aa2900

There will also soon be another fracture in the EU. At some point the negotiators who are telling the UK we can't have free access to the single market will be having to explain to millions of their citizens why they are losing their jobs because they no longer have free access to sell in the UK.

I'm not sure that is actually true or that we should read anything into it even if it was. Bernie certainly bought the circuit in 1997 and spent millions on it to bring it up to international standards. It hasn't hosted a grand prix since. More to the point the circuit was in the name ofThe Bambino Trust which was owned by Bernie's wife who is now no longer his wife. So I'm not sure that Bernie stands to make anything from allocating the race other than what he gets already.

Although rather less than they had a month ago. It seems the farce with the aircraft carrier rather backfired. The smoking heap of junk that sailed through The Straits of Dover probably did so because it wasn't fit to go out into open water, rather than as an act of strength. It is always escourted by tugs for when it breaks down and apparently now only has 12 working toilets for the 2000 crew due to frozen and corroded pipes. It is the same age as the UK carrier which today is sailing to the scrap yard. But the biggest problem is there are no working catapults and the arrester gear rarely works. It took 15 aircraft to the Med and 2 were lost over the side last month when the arresters failed. The remaining aircraft have been flown to land bases. It's not what you expect from a public display of the navy's flagship.

I'm not sure whether the Italians would vote to leave the Euro either. However they are very likely to elect a government who would, and as Italian bond yields continue to rise so does the pressure on the government to do something radical with the currency. I'm not sure that the Eurozone can afford a Greek style bale out with a country the size of Italy.

The big problem for the EU is that Italy may well vote to leave the Euro. Their bond rates are going up and there is real pressure on Italian finances they may leave the Euro to survive. It could lead to Italy leaving the EU and it wouldn't take much for Netherlands to follow suit.

That's good news. We always enjoyed Le Castellet and in particular nipping down to the Riviera after the sessions.

Yes I could see how that would be a game changer. Do they do that a lot round your way?

So what stops someone else reopening the shale gas production. Actually I'd not heard of all these shale gas producers going bust in the first place, but I'm sure you can back up that claim.

Isn't that pretty much what the Ludites were saying when the power loom came along? They couldn't imagine anyone owning more than one set of clothes. So bring on robots and automation. If it brings down prices folk will be able to afford more. It's generally called improving the standard of living, which is what most folk would like.

I really couldn't give a toss what impact it will have on your life. But it will have an impact and to think otherwise probably explains why you are asking for folk to use words of no more than 2 syllables

That's cool. If you don't think that the collapse of the Euro, the disintegration of the EU or Donald Trump taking over the White House will affect your life, you have achieved your ambition of arriving in lala land already.

But in the meantime a couple of countries could ditch the single currency and the Euro could collapse, and a couple of countries could follow Britain out of the EU and the EU could collapse.

But surely on the flip side Labour have Jeremy Corbyn.

But he did transform the political landscape with just one MP. UKIP got what they wanted which is Brexit and Farage has been shortlisted for Time Magazine's "Person of the Year". I think Farage will be pretty content with his lot.

It seems that Nigel has admirers beyond Donald Trump. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-38217040

On the plus side Thwaites seem to have worked out that their future isn't about a huge brewery brewing thousands of gallons of the same bland rubbish everyday. They have built a small brewery and brew small batches of the interesting stuff whilst letting Marstons get on with brewing mediocrity. http://www.thwaites.co.uk/brewery-and-our-beers/our-beers/ I'm assuming that Marston's brew the first two. ---------- Post added 05-12-2016 at 16:12 ---------- Yes still available as of late last week. A joy in the glass.

Thwaites was not sold to Marstons. Thwaites still exists as an independent brewery and pub estate. They sold off the old brewery and several of their leading brand names and even get Marstons to brew some beers for the Thwaites pubs, but Thwaites still operate a much smaller brewery and produce a range of "craft beers". Unfortunately it isn't always possible to work out which is which.

I think in the next decade it will be irrelevant. The auto performance difference is a thing of the past and a myth from the old 3 speed autos. Infact you would need to be pretty brutal with most manual boxes these days to outpace the auto version. My current car has an 8 speed and isn't available as a manual. Many manual boxes are now paddle shift which I presume could be driven on an auto licence anyhow. The old clutch on the floor and a gear lever will soon be history pretty much like happened in the US decades ago.

Its hard to know what Thwaites are doing these days. Most of Thwaites beers are contract brewed by Marstons and Marstons are allowed to use the Thwaites name on several "brand name" beers that were bought from Thwaites. Stones hand pulled ale is no longer made. The canned and keg beers have no resemblence to draught Stones anyhow. They are still sold but the only things for sure is they aren't brewed in Sheffield and aren't very nice.

It is pretty easy to know. We know the population and know that the population of what was The Warsaw Pact has more than halved. We know how much steel they produce and satellites report on arms factories. You can't hide an aircraft carrier an aircraft factory or a division of tanks. We know what they have and pretty much what it can do. We encountered Russian tanks in Iraq and they weren't much good. So it is only the latest stuff that is unknown, but they haven't got much that is modern. Even their only aircraft carrier is 30 years old and makes more smoke than a black cab. There is a lot of bluff and sabre rattling but there is one inescapable fact. If Putin were to attack the west he would lose so much hardware in the first few hours that the republics that didn't get their freedom would have the firepower to try to gain it by force of arms. The reslt would be pretty much like Syria is now.

I keep hearing about Russia as a military threat to the west, but I wonder if in reality that is the case. Harking back to the late 1970s the Warsaw pact countries had a population approaching 400 million. They were largely totalitarian states that spent large parts of their GDP on arms. They faced the west across the Iron Curtain where countries spent large amounts to deter that threat. But then the Soviet Union collapsed and countries like Poland, Albania, Rumania, Hungary and Czechoslovakia effectively changed sides. Soviet republics also left the pact and either joined NATO or remained hostile to Russia. What is left is a Russia with a population of under 150, 000,000 & less than half the manpower of the Warsaw Pact Countries whilst the NATO Alliance has been boosted by something approaching 150,000,000 people. Nuclear disarmers would have us believe that nuclear weapons are of no use. If so how does Russia with its 1 aircraft carrier and conscript army pose a threat to the west?

On the contrary it must be easier to be in a front running teams as there are less cars to avoid at the first corner. Wehrlein won the DTM for Mercedes and has spent 3 years as Mercedes F1 test driver including 2 years as their reserve driver. He was contracted out to Manor (along with a supply of Mercedes engines and drivetrains) to gain the experience of competing in F1 whilst still testing for Mercedes, so he knows Mercedes personel and procedures and their 2017 car. I recall Keke Rosberg scoring nil point for Fittipaldi in 1981 and then getting the call from Williams at the last minute when Reuterman stepped down. Rosberg won the title that season.

Hey if you want to bet 5 grand on them all being wrong and Corbyn being our next prime minister you go ahead! I think you could risk 5 grand and come out with a mill.

The obvious candidate is Pascal Wehrlein. He is part of Mercedes young driver program and contracted out by Mercedes to gain experience driving for Manor. It just goes to show that the contingency plans are worthwhile.

Me too. We flew out to Bucharest in the summer for around £65 each return on Wizz.