rosedraws wrote: 
As the man said "people are a problem"

  
fingers crossed and ballot paper

 MrsHobieJoe wrote: 
Good luck!  

We were at the English Pub last night, chatting with the owners, I was trying to make more sense out of the Brittish system... no luck.    

And the same thing that happens everywhere looks like it's pending in Brittain:  A balanced governing structure should be the optimal representation of the people with sensible solutions to problems.... but instead, it's gridlock.

And hey, you still have paper ballots?

OK, here we go.  42,000 polling stations for a potential electorate of 44,000,000.  I voted at ten to eight this morning and demonstrated democracy in progress to sprog.  One piece of paper, one vote into the black box.  The die is cast!

My forecast:

320-330 seats for the Tories, 70 for the Libdems, 220 odd for labour and the rest to the others.

My preference would be to see a much stronger result for the libdems so here's hoping!

 MrsHobieJoe wrote: 

No, the name of this Hogarth work isn't "Election Day"!

Gin Lane by William Hogarth

It is said that gin moved up from the drink of the lower classes when it was decided that officers in the British Navy should have gin to distinguish them from the crews, which received a daily ration of rum. Perhaps gin acquired more respectability when it was used to cut the bitterness of quinine (tonic) by administrators of the Empire in the malarial tropics. Since immunizations only provide about 50% protection from malaria, I attribute my freedom from the disease after many sojourns in the tropics to the liberal preventive use of gin and tonic. 

I haven't noticed any change in the quality of Plymouth Gin since the distillery was bought by the Swedes and then by the French but the packaging has suffered. Bring back the cork stopper!

 Be grateful. At one point, American news programs had begun declaring winners hours before the polls closed which apparently caused some people to change their votes to the projected winners. Early announcement of winners isn't done anymore, either voluntarily or from legislation.

Although I'm keenly interested in the outcome of the election, I'm reluctant to do any cheerleading. It's partly because I have only a superficial understanding of British polity and partly because of the ontoward opining by non-Americans about American politics in the RP forum. With that said, a hung Parliament might not be an entirely bad thing, especially for the international financial markets.

 oldslabsides wrote: 
I know!

 NoEnzLefttoSplit wrote: 

I was dead serious.

 oldslabsides wrote: 
unfortunately there's a bitter truth in that.

 NoEnzLefttoSplit wrote: 

they're about due - it's been a while.

 MrsHobieJoe wrote: 
Maybe they just need to wait a few days.. looks like Europe is falling apart at the seams.

Chaos UK

 NoEnzLefttoSplit wrote: 

Send em all home.

The majority of immigrants to this country are from European states I believe (actually someone can probably find the numbers and prove me wrong).  As we are part of the EU we have freedom of movement and therefore that element of immigration aint going to stop.  You need to vote with the loony spectrum UKIP or BNP if you want us to exit the EU.

There is potential on EU immigration to delay the rights of the populations of new entrants to the EU from coming here for about 5 years from the country joining the EU which is what we didn't do with Poland.  However arguably the Polish immigration really stoked our economy along for a few years when we needed those extra hands.  There definitely is an issue in some inner cities where the services are under pressure.  Our kids goes to a school where virtually everyone's first language is English.  In parts of some cities she would be in a massive minority and there is definitely a need to tackle the social pressures that immigration has put parts of the country under.

 oldslabsides wrote: 
Yep, bloody kiwis everywhere.

 oldslabsides wrote: 
I don't see that its an issue.  People here have been served by an education system that means they can do jobs that are more attractive than potato grading.  The Poles (and others) get paid so poorly at home that it makes sense for them to come here and grade potatoes, and they are happy to do so.  Wheres the issue.

The BBC did a programme where they got people who had been on benefits for a long time, and were members of the 'they are stealing our jobs' camp.  They put the four 'volunteers' into jobs with immigrants.  Only 1 stuck it out longer than a day, and he left before the end of the programme.

 callum wrote: 
the "doing work that no one else wants to do" argument is a societal problem that I agree needs to be addressed along with the immigration problem.

 oldslabsides wrote: 
yes, except that the main issue here is that its not really an issue.  There are a large number of immigrants, but for the most part they do work that no one here wants.  Often they are exploited and underpaid and here legally.  Because of our free immigration agreement with the EU people from Eastern Europe, particularly Poland, have come over.  However many studies have shown that they do work that no one else here wants...

Listening to a story about the British elections yesterday on NPR I found that you have your own immigration issues.  Apparently some folks there feel the country is being overrun by immigrants and something needs to be done about it.  Sounds familiar.

 geordiezimmerman wrote: 
... and a good one, no doubt. I didn't realize he was all cushy with Charlie.

 NoEnzLefttoSplit wrote: 
I do have SOME time for Mr Fry but he's still very much a royal loving, expensive dining, super rich lovie who in many ways doesn't live in anything like the real world. Often dining with the likes of Prince Charles and other royal members, he is so out of touch with the normal everyday person that he can't really be seen as a spokesman for them. I find him rather humerous when he's chairing his quiz, Q.I and often will listen to to him when seeing him being interviewed only because he can be rather interesting but mostly I find him to be rather hypocritical. One moment speaking of a better world for all and a peaceful society but yet he seems to prefer the company, and of course he himself directly benefitted from, some of the very people who I believe are the biggest culprits of greed, tax dodging,snobbery and the like.

Just my opinion of course.

 edieraye wrote: 

  actually no.  I saw 7 pages and thought, I'll just skim the first paragraph and then ended up reading the whole thing.