Motorway driving in the fog

No, uniformed officers in patrol cars, sirens, flashing lights, twenty
minutes grilling at the side of the road, summons, court appearance,
incarceration, buggery in the showers. They'll learn. I reckon we need
Spelling Cameras on usenet, though.

 

I've been called far worse, sometimes deservedly so, sometimes not.

I suppose being from a provincial backwater, almost as far from London
as it's possible to be without leaving England and only having visited
the place on a few, limited occasions, leaves me feeling somewhat
disconnected from the city; I admit to a fairly limited, naïve
understanding of larger matters, perhaps partly as a result of the
above. London as a place has very little relevance to my daily life,
yet dominates it in ways I can't contemplate and occasionally feel
resentful towards. I empathise with the likes of Scottish and Welsh
nationalists, although I do understand that their causes are fairly
futile - "united we stand" has some truth to it. Seeing London get
things like funding for Crosslink etc, Olympic Games and such like
leaves a bitter taste for those of us who will get very little benefit
from anything like that, yet pay our taxes like everyone else. England
is very much a fragmented, disparate country.

 

Beats capital punishment...

 

i don't think this really has anything to do with london, it's just
about the interests of the powerful.

i mean, look at j2 of the m25. they've fucked it. completely. for months.
and for no reason whatsoever, apart from to make sure some lucrative
construction project funds got into the right hands. it wasn't broke,
and it didn't need fixing.

meanwhile, at j5, it's 10-mile tailbacks every day as usual, due to a
road layout that appears to be defective by design.

 

The whole of the UK floats on the tax revenues made inside the M25 Darren.
Scotland could be a successful statelet however the Socialist government
imposed by the population block in the Central Belt would ensure that it
never became so.
They would rather ally themselves with Castro, Chaves, Iraq, Palestinians
and the likes.

 

Think of it as a golden opportunity to show of your ever improving
filtering skills to thousands of jealous cagers, twice daily.

 

That's sort of what I object to, there is too much preference and
precedence given to a small part of the country - yes, there is a
significantly higher population in that part, but it's still not
everyone, is it? Just as Scotland (and Wales, and N.I.) should not be
governed exclusively from Westminster, perhaps the more outflung parts
of England should have greater autonomy, as the economic conditions
and demographics are (IMO) significantly different.

I think that the part of England in which I live has more in common
socially with Scotland than with the South East of England - this was
in fact part of Scotland several centuries ago. Maybe it's time for a
People's Republic of Northern England? Politically I consider
myself a liberal socialist, if such a thing can exist.

 

Sucking his keyboard for inspiration, DR typed:

John Prescott, bless 'im, thought the same, but shamefully the ungrateful
people of the North didn't agree.

Now *that's* an oxymoron.

 

It is called a social democrat and is very much the face of politics in
the uk as you see it on the telebox today and the sooner we can dispense
with it's gutless meanderings the sooner we can have good old fashioned
tub thumping confrontational politics from people who actually believe
in something other than securing a pension from westminster and as such
can only exist as a valid viewpoint in a political system that has lost
it's way.

Course if we did it and did dispense with the whole concept of social
democracy it would mean chucking away all the improvements we have made
in society including the stability what allows you to hold your views
without much serious challenge and then you would have to think
differently and have aims instead of opinions and wouldn't be able to be
a social democrat anymore and wouldn't have a valid viewpoint. So no
real change there then.

 

Perversely the middle and North of Scotland is farming oriented and farmers
who survive are by definition good business people. They understand the need
for untying bureaucracy, low tax rates, tax relief for new businesses, low
business rates etc etc.

 

1149-1157? Like, eight years, back in the 12th century? That was an
opportunistic land-grab while Stephen was distracted with a civil war in
England and various other troubles across the Channel. Culturally, it was
all peasantry up there.

The problem would be income - the North is an industrial wasteland. Apart
from the touristy bits, it's all empty warehouse and carpark zones. If
there was money around, the North would be trendy and hoaching with Her
Majesty's Middle Classes.

 

DR says...

Listen sunshine, Carlisle had it's chance at being the nation's capital
a long time ago and royally fucked it up, that's why they moved the
capital to civilisation.

--
Lozzo
Triumph Daytona 955i SE
Suzuki SV650 K3
Honda CBR600 F-W
Suzuki GSX-R750L
Yamaha SR250 SpazzTrakka

 

So who the ****'s buying all the houses? It's not salt-of-the-earth
working class Norvern Munkeys. Other than that, I can't argue with
you.

 

David Johnston says...

My ex-wife is from Carlisle, and she's a thieving bitch. I don't mind
the rest of the Cumbrians though.

--
Lozzo
Triumph Daytona 955i SE
Suzuki SV650 K3
Honda CBR600 F-W
Suzuki GSX-R750L
Yamaha SR250 SpazzTrakka

 

You wouldn't be happy with a regional tier of government. Just go to Rhyl
and talk to the residents there about regional government. You would still
be subject to a north south divide, except in this context the south would
be the M62 corridor.

 

Yes, but then they moved it from York to London.

 

For some reason I missed the post from David Johnston. I live in
Cumbria, Carlisle to be precise. There's a reason they put Calder
Hall/Windscale/Sellafield where they did, and that reason is that it's
about 350 miles from London. If the capital of England had been, for
example, Carlisle, the nuclear plant would have been somewhere on the
Kent coast, you can guarantee it.

 

So many answers...

 

Incomers. The autochthonous underclasses haven't the wherewithal to invest
in buy-to-let.

 

Nearest point to France. Good thinking.