RE: Pic of the day.

The MD-11 was so “good” that it ruined McDonnel Douglas. Instead of building a new fuel efficient jet (like Airbus did with the A330 or A340) they put winglets and EFIS on the ancient DC-10.

Okay, the upadate was a bit more than that – but it can’t compete with the Airbuses, which is why everoyne replaced DC-10’s with either 767, 777, A330 or A340.

RE: Anti terror war-Isrealis style.

Skythe

It was well known that Sharon was likely to “stick it” to the Palestinians when he was elected. So his murerdous tendencies were after all, put there by the electorate.

I also disagree about NATO. We all know that NATO = the USA. How can the British voters stop Gen. Dan Cheeseburger III from using cluster bombs? No one else is listened to within NATO. You either accept the US domination or leave altogether. Maybe we should have the moral courage to leave. NATO seems to serve no useful purpose these days, anyway.

RE: Eugenics : the thread

Okay kev, fair enough. As long as you don’t think I’m some kind of unfeeling monster. I’m just trying to see the big picture. I mean, those in charge don’t care about individuals. They haven’t got the time. That’s why politicians kiss babies, to fool everyone. The way I see it, Revenue = X and so, Expenditure must also = X. That precludes the caring “everyone must be cared for” attitude in my opinion. It’s all down to resource allocation – which is the first thing you learn on any Economics course.

Greater revenue = greater care. I live on the Isle of Man. The government has money coming out of it’s ears and they are in the middle of building one of the best hospitals in Europe as a result. Recruting staff, too.

So – NHS Funding (and mismanagment) is a future thread, together with the great Lady T?

RE: Eugenics : the thread

[updated:LAST EDITED ON 28-07-02 AT 01:09 AM (GMT)]When I was describing some mentally disabled people as cabbages, I wasn’t advocating euthenasia. I wasn’t even considering stopping them being born – I was just pointing out that our mental definitions of what mentally disabled equals were, initially, different.

What is wrong with the term cabbage? It is well understood. I think you’ve got a bit of the dreaded political correctness creeping in to your thinking. In my mind, cabbabge = persistent vegatative state. Whether or not there are varying degrees of PVS is one for the quacks, not me. It doesn’t look like there is.

And what precisely was wrong with Lady T??

She smashed up those god awful unions and privatised some indsutries which the state had no right to be involved with. Coal is not especially a desirable thing to be involved in. Regardless of the price of foreign coal, it is a dodo industry anyway. Domestic use is nearly non existent and power generators are turning away from it. Coal will not be used at all, before too long.

Just because you obviously dislike her policies, is no reason to cite her as a bad example. If the US had followed her lead there would be no stupid steel tarrifs blighting US/Euro trade relations!

And yes, Lady T was/is more valuable than I am. If I died tomorrrow, there would be no great loss. I’m not creating jobs or tax revenue or administering structural change. I’m not holding Britain’s end up diplomatically. She contributed more to society than I have, or probably ever will. I am equating contribution with value I suppose, but I am comfortable doing this directionally. If someone contributes more than me, they are more valuable than me. If they contribute less than me they are not necessarily less valuable than me. They have latent potential to contribute either directly or through the inspiration of others. In this way, my cousin James was no less valuable than me. But he was less valuable than Lady T. Not to me personally of course, but to the nation as a whole.

I don’t think there is much room for feelings here. That is for the “carers” amongst us. You’re probably one, whereas probably I am not. Maybe that’s why you’re in nursing (I think?) and I’m an accountant. I tend to take a wider view, which is necessary, but then again a caring view is also necessary. My point is that both philosophies are important.

Leaders have to take a balanced view and that is not always easy. How would you allocate funds, for example? You have a fixed budget and could either care well for some disabled people or you could reduce their care some and be able to afford to perform a heart bypass. If you try and fudge it by doing both, the whole thing starts to unravel through universal lack of resources and misnamagement. Look at the NHS today. If you had to make the decision, what basis would you use? Leaving it to providence or a random choice is not acceptable. There needs to be a decision making framework in place, which implies that a view needs to be taken as to relative value.

Sorry to ramble a bit and also sorry for the ambiguous nature of the arguments. It’s not a subject which I am able to articulate well, to be honest!

RE: Anti terror war-Isrealis style.

Skythe,

Okay, I accept that NATO has done things as bad as Israel.

But the one shred of moral high ground I have left is that NATO’s actions were taken by a bunch of muderous generals that nobody elected. A lot of them aren’t even British – the Americans and other NATO pilots are guilty as well. I weould certainly point out that in Afghanistan, it was the Brits who were very annoyed when the US used cluster bombs against ill defined targets; Rumsfeld could not be stopped.

But the Israeli government was directly elected by popular mandate to carry out murder. That’s a worthwhile difference I think.

RE: ETOPS

Wysiwyg

What is the basis for determining the flying time? Some of these “minutes” look arbitary at first glance.

Also, is the ETOPS rating dynmaic? I mean, can the same aircraft/crew get 180 mins over certain terrain, but only 60 minutes over other terrain? I should imagine you could stray 180 mins from a diversion runway in the civilised world, but less than 180 mins in undeveloped regions as the emergency services are not as efficient?

Does it depend on quality of ATC coverage?

Being an accountant, I would seek to derive a mathematical model for ETOPS times beased on all these factors and probably lots more which I lack the knowledge of.

RE: Anti terror war-Isrealis style.

It really does take the biscuit.

I am able only to offer only simple comparisons, because this action taken by a “civilised” country is disgusting.

Imagine if Britain had dropped a Paveway onto a building in Belfast – just because Gerry Adams was there, or some other IRA leader. Basically, this would never happen. We would rather risk losing a few men with an armed assault than resort to this.

Oh – I know…

A known IRA terrorist was in the WTC. The British were keen to get him, so a secret MI6 unit known as Al’Qaeda hijacked some planes and glew them into the WTC. Perfectly justifiable, isn’t it?

RE: Eugenetics : the thread

Kev,

I think we are talking at cross purposes here.

What I mean by “menatally disabled” is people who are cabbages. I wasn’t thinking of autistic people when I said they don’t contribute to society.

Maybe my personal definition of “mental disability” was too skewed towards the cabbage end.

I think you have to be mindful of relative degrees of contribution though. It’s not a binary system – “contributing” and “not contributing”. There are varying degrees. Does this affect the “value” of a person? I am not sure, to be honest. Lady T is more valuable than me (at least, she was) but then again she was truly outstanding. The other 99.999999999% of us are not more valuable than me. The question is – does it work the other way round? I’m afraid that is a very hard question to answer! Of course, you ad I are less valuable than Mrs. Thatcher – but is anyone else less valuable than us? I truly have no idea.