h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

It is a poor service to the memory of the victims of the holocaust to adopt a central doctrine of their murderers.

You don't mean to say that the bbc might have their own political agenda, do you? Heaven forbid.

Not quite on Topic, but are we allowed to discuss/shout from the rooftops - any of the issues that this Election is about? Even if we were talking about them before?

Examples include: The Euro, Farming (in general), Foot & Mouth (in particular), the NHS, Taxation, The whole political system, IT, Food safety, the Price of beer, Education.... etc.....

I could go on but I think you get the general idea?

If so, OK FIne - I'm off back to N2G2 via Yahoo.... (oops sorry that'll be moderated...)

> re: Holocaust

Saying that the Holocaust didn't happen is racist, and would be judged such by the majority of readers world wide. It is *ALREADY* grounds for censorship, and has been since this site was founded. You've never been free to be a racist bigot on h2g2 - quite why this has taken you this long to realise is beyond me.

If you think that racists should be given free speech, that's fine - you can have your opinion. Myself, I think you're wrong, and that's my opinion. It's all a very interesting debate, but it's not going to affect the UK Law one bit. Neither is anything else you do on h2g2. Racial harrasment is illegal. Racial discrimination is illegal. Incitement to racial hatred is illegal. Get over it.

Okay, Luc, we'll drop this discussion. I'm usually radically left in politics and dislike the imperialist actions my govt has taken. But you make me feel proud to be an American, where at least I know I'm free.

> "Are we allowed to discuss any of the issues that this Election is about?"

Yes. You will be able to discuss everything except the General Election. Right at the moment, in fact, you can still discuss the general election. Myself, I reckon Labour will win it with a pretty big margin - though they won't get a landslide.

Tickles me pink, all this discussion about whether we should be allowed to discuss the general election when its announced... and absolutely NO discussion of the general election. Gee - anyone would think that h2g2 wasn't terribly political.

> "(oops sorry that'll be moderated...)"

No it won't. *smokes virtual joint* And neither will that.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/scotland/chewinthefat/media/download_sounds/mrs_olfactory.wav

.....in more ways than one.

Now I'd love to listen to that - but I suspect my co-workers would object.....

So, Luce, We are allowed to mention Websites just not in a URL format? (Sorry - this is probably covered in the Q and As - it just occurred to me in this train of thought is all). As a Matter of interest (as you have obviously read the guidelines ) what constitutes a(n?) URL? (and yes I know the definition, just wondering how far we can go....).

Anyway - I shall probably be voting in the General Election, I hope Labour don't win by another Landslide - maybe they'll listen more if their majority is cut. Equally (to keep a balanced view) I hope the Conservatives don't make a big come back, but that the Liberals have a better showing - leading to a more Balanced parliament. Also I hope, but doubt, that more "independants" get seats - like "white suit man"..... (Can't remember name...).

Argon, are you good at counting?

209 Tories
237 Labour
160 Liberals
164 Perverts

argon> "what constitutes a(n?) URL?"

Technically, a URL or Uniform Resource Locator is anything of the form something://something_else. This isn't h2g2's interpretation though. Exactly what their interpretation is is unclear - when I asked for it they accused me of "nitpicking"...

From practice, it appears that giving directions ("search for X on Y", or "go to my home space and click Z") is fine, and mentioning the name of dot coms like amazon or yahoo is equally fine. Mentioning URLs to make an editorial point is equally ok, as in the 'bigot.com' thread. Complain at the moderation helpdesk if any of these things get premanently removed - they'll sort it out for ya.

I'm a fan of Martin Bell too... (white van^H^H^Hsuit man)

I think you mean Martin Bell, the MP for Tatton in Cheshire. It would be good if there were more independent MPs, but it is pretty unlikely that it'll happen. The circumstances that led to Mr Bell's election were pretty extraordinary.
The sitting Tory MP, Neil Hamilton, had been accused of accepting bribes in exchange for asking parliamentary questions at the time of the election, but the local Tories insisted on standing by him.
He had a big majority - Tatton was the fifth safest Tory seat in Britain - and the opposition in the constituency was pretty evenly divided between Labour and the Liberal Democrats.
So, in a detemined attempt to get Hamilton out, Labour and the Lib Dems agreed to withdraw their candidates and put up Martin Bell as an independent anti-corruption candidate, with great success. They were vindicated when the investigation into Hamilton's activities concluded that he had indeed accepted bribes from Mohammed al-Fayed, the owner of Harrods department store.
Mr Bell promised when he was elected that he would serve in Tatton for only one Parliamentary term. This time around he's standing in Brentwood & Ongar, where it has been alleged that the local Tories (who hold the seat) have been taken over by evangelical Christians!
I suppose I may as well pin my own colours to the mast while we're still allowed to do so. I'm a lifelong Labour supporter, but one who has found New Labour a great disappointment.
I voted for Ken Livingstone in the London Mayoral elections just before moving back to Bradford. I'll vote Labour in this election because it's effectively a straight Labour-Tory fight in the constituency I live in, but I too hope the Liberal Democrats do well nationally - these days I reckon they're to the left of Labour.
Certainly I'm glad that a Labour victory looks certain. At least they'll co-operate with Europe, where the Tories would go in for a lot of outdated nationalistic flag-waving. Europe is the best hope for the underprivileged in Britain these days - most of the limited advances in employees' rights that have come about here in the past few years have happened because of initiatives from Europe.
Anyway, if you're in any doubt as to who to vote for, I suggest saying the words "Prime Minister Hague, Chancellor Portillo and Home Secretary Widdecombe" to yourself.
That soon puts everything in perspective.

Actually I could live with Portillo, and I can live with Hague too. It's that Widdecombe woman who scares me - mainly because she seems to be in a penis size competition with Jack Straw - "I can crack down harder on crime than you!" "Oh, no you can't" "Oh, yes I can! "Oh, {etc}"

I couldn't agree more about Widdecombe, Lucinda. And of course that makes it almost impossible for there to be any sensible debate on law and order issues (drug law reform, for instance) because Straw and Widdecombe are so busy trying to out-Judge Dredd each other. Widdecombe's shameless homophobia is pretty repellent too - few Parliamentarians were more stridently opposed to lowering the UK age of consent for gay men than Widdecombe.
Portillo, admittedly, has been impersonating a reasonable human being lately, but I remember him in office so I'm not entirely convinced.
I dislike Hague for a whole list of reasons. To name just a few, there's his xenophobic anti-European stance, the way he plays the race card over asylum seekers, the way he'll always jump on any passing populist bandwagon - and the fact that if he was PM, it'd give Yorkshiremen like me a bad name.

Ormy & Lucinda -- I just *love* the way you're discussing what you're discussing and especially where you're discussing it!!!

*I must admit that I, though not being British at all, feel that just this sort of discussion does belong here... sorry to all those who feel that a) it doesn't, b) it can't be and (especially) c) that is does but for whatever sound reason it can't be)

SG V

Well, back when Portillo was in power I was young, naive, and right-wing - so I probably missed his bad points. Regardless of his politics, he's always struck me as intelligent and freethinking - both of which are in seemingly short supply in politics.

Hague's opportunism is rather pitiful, isn't it? On the other hand, the job of the opposition is to oppose absolutely everything, regardless of how much they might agree with it - and Labour behaved exactly the same when they were in opposition. The downside of our political system, I guess.

They ought to make a "Fantasy Political Party" game - so you can pick and choose the politicians you want in it, and doing what. I'm not sure how you'd score points, though...

Lucinda,

'They ought to make a "Fantasy Political Party" game...'

They have been every week in The Spectator.

(Not that I'm a fanatical reader of it. I deal with all periodicals occurring alphabetically between "Safety & Health Practitioner" and "Teaching Exceptional Children," 705 titles, here in the Serials Acquisitions department of a certain U.S. microfilm company. In fact, I'm neglecting my job right now in order to write this. Oh well, back to the drudge of entering "Scientia Horticulturae" in the database...)

Que? (In a very Manuel way) Wumbe?

The prob with the Tories at the moment is that they are where Labour were two terms ago - i.e. with no real policies except to oppose everything that Labour is doing. Only when Labour came up with some "New" policies (i.e. various nicked from all over the place + little bit of Socialist Spin) did they become electable. Its a shame they haven't been able to keep more of their promises in their first term though.

What any party hoping to get elected needs first and foremost is a strong leader - that APPEARS to be strong to outsiders. Exactly the opposite of Vague. Maggie and Blur appear to both be from this mould. Major, Kinnock and Vague were/are not. (OK this seems to be contradictory to the above - but a strong leadership leads to real policies...).

Anway as before this is all just IMHO