Bear

The British goverment really do suck up to the USA, espically when Tony Blair was in power. He was in no way a terrorist, he didn't want to put American lives in danger or hurt anyone, he just wanted to find out about aliens. He is British and I do not see the gain in sending this man with an obvious mental disability to a prison thousands of miles away from home and spend his entire life in a federal prison. He needs to be tried over here so he can get a decent trial as how is meant to defend himself in a place he is so unfamilar with and scared. The secret websites should have been better protected as this has happened before.

Another bash at Scotland is the fact they get to go to university for free yet they are thinking of raising tution fees up to £7000. I don't think thats particularly fair. In alot of ways when you hear the Scottish how much they hate the English, I just end up thinking fine then gain Indpendence but I don't think they should because like Thomas said it will bring up so many problems. But I think that what applied to Scotland (free prescriptions) should apply to England too.

All of the UK should have free prescriptions, its not fair that Scotland and Wales do but England doesn't (unless you have cancer, children, constant health problem and if your on benefits). Its not fair asthma doesn't come into that. When the NHS was first brought in it worked perfectly, its only in the last decade that its gone to shit. My Mum is a nurse and she said when she trained they cleaned the ward and were very proud of the standards they kept it to. Now however its all about targets and they have cleaners who are from private companies who don't care. Also British nurses aren't trained how they used to be, before it was mainly pratical (80%) and 20% theory and they were on the wards very early on. Now its a degree which is 50/50 now and they don't go onto the wards until year 2. Also british nurses don't get the jobs as the NHS hire foriegn nurses as they are much cheaper. Employees don't have the pride they used to have and don't have much consideration for the patients. My Grandad had to have maggot treatment on his leg, in the night he used the call button because the bandage fell apart. They ignored him, in the end he spent the entire night in bed filled with maggots.

I love how this turned into a massive bitching session of whats wrong with our countries. I hate that if I go to Scotland (no offence Thomas) and Wales then its free prescription yet in England I need constant medication because of my asthma. My pumps run out so quickly and I need two so it costs me £15, yet if I wanted the pill then thats free. Not fair.

Thats usually what people use, its a whole thing of gangs and people just stabbing each other to prove themselves. Its very common in East London.

You make a very fair point, I shall see how this topic goes as its still early days. If its still very popular after a week then I will pin it.

When I started secondary school I was constantly asked "Are you related to......?" because my name was so common, that was annoying. In uni there is another Victoria Cole, I was not impressed. My first name is a very English name, not sure where Catherine originated from though.

I don't think guns are needed in every home. We dont have a gun problem but we do have a major knife problem. The problem is our justice system is bizarre, someone can get sent to prison for a few months because they didn't they used their hose in a water shortage yet there was a case when an illegal immigrant killed a child while drug driving and his sentence was to pay £200 for damage to a council tree, that was it.

I have pinned it as this topic can keep on going as politics will keep on changing and I am sure there will be more scandals for us to discuss.

Cole is good for the fact I am usually one of the first. My initials are VCC.

Off with your head then Raybob! I do think heritage is a facsinating thing. Sometimes peoples last names are a big indicator, mine is dull though. I'm just a Cole.

The NHS is a great thing but it really needs to go back to the 80s where English nurses were the best in the world and hospitals were clean and everyone took pride in their work. Now its appalling to see what the hospitals are like, my Grandad got MRSA twice because it was dirty and no one really cared. He couldnt eat because he was laying down and they just put the food infront of him even though he was blind and couldn't see, also he had no legs so he couldn't push himself up.

I will probably vote for Conservative as I think Labour is ruining this country with its silly laws when ignoring the bigger problem. I think with immigration we should be strict like Australia and let the people who have a skill that we need in. I think being able to speak decent English is important as there are many people who have lived her for a long time but still can't speak the language. I really think the benefit system needs to be sorted out as there are so many people taking advantage of the system. Someone in uni has an aunt who is on benefits because she won't work as she has children one is nine and the other is 15, she won't even get part time work. I think that is wrong, she may be a single parent but so was my and she worked and I have done well. The argument was that if you don't want to work then you shouldn't. I think alot of people believe in that now.

I was born in New Jersey. My family history is quite interesting on my Mum's side we have a murderer and then on my Dad's side my great great (maybe more greats) grandfather owned Hoboken but then lost it in a card game. How lame.

I'm buggered then. A couple of months ago they wanted to stop all imports and exports and just have British products. Which to me is just a silly idea, this may have changed. I read this on their website. They also wanted to bring back capitol punishment (murderers and peadophiles)and corporal punishment.

Me and Thomas were talking about it being very hard to class yourself as a pure Native of the country you live in. In the UK it would be incredibly rare to define yourself as pure English because of the Saxons (Germans), Romans (Italians), Vikings (Denmark, Sweden etc.), Normans (French) and many more. Does anyone know their family history and if they are melting pot of Nationalities. My heritage is very mixed. I have Welsh, Irish, Russian, Italian and Native American blood in me. These can easily be seen in my families looks. My Mum has the Russian Jewish nose, we are all very dark haired and skin.

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I'm not native English, I'm an immigrant. Hardly anyone is Native English if you think of it Romans, Saxons (Germans), Normans (French) and so on.

The political party I loathe the most is the BNP, they actually make me so angry. I know so many people who vote for them because they think the UK should be white. Also the BNP wants every immigrant out as they want it to be Native English (From the Ice Age) people which is rather stupid as I very much doubt anyone is.

That is silly. I'm just so glad Danyl Johnson didn't win.

I'm glad Joe won but my support was with Stacey just because she was local really and of course John & Edward had gone so I might as well have supported someone. But Stacey was at my rival college and was at my theatre school, I have probably met her I just don't remember, it was such a long time ago. Once she left I prefered Joe, I found Olly too cocky.

I think thats very true, I feel very sorry for him and do feel he should be tried over here. How do the USA think they are going to have a decent trial with him very scared, confused and thousands of way from home. Then again its easy for them, find him guilty and then just chuck him into prison for 60 years.

In the UK it was Disney, I know it wasn't a cartoon but it was a good children show so I thought I would just throw it in. I know this isn't a cartoon but I really miss Wishbone. That was one of my favourite shows, I used to have a Wishbone cuddly toy. Pingu was awesome! I miss him and his silly antics. Did anyone ever watch Fireman Sam?

Gary Mckinnon is most likely going to be sent to the USA before Christmas. He is to be tried for hacking into many secret goverment websites because he wanted information "on the little green men". He suffers from Aspergers which is a form of autism. The main debate here is should he be sent to the USA to stand trial and face 60 years in prison or be tried in a British court. Outrage has occured because many British people have been extradited to USA to stand trial whenever America has demanded it but there have been many instances where the UK has demanded American citizens to be extradited to the UK but the USA has refused. So what do you think? http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/nov/27/gary-mckinnon-aspergers-autistic

Thats what decent kids TV needed. Home Improvment was full of them. Over in the UK the goverment was going on about putting an 18 certificate onto cartoons with smoking in them as it clearly makes children want to smoke. When I counted the amount of films and shows that show smoking it was sad to think these could be kept away from children. I doubt seeing a mouse smoking will make children want smoke a pipe.