pap

Can we please stop pretending that what David Cameron did was 'best for Britain'? He did what was best for himself, and Conservative party backers. Having said that, if a consequence of these events is that we get closer to a referendum, I'm onboard.

I like snooker. I blame my mum and dad for getting it on in 1974, thus rendering me ripe for the sport when it was in its heyday.

Coolness torch has well and truly been passed on. Listened to the new Florence + the Machine album after Juvenile Unit #1 played some in the car. Very good, although I'm not sure quite how to classify it.

It will probably save a lot of money on Kleenex removal and/or the laundering of soiled socks.

Our economy is dangerously weighted in the financial sector and is in dire need of diversification.

Was listening to Today on my way back from the school run. Apparently, David Cameron is making the protection of the City his top priority at the next summit. All this guff about repatriation of powers is exactly that. Pretty clear that a referendum is out too.

Sorry trousers. Wasn't thinking. I'll try not to let it happen again

The speed of light is far too limited. We need hyperspace or artificial wormholes. I refer SaintsWeb to Babylon 5 or Deep Space Nine for specifics.

And er, failed to write down

That's a pretty good rule, imo. There is virtually no competition on the railways, and for some people, the choice is "use the train or lose a job". Not saying that there is no overlap, but mostly, the train operating companies are subsidised monopolies that are raking above-inflation rises from an effectively captive market, year-on-year.

Well, the old geek boner perked up at this when I read the Beeb article, and had some of the same questions running through my head. Depends on what sort of life we find. Discovering microscopic organisms is one thing. Intelligent species like our own are something else. Both possibilities are profound, but the latter would be a game changer for self perception, especially if it challenged our assumptions about being at the top of the newly expanded natural order. Religion would survive the discovery of an extra-terrestrial microbe, but would have a much harder time in the intelligent life scenario. It wouldn't be the first time that religion has been trumped by science, but I feel that discovery of an intelligent species would shatter most religions, leaving only the most pious as believers.

Oh, and one more thing. While doing the research on this, found out that there are quite a few 4GB enablers out there for various PC games. Might be worth a google if you're playing anything else.

Unfortunately, it still runs through Steam - but I'm finding that less of a hassle ever since they introduced offline mode. The previous version of the 4GB patch used to modify the executable and circumvent Steam entirely, but Bethesda put the kibosh on that one pretty quickly and made Steam mandatory. The beauty of the new patch is that it's a separate program, doesn't touch the original and plays nice with Steam, meaning you get all your achievements, etc.

Answers:- 1) Go here. http://www.skyrimnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=1013 2) Dump it somewhere on your hard drive. Double-click Skyrim4GB.exe - it'll automatically locate your copy of Skyrim and launch it with the 4GB flag enabled. 3) If it causes you issues, just launch Skyrim as you normally would. All Skyrim4GB.exe does is set the 4GB flag before execution. Launching it from say, Steam, will implicitly launch the 2GB capped version. No real uninstallation as such. Just delete the files if you no longer wanna play in 4GB mode

Which is exactly the point that was made during Osborne's plan to squirt liquidity at SMEs. Seems to me that's a much more haphazard way of doing things. I would generally be in agreement with you. I like small government, and to be honest, if we did create a national corporation, wouldn't want them anywhere near it. It'd have to be in stable and experienced hands, not a numpty minister who only got the job because the last one had his hand in the till. That said, we've seen private industry at work post-globalisation, and it's not pretty. They have no interest in creating jobs here unless heavily subsidised to do so. Manufacturing has moved East on a massive scale, and that is largely due to cost and a company's bottom line.

True, but the roads are for general purpose use. Rail infrastructure is specifically tailored towards trains. Not really the same comparison.

Which I could definitely live with. Problem is that we have a lot of sectors to create in the national interest. The national interest at the moment is economic recovery. Now, would you be more amenable to say, a new British car company, if there was a solid plan to sell it off within 20 years?

Good post, solentstars. I agree. We need to start paying our way. We have resources on our doorstep that we can't use, farms lying fallow because private enterprise gets a nice whack not to farm them. We're moaning about the Tobin tax at the moment because it'll affect our precious financial services. Forgive me if I'm wrong, but it's financial services that got us into this mess in the first place. Problem is, it's no good ploughing money into a new industrial revolution if all the jobs are going to go to Eastern Europeans.

You could still have nice new shiny trains. They could even be on-time too. However, the railways really are an example of how some industries can't really be privatised. If the train operating companies had to pay for the upkeep of the lines, there is no way they'd turn a profit.

Yes, but the question you should really be asking is why does it cost 1200 Euros a month to keep la granny in care? I'm sure that other countries look after their grannies too, but at a much lower cost.

Recent events have made me consider the value of nationalised industries. We used to do this sort of thing all the time, with many of the companies that were formerly owned by the public doing pretty well. We've also got large gaps in our economy, especially in sectors like manufacturing. Ultimately, I don't believe that we can trust the private sector to create new jobs in these areas, yet we still need those jobs. Personally, I look at George Osborne's latest scheme, to pump money into banks who can then lend to businesses, and find it a bit of a non-starter. I'd much rather the Government established a new national corporation to build something ( cars would be a good example ). I appreciate that there are a load of factors at play here, but right now, we need industry to act in the country's interest, and industry is doing its usual trick of not giving much of a feck. You can lend all the money you want to SMEs, but at the end of the day, only customers will keep them going. What are your thoughts on nationalisation? Are there any particular industries that you feel that this sort of intervention is justified?

Well, taxation rates on business are part of the problem, but you'd have the same issues whether you were inside or outside the EU. The big issue you've raised - the relative competitiveness of EU economies when put up against say, China - isn't just about tax. All of our salaries are driven by the cost of living, which is still a ton higher here than it is in developing countries. That's money that people need to find every month. The only way we can compete with the likes of China and India is to stop pretending our houses are worth as much as they are. Chances?

Partially true, but the Chinese are already well in there - I'd see that trend continuing, more so if the Greeks are turfed out.

I hear similar accounts from all over the continent. Spain was ruined the day they joined the Euro. I remember going over in 1994 with very little money ( basically the proceeds of my then Asda job ) and living like a king on pesetas. Massively different under the Euro.

That's probably true, but do most normal people know the extent to which the EU is jamming up their lives? Let's take your example of jobs. Has the EU made it easier to get a job? Nope, the EU opened up the labour market to such an extent that there is no such thing as a British job anymore. There may be jobs which are based in the UK, but they're essentially open to all EU citizens. Now let's look at food. Well, the EU's common agricultural policy ( mandatory for anyone in the internal market ) has historically had the effect of raising food prices by placing high import tariffs on food from outside the EU. Interestingly, we can also tied the CAP into our energy companies, who benefit from CAP subsidies. The point I'm trying to make, and one that I think has been missed, is that the EU is responsible for a lot of the things that people worry about day-to-day, sometimes directly, sometimes indirectly. If people are worried about jobs and food prices, they should be worried about the EU.