5, 9-10: come on. BTW, French trains also drive on the wrong side of railways!
6: that's about a minority of the population, which is in good company of say Italian colleagues. *Traitor*, n. A benighted individual who perceives an illusory distinction between serving his nation and abetting the criminals who govern it.
BTW back at you, it's impossible to say french trains drive on the wrong side of the railway since french trains are the best in the world, which means whichever side we drive them is the best side and the rest of you must be wrong, just look at those supposedly engineering giants in germany who drive them on the "right side" and yet have so many accidents with their slower trains. (And don't even get me started on brit rail...)
And you can't really tell me with a straight face that I am wrong about the food. A country's food tells you a lot about its people. And in england's case it tells me they absolutely had to become an imperial power if but to eventually be able to provide average english with good south asian, chinese and caribean recipes to be able to have prepared for them in restaurant, lod knows they can't make it for themselves since it isn't prepared with some bland white sauce, baked beans or cucumbers. "C'est un scandale !"
No. There is also such a thing as different election systems. (To boot, I think the elites 50 years ago very rather different from those 25 years ago.)
Are you saying there isn't a deeply atlanticist, anti-european current pervading english society which makes it impossible for any english government to actually commit england to Europe?
I think there is such a current, it may even be stronger than everywhere else (maybe with the exception of Italy and Germany), but I do not think that it makes such a commitment impossible. At least not via the election (or referendum) booth.
so many accidents with their slower trains
Uhm... slower trains, so many accidents, where did you take that? At any rate, the side French trains drive on is the British side, they took railways from them. How much more civilised right-driving trains are is shown by the fact that France has not converted right-driving lines in the Alsace back to left-driving in 80 years :-) *Traitor*, n. A benighted individual who perceives an illusory distinction between serving his nation and abetting the criminals who govern it.
They could've just bought TGVs you know.
I wholly agree with you on political systems and the English have the same hidebound first past the post political tradition which hobbles the Americans too. This being said, at what point does a nation need take responsibility for an outdated and undemocratic political system?
Is this true about Alsace? Even the TGV Est line? "C'est un scandale !"
Yes, you are! You are linking to one single accident on a conventional line. It's not like the TGV would not be prone to accidents in the same low-speed situation :-) Also, Siemens was only one consortia member for that train, but made the trains currently commissioned for the highest speed, Spain's S-103, completely, while the TGV Est sees parallel service of German ICE-3 and French TGV POS (<-acronym in a civilised right-driving language, Paris-Ostfrankreich-Süddeutschland!) at the same top speed :-)
Is this true about Alsace? Even the TGV Est line?
Yes, it is true. The TGV Est line hasn't reached Alsace proper yet, presently the end of the line 'solves' the change-over (I can testify from travelling both via Strasbourg and via Saarbrücken). *Traitor*, n. A benighted individual who perceives an illusory distinction between serving his nation and abetting the criminals who govern it.
European Tribune member Redstar was found dead at home yesterday. A post-mortem determined he was killed with a large dose of Marmite-laced beans on toast. In addition, an army NCB weapons team later located a booby-trapped haggis in the bathroom, a large amount of glow-in-the dark custard, and a baking tray full of spring-loaded toads-in-the-hole. According to a police source speaking on condition of anonymity, the latter are "reminiscent of the chestburster creature in Ridley Scott's film, Alien (1979)". The Shadow Home Secretary has accused the government of "a cavalier attitude in the defence of British food and cultural icons". Later during Prime Minister's Questions, Gordon Brown announced that sausages will be banned from the hand luggage of airline passengers.
But to be more precise, it is also not english! "C'est un scandale !"
Pancakes anyone? You can't be me, I'm taken
