The Vote for Heaven or Hell A powerful senator dies after a prolonged illness. His soul arrives in heaven and is met by St. Peter at the entrance. "Welcome to Heaven," says St. Peter. "Before you settle in, it seems there is a problem. We seldom see a high official around these parts, you see, so we're not sure what to do with you." "No problem, just let me in," says the senator. "Well, I'd like to but I have orders from higher up. What we'll do is have you spend one day in Hell and one in Heaven. Then you can choose where to spend eternity." "Really, I've made up my mind. I want to be in Heaven." "I'm sorry but we have our rules," replies St. Peter. And with that, St. Peter escorts him to the elevator and he goes down, down, down to Hell. The doors open and he finds himself in the middle of a green golf course. Nearby are all his friends and other politicians who had worked with him. Everyone is in evening attire and very happy to see him. They run to greet him, hug him, and reminisce about the good times they had while getting rich at the expense of the people. They play a friendly game of golf and then dine on lobster and caviar. Also present is the Devil, who really is a very friendly guy and who has a good time dancing and telling jokes. They are having such a good time that the time flies, before he realizes it, the senator has to go. Everyone gives him a big hug and waves while the elevator rises. The elevator goes up, up, up and the door reopens on Heaven where St. Peter is waiting for him. "Now it's time to visit Heaven." The next 24 hours pass with the senator joining a group of contented souls moving from cloud to cloud, playing the harp and singing. They have a good time and, before he realizes it, the 24 hours have gone by and St. Peter returns. "Well then, you've spent a day in Hell and another in Heaven. Now choose your eternity." The senator reflects for a minute, then answers, "Well, I would never have said it, I mean Heaven has been delightful, but I think I would be better off in Hell." So St. Peter escorts him to the elevator and he goes down, down, down to Hell. Now the doors of the elevator open and he is in the middle of a barren land covered with waste and garbage. He sees all his friends, dressed in rags, picking up the trash and putting it in black bags. The Devil comes over to him and lays his arm on his neck. "I don't understand," stammers the senator. "Yesterday I was here and there was a golf course and a beautiful club and we

I hate to tell you but all commercial news is one sided, it's side being that of it's owners and shareholders. News companies are there to make money not disseminate information you pillock, and they will aim their news at what they believe to be their target audience to make their advertising space etc more valuable by having a wider audience/readership. European news is not there to provide American's overseas a constructive method of judging and making their vote for the candidate of their choice. You appear in fact completely mental and unrepresentative of the opinion of any other european I know, did you leave the tin-foil hat at home again this morning again Tomaz? You really should know better by now Rhys A bus station is where a bus stops. A train station is where a train stops. On my desk I have a workstation... Vampireware /n/, a project, capable of sucking the lifeblood out of anyone unfortunate enough to be assigned to it, which never actually sees the light of day, but nonetheless refuses to die.

What a load of crap! Don't get me wrong, most people I know will make fun of the 'American stereotype', (big, brash, loud, overweight, thoroughly confused by roundabouts), but then we're not exactly gentle with each other, and I've seen the threads with this coming the other way. Anyone and everyone I know with half a brain knows that you cannot control your president as much as we can't control our prime minister. Some of you will think lil' George B is great and grand, and others that he's a maniacal despot but at the end of the day most of you are middle of the road, (probably leaning to the right given American political ideology). We hear a lot of crap from our media, most of which is Murdoch owned, (see it's all the fault of Australia really! ;-)), we don't really understand your electoral system or how anyone actually got installed as President last time round. I'd suggest most really don't like Tony Blair trying to insert parts of himself into Mr Bush in order to ingratiate himself, and really don't want to feel like we're becomming the next annexed state of the USA. But that's not really your fault individually, it's our politicians. The UK populous is largely against the involvement of British troops in Iraq and it has been shown that we were misled by intelligence in the run up, and that dodgy intelligence that has since been shown to be false/incorrect was the premise given to parliament during their votes on whether to involve British troops. Given we elected our idiots, we're probably even more distrustful of yours as we have no control there at all, but as i said Blair just seems to keep on doing what he's asked and not paying attention to the general will of the electorate. Realistically I don't think anyone really cares too much, although I hate to say it but you'd probably be less liable to ridicule with a president who can string more than on legible sentence together, but then have you heard some of the thing the Queen's husband has said, they're way, way better than Bush :-). Personally, I'd love to see America, or at least parts of it, but then I'd want to see Canada and New Zealand first, and i don't want an ID card or my person recorded biometrically in a Government database (I've worked on Government contracts and I simply don't trust their ability to manage the data securely and honestly) so if I don't get there before my current passport expires I may never make it, and that'd be a little sad. At the end of the day we have the same ratio of idiots as you, well maybe some

This is quite an interesting subject what with us UK'ers looking at having various forms of hunting banned. Lots of interesting views too so I'd thought I'd share mine. I've never had a problem with hunting for food or neccisity (too early to care about spelling - sorry guys :-)) and I can easily accept that there are places around the world, even in area's of the western world, that it is still neccesary. But for sport it's just a petty sick exercise in power tripping. If you want real sport as a hunter, why not employ a person to hunt, and arm them too. I'll bet most don't find it quite as exhilerating when the shoe is on the other foot, but there would also be people to whom this would be far more of an exciting challenge. Rhys A bus station is where a bus stops. A train station is where a train stops. On my desk I have a workstation... Vampireware /n/, a project, capable of sucking the lifeblood out of anyone unfortunate enough to be assigned to it, which never actually sees the light of day, but nonetheless refuses to die.

Stan Shannon wrote: Lets face it, the US is saddled with the task of cleaning up the mess Europe left behind. Europe deserves W - its karma. Is that why the US is asking for UK troop support in Bahgdad? Oh-no, that's just Stan's powers of selective observation springing up again. NB: Stan - Spelling note: Losers not loosers Rhys A bus station is where a bus stops. A train station is where a train stops. On my desk I have a workstation... Vampireware /n/, a project, capable of sucking the lifeblood out of anyone unfortunate enough to be assigned to it, which never actually sees the light of day, but nonetheless refuses to die.

A little stilted and un-informative there Tomaz. Who's to say a right-wing christian should be sitting on a Civil Liberties committee? Historically strong right-wing bias has not led itself to a reasonable assessment and protection of civil liberties, but as you clearly state, (every time :-)), neither has a strong left-wing bias. Both political wings generally lead and strive towards more governmental control and a nanny-state mentality, wheras civil liberties should be about freedom from those controls, but protection from unfair treatment because of your views. Homosexuality isn't a sin, and shouldn't be regarded as so as Religion should play no part in politics or policy in the EU, and if marriage exists (as you state Buttiglione believes) to subjegate women to a point of near-slavery shouldn't it be outlawed in order to protect the civil liberties of women? Can you never accept that at times it's perfectly reasonable to doubt someones ability to perform a role due to concerns that their own personal viewpoint could affect the role they're performing and thusly the validitay and legitimacy of the EU as a whole? Don't get me wrong I'm politically middle of the road, and I'd like to see less legislation and nanny state mentality and more freedom from Government, but don't believe it's possible with too strong a bias to the right or left. Rhys A bus station is where a bus stops. A train station is where a train stops. On my desk I have a workstation... Vampireware /n/, a project, capable of sucking the lifeblood out of anyone unfortunate enough to be assigned to it, which never actually sees the light of day, but nonetheless refuses to die.

Fair play Stan Rhys A bus station is where a bus stops. A train station is where a train stops. On my desk I have a workstation... Vampireware /n/, a project, capable of sucking the lifeblood out of anyone unfortunate enough to be assigned to it, which never actually sees the light of day, but nonetheless refuses to die.

I hate to mention this but the religion question on the census was a bit of a running joke at the time. There was an 'other' option in which you could write your religion of choice, and most people I know put Jedi. Basically, in order to be able to fully quantify the religious spread in the UK if 100000 (I believe that was the quoted figure) people enter a specific religion, then that is recorded as a 'genuine' religion even if it's a minority one. This really makes the poll above more of a joke as those people (and I believe the figure did come to more than required) who did put Jedi would be recorded as 'of religious persuasion' in the above statistics even though there answer was something of a merry jape in order to be fully recognised as a Jedi :-) So don't trust religious statistics coming from that Census! Rhys A bus station is where a bus stops. A train station is where a train stops. On my desk I have a workstation... Vampireware /n/, a project, capable of sucking the lifeblood out of anyone unfortunate enough to be assigned to it, which never actually sees the light of day, but nonetheless refuses to die.

Technically, the guy did what he should as an elected official and has presided to the will of the people (who didn't want to be in Iraq in the first place) and did what he said in his manifesto. Is that what you americans have come to expect and want, leaders who say one thing and do another? I wish Tony Blair would ante up and start saying what he intended doing rather than saying one thing and doing another the minute he gets power. Rhys A bus station is where a bus stops. A train station is where a train stops. On my desk I have a workstation... Vampireware /n/, a project, capable of sucking the lifeblood out of anyone unfortunate enough to be assigned to it, which never actually sees the light of day, but nonetheless refuses to die.

Stan, Islam is not terrorism, it's a religion you dope. Within every religion, christian, islam et al, there are extremist groups (hezbollah, pro-life etc.), that will lower themselves to terrorism and the like, but that does not make all followers of a that religion a terrorist. Stop trying to pigeonhole every group so generally it doesn't work, the world is made up of shades of grey, there is no black and white in the way you intimate. Don't get me wrong though, I personally dislike organised religion and religious groups as much as i do terrorist groups, I just don't think it's fair to call them all terrorists, some of them are just plain gullible. [Flame-Proof hat on!] Rhys A bus station is where a bus stops. A train station is where a train stops. On my desk I have a workstation... Vampireware /n/, a project, capable of sucking the lifeblood out of anyone unfortunate enough to be assigned to it, which never actually sees the light of day, but nonetheless refuses to die.

Daniel Turini wrote: Not only this. I've seen a study (I'm searching my e-mails for a link...) showing that diabetes has a similar growth curve than (IIRC): 1. obesity 2. # of cars 3. Global papaya production 4. # of computers 5. # of flies on North Africa 6. AIDS 7. Sugar consumption :-D:-D:-D Rhys A bus station is where a bus stops. A train station is where a train stops. On my desk I have a workstation... Vampireware /n/, a project, capable of sucking the lifeblood out of anyone unfortunate enough to be assigned to it, which never actually sees the light of day, but nonetheless refuses to die.

Based on the below, is George W Bush a terrorist? If You Harbor Terrorists, You Are a Terrorist[^] Rhys A bus station is where a bus stops. A train station is where a train stops. On my desk I have a workstation... Vampireware /n/, a project, capable of sucking the lifeblood out of anyone unfortunate enough to be assigned to it, which never actually sees the light of day, but nonetheless refuses to die.

The rise in cases of diabete's is linked to the rise in obesity. Diabete's itself also affects numerous people from birth, and later, brought on by genetic disposition etc. One of my closest friends suffered from Diabete's from birth, she died from the associated problems at 28. My father contracted Type 2 diabete's at 57 or so, though not overweight let alone obese. The problem isn't diabete's it's the cause of the rise, obesity, that's the issue, and I wonder what percentage of NHS funds go on Obesity related illnesses each year? I really wish these articles would concentrate on the causes of these problems (obesity) rather than the effect of them. Rhys A bus station is where a bus stops. A train station is where a train stops. On my desk I have a workstation... Vampireware /n/, a project, capable of sucking the lifeblood out of anyone unfortunate enough to be assigned to it, which never actually sees the light of day, but nonetheless refuses to die.

'NO AL QAEDA-SADDAM LINK'[^] Opinions? Rhys A bus station is where a bus stops. A train station is where a train stops. On my desk I have a workstation... Vampireware /n/, a project, capable of sucking the lifeblood out of anyone unfortunate enough to be assigned to it, which never actually sees the light of day, but nonetheless refuses to die.

URGENT: Information for HP Customers![^] Rhys A bus station is where a bus stops. A train station is where a train stops. On my desk I have a workstation... Vampireware /n/, a project, capable of sucking the lifeblood out of anyone unfortunate enough to be assigned to it, which never actually sees the light of day, but nonetheless refuses to die.

URGENT: Information for Mac users![^] Rhys A bus station is where a bus stops. A train station is where a train stops. On my desk I have a workstation... Vampireware /n/, a project, capable of sucking the lifeblood out of anyone unfortunate enough to be assigned to it, which never actually sees the light of day, but nonetheless refuses to die.

Victim not killer owned 'murder manual' game[^] Rhys A bus station is where a bus stops. A train station is where a train stops. On my desk I have a workstation... Vampireware /n/, a project, capable of sucking the lifeblood out of anyone unfortunate enough to be assigned to it, which never actually sees the light of day, but nonetheless refuses to die.

Given that under British, and i believe American, law someone is innocent until proven guilty and that domestic prisoners are granted basic human rights including food and clothing no matter their crime, if what is stated is true then this was revenge, torture and intimidation on the part of the forces undertaking the prisoner care, not an act of acheiving justice for those killed or bereaved on September 11th. If it's true those people were treated in the manner described, then those who ordered and carried out this treatment should be tried under applicable laws. Just because terrorists choose to breach laws, morals and ethics in enacting their wanton murder doesn't excuse anyone else of behaving in the same, or a similar, manner. :sigh: Rhys A bus station is where a bus stops. A train station is where a train stops. On my desk I have a workstation... Vampireware /n/, a project, capable of sucking the lifeblood out of anyone unfortunate enough to be assigned to it, which never actually sees the light of day, but nonetheless refuses to die.

US wins David Blunkett Lifetime Menace Award![^] ;P Rhys "When one burns one's bridges, what a very nice fire it makes" -- Dylan Thomas "As to marriage or celibacy, let a man take the course he will. He will be sure to repent" -- Socrates "Doh!" -- Homer Simpson

Preparing for emergencies!^] Rhys A bus station is where a bus stops. A train station is where a train stops. On my desk I have a workstation...:zzz: ""Vampireware /n/, a project, capable of sucking the lifeblood out of anyone unfortunate enough to be assigned to it, which never actually sees the light of day, but nonetheless refuses to die."