[wdvltalk-social] Hello there!

[joseph harris]

On 01/05/2011 12:16, David Precious wrote:
> On Sunday 01 May 2011 12:00:54 Franni Vincent wrote:
>    
>> Still here!
>>
>> Dodged the Royal Wedding,
>>      
> Heh, yeah, it's all I was hearing about.  I bear them no ill will, but at the
> same time I have no interest in them, and consider them an irrelevant waste of
> the country's resources; I object to my taxes being used to pay for their over
> the top wedding.
>
> (However, I always considered the royal family a net drain on our country's
> economy; someone informed me the other day, with believable figures to back it
> up, that the money they contribute back, both directly and due to tourism, is
> more than we spend on them.)
>    

Much, much, much more. The sovereign is also a key in our constitution 
and a backup family is unavoidable. Check against the  cost of 
presidents :-) We have a valued head of state on the cheap. And one who 
is currently the most experienced politician on the planet. Still works 
harder than I have ever done - and at 82!
>
>    
>> now busy in the run up to the Referendum on
>> Thurs. Just in case anyone feels they need AV explained, or a feline
>> flavoured laugh, check out
>> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HiHuiDD_oTk&feature=youtu.be
>>      
> Ah yes.  I really need to get round to making up my mind about AV; I'm
> undecided as yet.
>
> In principle, I think I support it, as it makes people more likely to vote for
> who they really want to vote for, rather than the common "I'd prefer $x, but I
> don't think they have a chance of winning, so I'll vote for $y as my least-
> hated mainstream option just to try to avoid getting $z"; AV seems to promise
> that you can vote for your top choice, then other choices in order of
> preference, which would encourage truer voting.
>
> On the other hand, we don't need to be spending a fortune on changing voting
> systems right now.
>    

The cost is nil, Dave, apart from the cost of the referendum. No 
machinery required, no more expensive to print voting papers, and the 
same bank clerks and other personnel to do the counting at the same fee, 
and the same polling staff and police on duty. According to current 
expertise the count is not expected to take longer either - though I 
doubt that.
> <snip>
> All is well here; these days I don't really do much front-end web development,
> primarily working on backend systems in Perl.  I've got a job with a company I
> like, working from home 4 out of 5 days a week, which suits me very well
> indeed!
>
> Cheers
>
> Dave P
>    
Which in these times is nirvana :-) . Good for you.

Joseph