Wes Tender

The poor and needy unforunately often fall victim to the machinations of bad government, especially when the result is high inflation affecting their income from savings. And presumably, this current crisis is all the fault of those nasty bankers, unless you include the Government under the convenient umbrella of "etc". Do you include the Government as deserving of blame? It seems to me that you are trying to absolve them of blame, or at least to lessen it.

The Android's inspiration is Joseph Goebbels.

Yes, you're right. He was a man who had an aura of charisma about him and it is a shame that having arrived on the political centre stage, his presence there was not longer. Although I would never have voted for him, I do see that he would have commanded respect from his opponents. He very much calls to my memory Iain MacLeod. Interestingly though, in the modern political arena, it all seems to be style over substance, so I wonder how the two of them would have fared nowadays?

I must be growing old. How intimidating the buckled loafers must have seemed. When I was a lot younger, the thick yobs had shaven heads, safety pins piercing various parts of their faces and steel toe-capped Doc Martins. In fact, the look epitomised by Viv in The Young Ones.

Lord Duckhunter: View from the top And there have been really inspirational male Labour leaders haven't there? People like Foot, Kinnock and Brown. Blair was the only one that you could vaguely call inspirational. So your counter argument is rather weak and feeble too.

The thread should have died ages ago, but you know how these things go; it's like the assassination of Kennedy and the theories about the grassy knoll. In this case, our grassy knoll protagonist is Sad Old Git, who won't let it rest.

So the Toad's hopped it. Oh, deep joy. And I understand that it's rumoured that he might soon be taking Calamity with him too. But still, the Blue Few feel that they have a realistic chance of mounting a strong challenge for promotion back to the promised land. Provided that they can exit the CVA, avoid a points deduction, offload the overpaid dead weights like Ben Haim and get the kids to play decent winning football on a shoestring. It should be a doddle. Perhaps they can root out a couple of Dutch lower league people who specialise in that sort of thing.

Oh yes. I forgot about the Unions block votes. Do they still use that as part of the electoral college nowadays, or was that swept away with New Improved Labour?

I usually try to debate first. Sometimes there are some really stupid responses and I reserve the right to say so.

Theresa May. Home Secretary. One of the big three jobs in Government.

Just read that the Skates are holding up the signing of Grant as West Ham manager by their insistence that they also take on £40000 a week Tal Ben Haim too. The article states that the Skates were kindly waiving the compensation fee for Grant (which was probably not payable anyway, as they had breached his contract by not paying him) and that West Ham were confident that things could be sorted and that James would probably follow Grant there. So what would be the situation with them having two top class goalies? Who would warm the bench between Green and James? http://www.dailyexpress.co.uk/posts/view/176230/EXCLUSIVE-New-hitch-in-Avram-Grant-switch/ What a blithering idiot the Android is.

I agree with the thrust of your arguments. Of course they bought into us because there was a probability that with some astute investment, they could make a decent profit from us. It is reasonable also to suggest that there is an element of fun about an investment in this sort of area and also that it makes the Mali Group and Markus Liebherr and Cortese much higher profile in business circles if they succeed in getting us back to the Premiership. So naturally as businessmen, their motives were selfish and sceculative. One hopes that although they might have entered into it rather dispassionately and sanguinely, that it is getting into their blood, like it has for us fans. There are some encouraging signs of this already and I personally am very happy to hear Cortese talking about us as his baby and to hear anecdotal evidence that ML nods off in his armchair with a happy smile on his face following a good win that afternoon. Undoubtedly there will come a time when they decide to sell on the club, but I hope that it is a long time away. But I feel certain that it will be as a going concern, without debt and with good prospects for the times ahead. An extraordinary contrast to the situation that we found ourselves in just a year ago.

Cannot argue cogently, so has to resort to petty name calling.

And a squadron of pigs will fly across the evening sky to the tune of the Dambusters. Do the electorate really have such short memories? Why, there are still some on here who bear grudges against MT from between 13/30 years ago.

Whoever they elect it doesn't bother me. Out of spite, I hope that they elect somebody like Balls who has little charm, or failing that, some leftie would do nicely. Whoever it is, I hope for a long, long spell in the political wilderness for them. Why, next time around, if the Lib/Dems impress with their cooperation in this coalition, they might even knock Labour into third place next time. That would be good.

Quite why various other posters cannot get their heads around this concept, is beyond me. I can't see the reason for the b*tching from a small minority who seem to have forgotten quite quickly, that without the arrival of Markus Liebherr and Cortese, we would be nowhere near as well off as we are, possibly even having been liquidated. As for Stu and his assertion that ML might have seen us as a prospect for investment when he was trying to sell Cranes to the Docks, he has a febrile imagination and is anyway misguided, as that is not the business ML is invloved in. And if he is going to continue his line that Cortese had little to do with ML investing in us, perhaps he would be good enough to furnish us with the concrete evidence to back it up. Otherwise, he is just going to look stupid, when Cortese had already told us that he was the reason ML had become involved. If it is a toss up between believing Cortese or Stu, it really is no contest. In fact, I'd go as far as to say that I'm inclined towards the position that Stu's future credibility on almost any other matter takes a knock in my eyes because of his ridiculous position on this matter. Mind you, it could just be that Stu has either imbibed too much alcohol when he wrote that, or that he is on a wind-up. Either is a distinct possibility.

+3. A settled team like the ones Pardew puts out would have been much preferred. And it isn't as if Burley didn't have enough time to figure out his best team, or to address the defensive shortcomings. But ultimately, looking back on it all, what a shame that Best played in that second leg, instead of a better striker.

You've read the signs wrongly.

Totally crap keeper. Was he bribed to let it in?

I'm entirely comfortable with a chief executive that keeps a low profile and just gets on with it. If because we achieve success and return to the Premiership, I accept that prices will rise and that corporate hospitality will be increasingly important as a source of increased revenue and profit for the owner. That is to be expected and I don't begrudge ML seeing the fruits of his speculative investment in us. Regarding the plastics, yes, they will increase as we return to the top tier of British football, but I think that we are indeed fortunate to have such a solid base of support, an average gate of over 20,000 in the third division, a support that is better than three of the Premiership teams. If we get off to a flyer this coming season and are headed towards automatic promotion, we will undoubtedly see those attendance figures increase still further.

When did the penny finally drop?

Had a great belly-laugh reading this in The News just now. These delusional idiots who call themselves Journalists, are obviously too young, or couldn't be arsed to do their research, or else they would have known that there are probably two major FA Cup upsets that rank as greater than theirs, had they beat Chelski. These are Sunderland against Leeds, (having also defeated Man City and Arsenal on the way) and Southampton against Manchester United. Many would say that Wimbledon's victory against Liverpool rates right up there, but Wimbledon were only a few places below Liverpool in the top flight when they did it, whereas both Sunderland and us we in the second division at the time. Although the Skates might have been at the opposite end of the table to Chelski, IMO the gap was wider between Sunderland and Revie's Leeds and us and Docherty's United, as both Sunderland and us were second division teams. And even in relative terms, allowing for inflation, the Skates team has to have been far costlier than the one that we had when we beat United.

Agreed that he didn't do badly in that game, but one swallow doesn't make a summer. But he is bound to be the prime candidate for getting the bird on here, as he doesn't fill the criteria of quality player and one hopes that the new signings during the Summer will make it unlikely that he will play, except under exceptional circumstances of injury or bans to others.

OK. Wotton. If he plays. Because he does not fill the criteria of quality player.

:smt081