Britbillsfan

Musharref would definitely want to catch him & the other high ranking leadership as would most in the military / police but there are serious problems in doing so where ever he might be (assuming he is in Pakistan, of course). After all Jihadists have made several attempts on Mussarref's life over the years and he has been active in trying to remove their support and power base within Pakistan. Firstly extreme Islamists in Pakistan's security services were the main backers of the Talebs in Afghanistan (also the various groups operating in India Kashmir), without the aid of them the country would have never fallen under the control of the extremists. Despite being able to remove a lot of these individuals from their positions Musharref will not have been able to do so completely - so there is definitely an element in the military that will be working aginst the efforts to catch the slimeballs in AQ that are hiding out in Pakistan. Secondly is a more cultural one. Pakistan's leadership would consider it a dishonour to their country if OBL was found there. They have constantly denied that he is in Pakistan and will do so up until he is found there. This mitigates against the president's desire to catch the AQ leadership since his government is simultaneously saying he can't catch them because they are not in Pakistan. Third - OBL's support is such that he is not going to be betrayed. Those that might have the knowledge are too hardcore to give up the information willingly, no matter what the rewards might be. OBL is a canny operator. Whilst in Afghanistan it was almost impossible for the CIA to get hold of him because not even his trusted bodyguards and drivers knew where he would be going and staying the next day and intelligence was always a little behind (sometimes by only a couple of hours). He has shown himself to be experienced at avoiding his enemies. There are other factors involved but I would say that overall the military would want to catch the man, Zawahiri, etc, but that their efforts are seriously hampered by all of the above. Some of the cities are hotbeds of fanaticism thanks largely to Zia so it is would be difficult in the best of circumstances.

AQ could pass on to one of OBL's sons as they are very active now in running the group (especially since so many top figures were lost in Afghanistan or arrested in Pakistan), and largely on the funding/money for operations side. I see Zarqari more as a field commander (which he does appear to be competant at) type rather than the organisation's commander in chief, Zawahiri could end up being the power behind the throne if one of OBL's brood does take his place at some point.

Immigration to the UK has been and still is a boon to this country, when it is looked at without the spin of rabble rousers and those seeking to gain from negative generalisations.

Le Pen is pretty much an old style nationalist / fascist charismatic leader. His platform is anti-non-whites (no, not just Muslims) up to and including ridding the law books of anti-racist legislation, anti-abortion (and he has doubts on contraception too), anti-gay (sidatoriums), anti-intellectual, and much more besides. He relies on whipping up the negative side of people by blaming problems in society on 'those who are not like us' when the problems in society have been there in myriad forms since year dot. VERY long tradition of this kind of politics in Europe and elsewhere (Jews, Romanies, Slavs, blacks, hispanics, barbarians, infidels, whomever) THAT makes him a bigot. If you can not see it then that is unfortunate.

Well since we in the UK opted out of the Euro we have still got our pennies and our pounds, so no need to change to the saying...... The European constitution has a lot more bits and pieces than what the Euro represents & that more people do not want, and it could mark a trend that the community will, at the least, slow down integration.

Le Pen is a bigoted scumbag, a vile individual. Mind you if he helps the French to go against the European constitution it will mean that I won't have to vote no when our referendum comes about as it will already be a dead issue. Even a bigoted scumbag can be right on occassion.

Is it possible TD did try to make a move on Witten but could not find anyone willing to do so? Once the first two rounds are over the coverage does drop quite a bit and these things do not always get reported.

OBL and Zawahiri (just a big a fish in the terrorist (cess)pool are difficult to locate as they have surrounded themselves with fanatical followers who would happily die to protect him. That kind of loyalty money can not sway. Whilst they may not be geniuses AQ is led by peolple with some smarts and they have gotten pretty good at covering their tracks (those that are not any good have gotten caught - Darwinism at work). They are also almost certainly hiding out in one of the major Pakistani cities by now, since that is where the other major AQ players have been caught since Afghanistan was removed as their base of operations. It is a lot easier to run a terrorist organisation from somewhere that at least has rudimentary access to the rest of the world (eg: media, telephones) than some backward hole in the ground somewhere. Having access to outside media has certainly helped OBL stay alive/avoid capture for this long.

The issue in Europe (well the UK at least) on the whole was that politicians get canned for their infidelity if they were seen to be hypocritical (ie: were droning on about 'family values' whilst having a bit on the side). For politicans not of this ilk the papers generally printed the story when it got into the public domain and then did an editorial, mostly along the lines of 'so what'. If they were British and acted in this way GWB (not saying he would, just trying to use an hypothetical example) would be hammered in the UK press, whilst Clinton would have been largely ignored after a week or so. Of course if you look at some of the gutter press we have all they are interested in reporting is mostly who is having sex with whom, so they will print endless rubbish but even in their case it is not as if they are treating politicians any differently than anyone else in the public eye. Oh, and these papers tend to be right wing, the printed press in the UK has a definite right wing bias. In France I believe the attitude is even more a case of 'so what', as the relevations about Mitterand were to show. As to the rest of Europe it varies enormously (after all there are real cultural differences between an Italian, a Greek and a Scandinavian) as to the attitudes towards wayward politicans.

Willis got picked because he was worth a number 2/3 pick overall if he had not been injured, the risk TD took was that if he could not get his knee back to strength it was a busted pick, but if he could you could be looking at having one of the best backs in the NFL for the decade (let alone just for a season or two). Whilst Travis is a good back no way could he be thought of as ever having a chance to achieve that kind of level of ability except through the most rose-tinted of glasses. TD was caned by a LOT of people over the pick as it was seen as not a need at the time. Travis had come off a very good year and the Bills were on the up and we draft a player a year away from playing, and probably another year from being able to play full out. Blaming Travis for the woeful defence of a few years back or the totally idiotic play calling from Gilbride after the opening game is bizarre. Mind you Travis can not pick up the blitz, is not a well rounded player, etc, etc - but Shelton for Travis is not a good trade - after all who else is really after Shelton. The lack of interest has a lot to do with there being a perceived glut of decent RBs at the moment (most teams are already set there) and Travis having only one year on his contract (not a problem for Arizona fortunately).

Probably will get the deal done with a conditional pick/swap of picks clause for next year. That way each side will know that they have got a solid deal.

[For what it's worth, Germany is the most successfull country for NFLE. There are several reasons for this, one of which is that in contrast to the UK, France, and Italy, I believe there is no professional rugy played there.] 295625[/snapback] Yep, there is a strong Rugby tradition in Britain, Ireland and France, and both Italy and Romania can field half way decent teams as well. But Rugby is not really 'global' (although compared to the US version it is), outside of the European teams Argentina, South Africa, Fiji, Australia, Samoa and New Zealand are the main proponents of the game. Japan has a solid tradition, but they are hardly major players, comparatively. Football (soccer) is the only real global team sport - it is played and supported in a majority of countries worldwide (there are a few exceptions, of course) and there is no other sport around at this point in time that has a snowball's chance of overtaking its position. No matter how much some of you lot hate that!

After all (US) football was derived from rugby football originally. The French have Rugby as well, and are very good at it. Rugby is a real wasteground of players now that it has turned professional, some top teams lose 50% of their players to injury in the course of a season. And the English national team has been stuffed from injury over the last couple of years. Ah, well, it was fun winning a real World Championship. A lot of the support in Germany is drawn from having a large contingent of Americans based there.Some go to the games, others will take along German friends to show them what the fuss is about. The placement of clubs has been an issue as well (in the UK London was a nice idea but given the way the support would have been scattered accross the country a more centralised location would have been better, especially as Londoners can be notoriously fickle in the next new thing).

Oil may be a big factor, and the Chinese regime has historically few scruples, BUT since none of AQ/Talebs/OBL actually have any, or real influence on those that have any, then an alliance of convenience would be rather pointless if oil was the object. The Chinese are mostly pragmatic when it comes with their dealings with the outside world, like most governments. They may be repugnant, but they are pragmatists. It would be a lot easier for the US to cut an oil pipeline permanently than AQ/OBL, so why piss off the FAR stronger of the two? As far as the Talebs are concerned, they are an internal looking group based on ancient tradition dressed in the clothing of Islam and nationalism. Part of that tradition was to protect muslims from non-muslims, which is why they were total fools with OBL (major cultural thing). They also have ZERO understanding of the wider world. They were a southern Afghan movement with little interest in anything beyond Afghanistan (and then only the Pastun areas of Pakistan and their Saudi backers), and they were an IMPROVEMENT on what went before in Afghanistan (very difficult to believe, but true). As such it is probably inevitable that a more 'moderate' faction will emerge that China (and everyone else) will pretty much have to deal with on some level.

I think it makes no sense that the Chinese could be hiding bin Laden. The Chinese have an aggressive policy of trying to wipe out anything that may form a basis of dissent to The Party (Islam, Christianity, Fulan Gong, democracy movement), and Islam is attacked probably worse than the other perceived threats since 9/11 (the activities of the Chinese in Moslem areas is diabolical). For al Qaeda to put its trust in the one regime in the world that is the most aggressive in its attempts to wipe out Islam within its borders makes no sense. Chinese policy in this regard has remained unchanged since the days of the Cultural Revolution (although the tactics used have altered) when dealing with perceived dissent. Also, in the grand scheme of things, al Qaeda itself is little more than an irritant on the world scene. It is a diverse grouping of extremists with little active support anywhere (although it is tolerated in some places) and whilst they do pose a danger and can cause carnage they are not that much of a threat to the stability of the west. The Chinese leadership has taken a longer term view in their policies and need western expertise to help them become a legitimate power on the global stage, to put this relationship at risk by hiding a deranged madman with no real power would be bizarre as there is nothing tangible to gain but an awful lot that could be lost. Neither of the articles quoted would be a great source IMO when it comes to China, India considers itself China's great regional rival and there is a lot of hatred towards China dating back to the 1962 war (and later border clashes) so an Indian source is not unbiased. The other piece is from a group specifically against the Chinese regime (something to applaud) and who's editorial stance is somewhat suspect. A lot of major AQ players have been caught/killed in Pakistan, and there is fairly high level of support there for them in some places (tribal areas and fanatics created by Zia-ul-Haq's dealings with the fundamentalists) so he is more likely to be there amongst fiercely loyal and heavily armed allies than in the dubious safety provided by the atheistic Chinese pseudo-communist government.

Pretty much all history was revisionist at some point. It is why it is not a science, as it is often a spin on the facts. Link is wrong on number of state sponsored deaths, though. The Marxist inspired regimes (none of them were really Marxist, but Marxism itself is an 'ideal' that could never be achievable in the real world) of the last century probably doubled the 95mil figure, Mao alone might have made that figure on his own with some of his policies (figures I have read have given the cost in lives in the famine caused by his 'Great Leap Forward' alone at somewhere around 20mil), there were (and are) an awful lot of Chinese in Gulags who perish in them, etc. However as far as the original post of the topic is concerned it is very annoying when incorrect 'facts' are posted about football and I agree that posters should ensure they know what they are writing about prior to posting. Please.

You are right. (He would have been hung at some later point after the second trial, as this is what happened historically, though).

I disagree

Carp are a fine delicacy if properly prepared. You would first have to get a live one and keep it in some good, clear water rather than the murky rubbish they prefer for about a week and then the muddy taste normally associated with them is gone, leaving a fine food fish behind.......hmmmmmm

Well thank you very much for burning that image into my mind.

This is based on a superb comic, and certainly looks as if it has got the feel right. Oh, and any movie with a gyrating Jessica Alba has got to be worth watching.......

The Jills would be screwed then.......

One of the few side effects of steroids that does not exist is causing a hole in the heart. So NO. Probably was born with it but because of the more extensive tests than usual that he would have been undergoing after his stroke it is probably the first time it has been picked up.

I could live with that.

Well, as far as the Moslem world is concerned most of it will never have heard of Theo Van Gogh, let alone be able to condone or condemn it. As bad as western media can be at least it does exist. And I doubt very many Muslims would 'support' Theo, he was a caustic character, although most would have been against his murder. No numbers but a brief snippet of info from here : http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/3978787.stm About 20,000 people attended a memorial gathering for the 47-year-old film maker in Amsterdam on Tuesday. Among them were many Muslims, to demonstrate that they condemned the killing.