gains off the DUP at the next Assembly election then I think they will want to make the DUP squirm over their short term politicking at St. Andrews which has opened the door to First Minister McGuinness.

The DUP raised merry hell over Reg's ill fated alliance with David Ervine to try and secure an extra Executive seat so I don't think they will be in any mood to rush to his aid.
Afghanistan ifs and maybes 1:27pm on 17 Nov 2009 The last thing Afghanistan needs is another pointless conference just so Gordon can flutter his eyelashes at Obama, we certainly need to spell it out to "The Mayor of Kabul" that if he doesn't root out his corrupt cronies we'll pull out causing the Taliban to regain control over Helmand and the surrounding provinces.

This whole war has lacked a coherrent strategy from day one. Afghanistan could have been in a much better state today if Cheney and Rumsfeld had given it the full commitment it needed after 2001 instead of simply viewing it as a warm up for the main event in Iraq. The Americans apparently blocked the reinstatement of the former King Zahir Shah who still had considerable loyalty in the country and instead imposed the corrupt and incompetent Karzai. We then had John Reid announcing at the start of the Helmand mission that he hoped the troops would come home without a shot being fired, while at the same time Gordon refused to increase the military budget to equip the troops preferring to spend the money on diversity co-ordinators and rubbish inspectors.

We're now at the stage where we are looking for the least worst rather than the best option. No more troops should be sent unless Karzai is prepared to agree to reform of the government and there is a timetable for the Afghans to take responsibility for their own security.
End confidential donations? 09:26am on 17 Nov 2009 Stormontspy,

The RPA?
Plotters, quitters and fighters 2:48pm on 16 Nov 2009 Nick sorry to be pedantic but wouldn't "Even an economic recovery won't help us, it didn't help John Major," not be a quitter's argument?

Looking at the polls it appears to me that 90% of the electorate has it's mind made up about what way it's going to vote. Glasgow NE is as untypical a constituency as you can find, Labour haven't faced serious opposition there since the 1930's and they needed time to set up a strong campaigning machine, they won't be able to do that across the board. While the Tories' headline poll figures have slipped slightly, the regional splits are still showing them with massive leads in the marginals rich Midlands. Labour is set for utter carnage in that part of the world on May 6th (172 days and counting!) any MP they have there with a majority less than 10,000 is likely to go.
Gerrymandering in Dunmurry? 10:15am on 16 Nov 2009 This is all reminiscent of the controversy over the building of Poleglass when Lisburn Council announced that they wouldn't provide refuse collection and other services and only backed down after the then Secretary of State threatened to send the councillors responsible the bill for the bin collection.

The whole RPA is just a sectarian carve up, under the plan, SF were to have 5 fiefdoms, the DUP 5 and Belfast was to be left 50/50. Unfortunately for the DUP the Boundary Commission haven't played ball and it could be that Nationalists will run NI's 2 biggest cities (oh what a gift for TUV!). This wouldn't have happened if the Commission had been able to create a Belfast City Council that took in the city's natural boundaries but of course that would have meant that Peter's little kingdom in Castlereagh would have been consigned to the dustbin of history where it belongs!

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