Happy Face

Should have got led zep on.

The New York Times said: "With its hilariously quirky Olympic opening ceremony, a wild jumble of the celebratory and the fanciful; the conventional and the eccentric; and the frankly off-the-wall, Britain presented itself to the world Friday night as something it has often struggled to express even to itself: a nation secure in its own post-empire identity, whatever that actually is." The Washington Post stated: "If the opening ceremonies of the London Games sometimes seemed like the world's biggest inside joke, the message from Britain resonated loud and clear: We may not always be your cup of tea, but you know - and so often love -our culture nonetheless." For the Sydney Morning Herald it was "an unforgettable start". "Boyle's vivid and vibrant pageant set the tone for these Games and perhaps even a new direction for the Olympic movement. Rio has a hard act to follow, which won't deter it at all," it said. The Times of India called the ceremony "dazzling". It said: "London presented a vibrant picture of Great Britain's rich heritage and culture as a colourful opening ceremony marked the inauguration of the 30th Olympic Games." "Kaleidoscopic pageant sets London Games rolling," said the China Daily. "Britain's Queen Elizabeth declared the London Olympics open after playing a cameo role in a dizzying ceremony designed to highlight the grandeur and eccentricities of the nation that invented modern sport," it said.

Said on Twitter its no suprise the queen is so miserable, she must have seen McCartney more than anyone else alive.

Steven Taylor starts

Note the bell flying through the air toward that woman and her kids.

What a bell end.

It is like a finger, pointing to da moon.

The funny thing is that what you're arguing is like saying without the dinosaurs being involved our ecosystem cannot thrive. Double

One final graph for you CT as i leave work in 10 minutes.... Link The average Joe is bound to feel like the country is doing worse, because despite all the growth around them, the inflation, average house prices going through the roof, petrol etc. over the last 14 years the median wage has barely moved. Effectively the vast majority are a lot worse off. It's the only thing not to have grown with the economy....with dergulation, deunionisation, increased low skilled immigration etc. it only gets worse, that's what a government need to rectify.

You're waffling. I'm looking for facts. Back it up with numbers. They should be available if you're right. If they aren't then it's probably best to question your ideas.

See my previous post. It doesn't matter if we consume what we produce or if we trade consumables with other nations...as long as we produce and consume. Every graph I look at of the last few years suggests growth rather than decline. Interested where you got the impression of a declining economy....other than gut feeling cos it's harder to get a fare on Ocean Road on Thursday night

...and if it's all the non-export industries that are declining...why is GDP up 150% over 2 decades? Can you show me anything that indicates a declinining economy over the last few decades? Genuinely interested.

Well, no, single examples won't show up in an individual graph, but that's the point of a bigger picture. Production of horse shoes is probably way down on a century ago, we don't lament the decline of that industry among blacksmiths when we have new combustion engines to manufacture. So overall manufacturing is up at every level, as are service industries. That's not a decline.

How does your view of a decline tally with figure 7 here... http://www.bis.gov.uk/assets/biscore/international-trade-investment-and-development/docs/u/11-720-uk-trade-performance It shows that exports are up for manufacturing at every level of technology, doubled over the last 20 years. ? Figure 11 shows the exporting of services is up 4 times over 14 years too. In what way is that a decline?

Krugman et al have been telling everyone the Euro was dead for months...too good an opportunity to increase borrowing with the IMF and have their business friendly Laissez-faire agenda shoved down nations throats to pull the plug straight away though. Only once the big boys start to drop, then they'll tear it up and start again.

It's always the ones with issues that drop these pearls of wisdom.

Which countries with their own currency/bank are recovering more slowly than the UK? Labour and the tories have no plan B because they're getting along just fine, they're beholden to their paymasters (and I don't mean the public) but they do very well out of that, irrespective of how the rest of us do. They share power between them for a bit then join the boards of the companies they did favours for. It's you as a voter that needs a plan B, not those in power whose careers are going swimmingly. Rather than continuing to blindly shill for either of the major parties, you could support the occupy movement...who's number one priority is to remove the corporate influence from government, the more people that back them the more legitimacy they gain. Or you could not vote at all, don't validate a corrupt system.

http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-18990253 So he's not claiming to be the bloke, making it clear to anyone reading he is not the bloke, not saying anything libelous...and they're still gonna shop him for? Satire is deed.

It wasn't directed at the tories at all. As I (and you) inferred, New Labour are also steeped in corporate cronyism, and their fiscal policy at the last election was broadly identical. This is why your faith in Saint Dave and your bile towards Labour has been so confusing....unless it's other policies of the Tories that garner such keen support from you? The Western economies aren't necessarily declining any more. They're still not great but the US has been slowly, steadily improving. Someone might correct me, but I think the UK are performing worse than any other country with their own currency and centralised bank. 2 benefits which should have seen us much better able to manage the fallout of 2007 than the rest of Europe.

I made no reference whatsoever to either party. I think you're projecting your blatant party prejudice onto the argument. Your fervent Tory support of the last few years has been replaced by a willful ignorance of everything they've done wrong and a renewed enthusiasm for defeatism, because your faith has been so rudely blighted. Labour are just as guilty of doing favours to elites, of towing the line with market demands, the only difference is they did it during boom time, they kept spending when Keynes says the government SHOULD drop spending. Labours plans were very similar to the Tories....that being the case, what made you so vocal on insisting that the Tories should get in?

The reason they don't change it is nothing to do with losing face, but it's not the defeatist view you have of there not being a better way for the entire population either. They don't change it because it suits them and their multi millionaire/billionaire chums/donors down to the ground.

Ironically Wolfy's life is staged.

The deficit has been reduced by a quarter since 2009, but debt is still growing. Important to recognise the difference between the 2. Good overview at 15:40 here... http://www.bbc.co.uk...cs_of_cheating/ Most of the deficit reuction is supposed to come from recovery, not from cuts.

Has anyone said how much more will it cost to immunise 15,000,000 kids every year than to hospitalise 11,000? Genuine question.

The boy who cried Wolfy