pap

Same. The matter remains unresolved. The essential concerns are as follows:- a) Everyone currently on my friends list is someone I've met in real life. I like that clean separation. b) Unsure of Glasgow's motives

Thatcher is being assessed on her record more than anything else. I think so far, we've had around four or five points on that list challenged. I'm certainly not unreceptive to some of the ideas on here from her supporters. I can grudgingly accept that we needed a change of government back then, just as I accept that we probably needed a change in government in 2010. What I can't accept is that all of the damage she did was necessary. The right love to talk about Gordon Brown selling the gold reserves. It implies that the Conservatives were economically competent because there was gold in the bank to start with to spend with. It's a deeply flawed assumption. If I sold all of my assets, I'd be richer for awhile too - but then, I wouldn't have the assets anymore - and wouldn't be able to use them. Is that me being economically competent or making a short term decision that'll get me some short term cash massive feck me up in the future?

Blimey trousers. This story won't amuse you. I met Deggsy in a professional context years ago. I worked for his son's firm for a bit just before I went to NI. He'd turn up in his flash motor (I think it was a brand new Merc, if memory serves), with as much effort lavished on his personal appearance as I'd see any scouse girl make. Designer gear head-to-toe. At around the same time, I was attending demos in London - and as a consequence, ran into many people actually on the hard left. They did not look like Deggsy.

Churchill was more concerned with Stalin than the welfare state. Besides, I'll take your "respected historical figure says something you agree with" and raise you to a "we're all being f**ked".

I think that if you have to invoke Derek Hatton to prove your point you're on a loser. I met him in 2007. He really didn't strike me as a militant left-winger.

Adams stepped down from his Westminster MP post (not that he did much) and ran for and was returned as a TD for Louth. They've been making concerted efforts over the last few years to make political headway in the Republic. Last election, they pulled just under 10% of the vote and 8.4% of the seats. That doesn't sound like much, but their numbers are going up each time (they shot up after the GFA) and Ireland uses STV as its voting system for the lower Dail. This means that unlike a protest party in the UK, they've got much more chance of getting seats, much more chance of being part of a coalition, and therefore much more chance of influence. They're into the South in a big way. At present, I think historical suspicion is keeping voters away from them.

I asked the same question to my landlady - "what are the real politics of Sinn Fein?". While acknowledging their Marxist past, these days, she reckons they're a bunch of opportunist buggers. They're implementing cuts in the North while campaigning against them in the South. Mind you, she is SDLP, and is miffed that after all the work that the SDLP and UUP did in promoting the peace process, the population went for the extremists when it came to electing their representatives in Stormont.

Yeah, and that's an attitude that got worse as time went on. Don't get me wrong. I was only half-serious when making my point, but it's always someone else's fault and always someone else's problem. Applies just as much to my generation as it did to yours.

Nope, but it is effective. You want less condescension? Try giving me less ammo.

Attempt to obfuscate point duly noted Also, if you're going to throw the "if you were around..." argument about, doesn't that open your generation up for some severe criticism? You were the people who let it get that bad, after all

The fact that I lived in NI doesn't automatically make me right, I agree. However, it's not like this is all I have to say on the matter. So far, I've covered discrimination, Bloody Sunday, state collusion in paramilitary murders and all kinds of other specifics about NI. If all I had to say was "I lived in NI. Feck off", you might have a point. I said more, so you don't.

I'll give you credit Kelv, you climb down on a point when evidence shows otherwise. I say that not to "beat you", but as a sign of respect. Yeah, EDF are incredibly successful, but £1.6 billion UK profit propping up France's balance sheet really sticks in my craw. If the French can do it, there's no reason why we should not be able to. Thanks to Thatcher's policy, we are subsidising France.

Same here.

I know, and I didn't mean to imply that the left are the polar opposite of that. However, it's much more prevalent on the right, essentially 'cos they're out of ideas.

Mate, I can well accept that you may have simply forgotten to mention other reasons when writing the above, but I think this is pretty cut and dried. What are your thoughts on EDF, post the "they're incredibly f**king successful" revelation?

So did your 10,00 (?) document skip over the massive discrimination of the 1960s? You asserted that Adams did what he did for historical reasons. That's not the case at all. To say so seems clueless to me. In terms of what makes me more qualified than you? I lived in NI for 3 years. My landlady was an SDLP councillor who was active in the NI civil rights movement in the 1960s to the situation today. I've had numerous chats with her and several other people from both sides of the community. Ok, it's not a GCSE or nowt. Some might think it counts for something.

Again, Kelv - you really don't know what you're talking about. Adam's actions were of course, partially motivated by history - but his main motivation would have been the ongoing discrimination faced by the Catholic community at the time. No access to housing or jobs. People living in caravans with no access to utilities. There was in fact, a burgeoning civil rights movement in NI in the mid to late 1960s. Might have actually worked, but then Bloody Sunday happened.

Our Conservative brothers have explained it all, Horley. Gerry Adams is evil. End of. Just like the UK wide riots were nothing but simple criminality.

Your problem is typical of many who share your political leanings. No real convictions of your own, no real background knowledge, no real attempt to qualify your argument and most of all, a complete lack of empathy with the situation of others.

Don't judge him. He's not thinking.

Must be really easy to pick cherries from your high horse.

I've made my points about accountability, responsibility and Thatcher's singularly controlling presence as PM. I've also asked the counter-question, give me a PM that had more personal power than Thatcher. That'll be a hard one to answer. So no, we cannot say that every decision was her own, or even that she floated the most despicable ones ( she bounced back this one from Geoffrey Howe http://www.politics.co.uk/news/2011/12/30/revealed-thatcher-s-plan-to-abandon-liverpool ). She is, however, accountable - and due to her personal convictions, perhaps more so than any other modern PM.

Three letters. EDF Nationalised energy company of France. Largest utility company in the world. £1.6 billion in profit last year in UK alone. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2102185/Energy-giant-EDF-announces-big-jump-profits-1-6bn-despite-drop-gas-electricity-use.html Basic research, Kelv.

Giving NA the benefit of the doubt for now, but I do wonder the same thing.

Mike Dean reffed the game last night. He's the one that looks like Jasper Carrott. He sent Kompany off (card rescinded by FA). Strikes me as strict and someone who falls easily for simulation.