SleepyHead

For starters I'd stop using the term 'extremist' - it's only ever used by one group attempting to characterise another group as having views or behaviour the first group finds unacceptable for some reason, but as with most things (except the truly psychotic) the views and behaviour of such groups usually has a cause. Investigate the cause and you'll be nearer the solution.

Unless your knowledge of the past informs your plans for the future you'll just keep making the same mistakes as before. In a number of high-profile cases in the 70s and 80s we convicted a number of innocent people in for terrorist actions carried out. It turned out later that the government of the time, and the police, were perfectly happy to convict the innocent as long as they kept up the public front that 'something' was being done. But the government would never do anything like that again, would they?

And why is that?

If you're prepared to ignore the risk of getting run over, and the risk of dying in a terrorist attack is lower than this, then yes. Besides - we put up with marginal threats from home grown terrorists before - have y'all forgotten about Northern Ireland already?

Perhaps not, but if you're planning to reduce the number of deaths by non-natural causes then one could easily argue that the amount spent on anti-terrorist measure easily outweighs the benefits.

Of course this argument does rely on equivocation on the term 'representation': Politicians are supposed to represent your views, not necessarily be representative of the characteristics of the population at large.

Not in our 'ouse - I'm from Sheffield an t'missus is from Bolton.

Ignore him - 'ees talkin' bobar http://www.sheffield.gov.uk/index.asp?pgid=119113&addComment=yes&mtype=print http://pressreleases.eon-uk.com/blogs//eonukpressreleases/archive/2008/08/12/1268.aspx

Despite our differing views on Thatcher I'll drink to that. Politics is supposed to be representative of the population and if that were indeed the case women would only form about 20% of the population of the UK (source http://www.parliament.uk/directories/hciolists/gender.cfm). A quick glance at the interactive population pyramid (ooh, such a fancy name for 'population spreadsheet') tells us that in 2006 the total population of the UK was 60,587,349, comprising 29,905,286 males and 30,893,382 females. Besides gladdening my heart that I live in a country where the Beach Boys target of two girls to every boy is almost within reach, this shows that females made up just under 51% of the population - which by my calculations gives us a discrepancy in female political representation of about 31% (and a corresponding over-representation of males by about the same percentage). I can't bring myself to believe this is because all women find politics boring, or that they wouldn't jump at the chance to represent constituents, but then maybe I'm wrong?

And to those of you whose views are limited to Sheffield Forum I suggest you try looking outside your own city. Thatcher came 4th in this poll - behind Attlee, Churchill and Lloyd-George. I can't say I'm surprised to find Thatcher mentioned in the Times poll - people always seem to love strong characters whether or not their views border on the insane (Jeremy Clarkson, for example, creates similar religious-style division), but what I do find odd is that Thatcher and Attlee be mentioned in the same breath, what with Attlee being the person who introduced massive health and welfare reforms, and Thatcher being the person who seemed determined to remove them all again. I guess that's politics for you though - all swings and roundabouts.

Ah well, can't win 'em all eh?

Absolutely. It would persuade me that more business should set up in out-of-town where the rents are lower and people who want to get to work under their own steam without having to wait half their lives for public transport can get there without incurring punitive charges.

a) They want your daughter to shut up and repeat what she's told like a good little parrot; b) Questions of the kind your daughter asks are likely to cast doubts on exactly the same sorts of areas her teachers suffer from so instead of grasping the nettle and dealing with those doubts they'd rather ignore them. c) Perhaps the teachers don't have much faith and have realised that as a consequence any answers they give about faith are likely to sound rather unconvincing.

Here are 3 reasons why the BNP are idiots. 1) Nick Griffin claims his core ideology is "concern for the well-being of the English, Scottish, Welsh and Irish ethnic nations that compose the United Kingdom". (source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_National_Party). Meanwhile many scientists have virtually disavowed the idea of race as a social, rather than scientific construct (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Race_%28classification_of_human_beings%29 & sources). 2) The BNP "believes that the indigenous peoples of the entire British Isles, and their descendants overseas, form a single brotherhood of peoples, and is pledged therefore to adapt or create political, cultural, economic and military institutions with the aim of fostering the closest possible partnership between these peoples". (source: http://web.archive.org/web/20070629010001/http://www.bnp.org.uk/resources/constitution_8ed.pdf) All of which would be OK were it not for the fact that determining which peoples are indigenous to the British Isles is really quite difficult since they didn't have any written history and we've been invaded multiple occasions by a) the Romans; b) the Vikings; c) the Danes; d) the French. Not to mention which - recent DNA research has led some scientists to believe that ancestry of most British people lies in migrations of peoples out of Spain some 7,000 years ago. Which means the BNP believe they're defending your rights but are, in effect, defending the rights of the Spanish. 3) "Pensioners who have paid a lifetime of tax and National Insurance deserve to be able to live out their lives in peace and security without having to sell their homes to pay for nursing care. That's a BNP promise." (source - the BNP info pack http://www.bnp.org.uk/pdf_files/InfoPackWeb.zip). Unfortunately, observing that people deserve better doesn't constitute a promise, but the BNP don't appear to have noticed that before they published their info pack online.

About the same as the difference between Democrat and Republican.