Verbal

And how is Mrs Bowie these days?

Inside job then - a rating killing an officer. Life on subs sounds fun.

What?!

It's what's called in psychoanalytic circles 'second-paragraph blindness.' Which is why I guess you get banned all the time, because you don't do them. Write all your barbs in the second paragraph and no one will notice, I promise. None of the above is true.

I know. You're indiginous.

In the A330?

Link please. I'd love to know if this is true or an urban myth.

It's an historical anachronism. Islam isn't alone in frowning on interest. Christianity does it too. Check on Deuteronomy 23:19 for example: Thou shalt not lend upon interest to thy brother: interest of money, interest of victuals, interest of any thing that is lent upon interest. Judaism only allowed it for Israelites lending to non-Israelites, etc, etc. Christians, Muslims, Jews, and pretty much everyone else in the modern world deals with, profits and loses from interest every day of the week. The idea that Muslims alone continue to live in a way prescribed centuries ago is preposterous. VW's friend has obviously got a bad dose of fundamentalism.

Did you mean 'indigenous English'? Or did you mean what you've actually conveyed to them: 'illiterate English'?

Deeper meaning and deeper music. Slowed down fives times, it's a masterpiece. The schoolgirl warbling is a brilliant disguise. http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/musicblog/2011/mar/30/rebecca-black-paulstretch

That did make me laugh this morning - Dune's bedroom pin-up Cameron saying the world is all Britain's fault. Mea culpa writ stupid. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/david-cameron/8430899/David-Cameron-Britain-caused-many-of-the-worlds-problems.html

I travelled through the Swat Valley shortly before it was completely overrun by the Pakistani Taliban. Once they'd seized total control, the FIRST thing they did systematically was burn all the girls' schools. The boys' schools - many of them run as English schools - were turned overnight into madrassas. The money to run them came, of course, from Arab sources. However, the big point to make with all this, I think, is that these incursions by Arabs only began when Zia came to power in the late 70s. What has happened is not irreversible; far from it. But to let the medieval peninsula Arab potentates and the Taliban rampage through the Pakistan education system unchecked would be a disaster for all of us.

I've been to one place in particular where sustained investment in public education has made a big difference. In the mountains of Northern Pakistan, around the (very liberal) Hunza Valley, Saudi inroads have been rolled back by Ismaili funding of schooling. They started with girls only - but found that the suicide rate among the girls shot up, partly at least because after being so well educated they were still having to marry the same sullenly stupid and socially conservative men. So the Aga Khan people started a more universal education programme, and the effects on the region are marked. It's the one place in that part of the world where it's relatively safe to travel, whether as a local or a foreigner - and the impact on the region's culture is pretty obvious. The tragedy is that for all its natural and cultural beauty, no one seems to dare to there. On the other hand, I can tell you some pretty depressing stories of the awful consequences when Arab money rolls in - as it is increasingly now even in the large cities.

If we (and many others) don't, the Saudis will, and have. 7/7 was one of the outcomes of Saudi long-term funding of extremist madrassas, which have virtually replaced a collapsed public education system in many parts of Pakistan. So even in terms of self-interest it seems a good investment.

Nice tweezer work.

The answer can be found on a £5 note.

This has to qualify as one of the most thoughtless (in the literal sense) comments I've read in years - you've outduned dune, something I thought not possible. So your basic 'premise' - to use your funny terminology - is that those who cost the welfare state more should pay for it. In case you hadn't realised, that isn't then a welfare state at all - or any kind of recognisably civilised society. People protested because the tax was wrong. Thatcher u-turned on it - this same 'lady' who is 'not for turning' - because even in her ideological haze she could see it was a disaster. As for going on protest marches, I've been on a few. It is a democratic right, you know.

Welcome back despot.

Good question Nick. I'm going to quote this whenever these crackpots start off about their glass doughnuts.

In the 80s we had de-regulation (and de-mutualisation) - quite a different kind of competition. As things stand after the credit crunch, there are fewer, consolidated banks occupying a virtual monopoly in parts of the banking sector (especially in merchant and investment banking.) The absence of real competition has driven costs of borrowing ever higher, and economies like Britain's ever lower. Regulated competition to drive down costs, and the obscene bonuses that are now financed by lack of competition, is an economic priority that the banks, of course, would rather ignore.

No, I'm just not seeing it: saying 'butchers' and reading working folk newspapers. I have you down as Alex from the Torygraph.

I somehow can't see you saying 'butchers' in real life.

Really? You'd be quite a catch.

Do yawns count?

What people say and do in US politics are entirely different. It's called separation of powers...or pork-barrel politics, if you're a cynic/realist.