Olympics this.... Olympics that....

Yes, of course... all the famous gaffes... American politicians are notorious for those things you mentioned.
I'm not convinced that that isn't just the human condition. Surely Tony Blair has stepped up to the microphone at an important formal affair and loudly passed gas or something from gulping down his spotted dick too quickly? Perhaps the American press is just more keen on making our leaders out to be idiots? What do you think?

Hi Timothy. I would say that Romney is a virtual unknown for those who are not interested in world politics. For those who are and I include me, he is a nightmare on the horizon.

I hear that a Jim Crow act has been passed in some states in an attempt to dissenfranchise black and hispanic voters. Are there no depths to which the Republicans will sink in their renewed greed for power.

I'm not a fan of our two party "duopoly"... being forced to choose between the Republicans or Democrats which are essentially two sides of the same big, corporate owned government nanny state.
I favor Libertarian candidates but by the nature of our entrenched party system, they have an uphill battle to election due to the massive funding the mainstream parties receive from special interests with deep pockets.

As for a law to supress the votes of blacks and hispanics. Not hardly!
Sometimes the liberal press spins it that way if for example our polling officials wish to require IDENTIFICATION from a voter to prove that they are who they say they are! I hardly find this to be over the top. You can't even rent a video without showing ID, why allow people to elect a president without doing so?
Obama has virtually 100% of the black vote and a massive majority of hispanic vote anyway. I think the laws you are referring to are perhaps designed to keep hispanic NON-CITIZENS from voting. You wouldn't want Yanks coming over there and electing your Parliament would you?

Timothy, It *is* the human condition. We've never elected a boob like 'Dubya' but UK politicians are not immune. There is famous footage from the 1980s of ex-Labour party leader Neil Kinnock falling flat on his Rs while walking on a beach at a party conference and of Thatcher resorting to petulant sarcasm after being too acutely interrogated by a child. More recently, previous (Labour) PM Gordon Brown became a magnet for disaster towards the end of his office and most famously left a microphone switched on as he branded a member of the public as racist.

Timothy,

Yes all politicians make gaffes, which they don't seem bothered about, Dubya did it all the time and he was a two term Pres, so they did him little harm. Dubya's really big gaffes were invading Afghanistan and Iraq...which did everyone lots of harm...apart from Dubya and our Tony.

You asked about Mitt's overseas gaffes. Your candidates are laughably ignorant of life outside the home of the brave. It does seem that your Presidential candidates are compelled to venture abroad (to places they know nothing about and have little interest in), every four years as part of their 'blooding'. Perhaps they should stay at home, only venturing to foreign climes once elected to boost troop morale when they invade the first heathen land of their Presidency.

I don't think the US press are any harsher on your politicians than the British press is on ours.

Hi Timothy,

What are your thoughts on voters who have had their voting rights denied for past criminal offences?
I believe the Florida state governor Rick Scott has reimposed a ban on anyone with a past conviction from voting in your election later this year affecting around 1.3million people in that state alone.
Link here,

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/jul/26/florida-assault-voting-rights

Of course this will affect the Democratic much more than the Republican vote as many of their voters tend to be poorer folk with past criminal convictions such as stealing apples from orchards which will prevent them from voting.

The UKip a right wing fringe party here recently floated a proposal for unemployed people to be denied voting rights as they dont contribute to taxes.
Would that type of proposal be acceptable to most Americans or would it be treated as a joke as it is here by the vast majority of voters?

Hi Timothy. I would no more want Yanks coming over to Ireland and voting for the party or parties that get into the Dail than many countries that have had huge ammounts of American (your) cash put behind candidates that the American administration of the time favours.

Neither would I want my country invaded because the voting went in a way that did not favour the American backed candidate or the military encouraged to mount a coup against the legitimately elected goverment or terrorists (freedom fighters?) sent across the border to burn down schools and medical facilities and murder men, women and children.

I don't suppose you would like that either would you Timothy?

What excuse is it that the poor folks have the implied right to steal. Nothing but self interest is the motive behind all crime and right is right and wrong is wrong.

Here in Australia we have a problem with the 'black' {and that's not a racial intent } Australians being dis-proportionally represented in our gaols. It's not rocket science to work out that if there are thousand black people in one community and one hundred are in gaol as compared to one hundred in gaol out of the 'white' community of ten thousand then the black convict rate could be argued as being a dis-proportionate percentage.

I say to all people, no matter what your skin colour or your ethnicity, if you can't do the time don't do the crime. I'm fed up with this chip on the shoulder resentment that some 'have nots' hold against the 'haves'. If those who have have inherited their wealth then good for them - I don't resent them for one moment. If they have worked hard and accumulated then also good for them. I get angry at the mob who want to storm the gates of those who have and force them to share.

The American comedian Bill COSBY has come out and said to the American negro population that it's high time they stopped blaming 'whitey' for the mess they're in and took responsibilty for getting themselves out of the ghettos. The story in the song by Elvis does NOT have to carry on ad infinitvm.
An Aboriginal named Neville BONNER was born on a river bank and went on to become a member of the Australian Senate.

ANYONE with the intelligence to achieve CAN achieve. All that holds them back is their own laziness and a willingness to always blame others for their failings.

Timothy said: < Perhaps the American press is just more keen on making our leaders out to be idiots? >

and Gordon said: < I don't think the US press are any harsher on your politicians than the British press is on ours >

The UK press has been bought, schmoozed and otherwise pandered to by governments of every stripe. Recent events have highlighted that much -- but it's nothing new: wasn't it Lloyd George who said (of the press) "what you can't squash, you square and what you can't square, you squash"? The press tend to attack and ridicule only when a politician or group has fallen out of favour with those that own the press (and favour is lost when a politician or group will no longer play ball). That gaffes, inconsistencies, underhandedness and criminality are not always reported has more to do with that relationship than with the ability and honesty of any UK government or the press.

Politicians are as just as venal, self-serving, in the pockets of the wealthy and prepared to sacrifice Joe Public's well-being the whole world over. And the media hardly differ from one nation to another, either, when empires can be built and favour found.

They already do and have done for decades, the City of London is full of "Yanks", running, sorry, ruining the country. The banksters all came over the when those nasty Tories deregulated. Ever heard of Bob Diamond?

Sorry if this has already been posted (can't be bothered to hack my way through it all) but as my son pointed out, it's hard to take the Olympics seriously when the 2012 logo looks like Lisa Simpson giving a bl*w job

Warned repeatedly for months about the strain London's transport system would experience with the expected arrival of 11 million visitors to the Games, Londoners and the usual non-Olympic seasonal visitors appear to have vanished from the underground train system, the shopping districts, theatres, hotels and abandoned other traders who benefit from tourism.

The British government's budget watchdog OBR pointed out in March that some visitors may cancel or delay trips to London in order to avoid the crowds and potential travel disruptions.

"Given the uncertainties and the relatively small size of any possible effects, we assume that, apart from the ticket sales effects, the Olympics will not have a material effect on the quarterly path of GDP," the OBR said.

Britain's government is trying to boost foreign investment and stimulate the private sector, while keeping to a strict austerity budget, and hopes the Olympic Games - the first to be held in Britain since 1948 - will showcase Britain as a business destination.

Prime Minister David Cameron hopes that will help assuage critics who see the 9.3 billion pound (14.5 billion) cost of hosting the Olympics as too expensive given Britain's strained finances.

London's much criticised public transport system, the busiest in Europe, won early gold for easily carrying a million spectators through an unusually quiet early rush hour on the first full working day of the Olympics on Monday.

Travellers said buses and trains were working surprisingly smoothly with only a few hiccups, confounding dire forecasts of a transport meltdown in a city once notorious for slow trains, late buses and incoherent delay announcements.

London's transport bosses expect an extra 3 million journeys per day during the Games on top of the usual 12 million, an Olympian test for an underground train network whose infrastructure in parts dates back to 1863.

"I've noticed how easy it has been to travel. With the influx of one million people for the Games, it's made me wonder, where are they?" Paul Richardson, a 37-year-old photographer, told Reuters on Monday at London Bridge, which the authorities had warned commuters to avoid.

WORKING FROM HOME

Part of the lighter load has come from those office workers who have been instructed or allowed to work from home while the Olympics are on.

Consultancy firm KPMG told Reuters that it expected some 50 percent of its 5,500 staff in London to work flexibly at some point during the Games.

"That could mean working from home, or a different office, or varying hours," a KPMG spokesman said.

Most theatres in London's West End have not seen traffic increase or fall for advanced August bookings and shut down last Friday to avoid clashing with an opening Olympic ceremony, which starred Britain's Queen Elizabeth, Society of London Theatre President Mark Rubinstein told Reuters on Tuesday.

He said the anecdotal evidence was that there seemed to be a lot of people on the streets of London, but much of the seasonal London tourist traffic seems missing from the West End.

"There's been fewer people buying tickets on the day," Rubinstein said.

Britain's two biggest airports said they had seen no significant increase in the number of passengers flying abroad while Eurotunnel said outward bound bookings on Channel Tunnel trains were slower than usual.

More than 10 million people braved torrential rain and then scorching summer temperatures to see the Olympic flame on its 8,000 mile (12,870 km) journey across the length and breadth of the United Kingdom, according to Games organiser LOCOG.

Only one in 10 travellers is leaving London to avoid the Games, according to a survey by the Association of British Travel Agents. Seven out of 10 Londoners were even looking forward to the Games, the survey showed.

"Numbers taking holidays at this time are fairly consistent with past years," said ABTA spokeswoman Victoria Bacon.

"While some have chosen to forgo a summer holiday during the Games, these have been balanced by those wanting to get away," she said.

That statistical and anecdotal evidence contrasts with the doomsday predictions by some of the British media that Londoners would flock to foreign shores to avoid the security checks, crowds and chaos of the Olympics.

DISAPPOINTED RETAILERS

Retailers in central London have also reported disappointment with the Olympic effect so far.

Jace Tyrrell, spokesman for New West End Company, which represents more than 600 retailers, property owners and businesses in central London, said they expected a change in trading patterns, but that advice from Transport for London (TfL) warning commuters may be working better than intended.

"TfL's advice in terms of capacity on the network has almost been too successful," Tyrrel told Reuters, adding that shopper numbers were down but there were more high-spenders in the British capital.

"We need to change the messaging there, in terms of there aren't the difficulties on the network that we thought there would be."

However, retail areas near the Olympic Park such as the vast Westfield shopping centre at the entrance were booming.

John Lewis, Britain's biggest department store group, said its store at Westfield Stratford, which borders the Olympic Park, saw sales double in the week to July 28.

Other London tourist attractions also complained that there has been a 30 to 35 percent drop in visitor numbers at the height of their summer high season, when schools are out and many people take their vacations.

Bernard Donoghue, chief executive of The Association of Leading Visitor Attractions, the body representing London's top tourist attractions such as the London Zoo, St Paul's Cathedral and Westminster Abbey said the statistics apply to overseas and domestic visitors.

"We and all of our members are incredibly positive about London and Britain hosting the Olympics not least because the tourism legacy of hosting the Olympics and having that global TV advertisement for Britain to the world's largest TV audience will be brilliant for British tourism in the long term."

HOTELS AND CAFES

Hotel wholesaler JacTravel said room rates are back to normal levels, as an early peak in prices has faded as LOCOG returns previously booked rooms to the market and as the Olympic Games deters normal London tourists.

Restaurants and other hospitality business owners such as cafes have also been bemoaning the quiet streets of London.

"It is very quiet," said Duli Konjuhi, who runs a coffee stall right at the exit of Aldgate tube station in London's City, the old banking district, where usually bankers and office workers line up for their after-lunch shot of caffeine.

"For us the Olympics are negative," he said. "One of my friends, who runs a car wash near-by, said he made just 60 quid yesterday."

An elderly British man, finishing a meal at a near-empty restaurant in the central Russell Square area where hordes of media catch coaches to Olympic venues every day asked the head waiter: "Where are all your customers?"

The waiter explained that many Londoners were working at home or avoiding the city for the duration of the Games.

"It's a disaster for us," he said.

I never mentioned whether it was blacks, hispanics or native Americans who were excluded from voting, that was your interpretation of my post which is obviously prejudiced against anybody non white.

'if you can't do the time don't do the crime'

I dont remember implying that anyone being unable to face upto the punishment couldn't take their punishment - They have by being sent to jail or fined etc, and now they are being made to pay for the rest of their lives by being denied the right to vote.

I'm not going to bother answering the rest of your post as it doesn't seem worth my while Roger as you seem quite happy for people to be subjugated and treated like serfs if their intelligence doesn't meet your required benchmark,

Many Australians can trace their ancestry back to convicts transported from the UK - Perhaps there should be a barr on voting if there is any history of convictions in the family - That proposal is just as stupied as the Florida ban on ex offenders voting btw but I'm sure there would be enough crackpots in oz who would support such an idea if they thought it would ensure a right wing government!

It has been shown that, in the US specifically, that the Hispanics and blacks are the main instances of urban poor and that's not a racist comment but a simple truism. I for one - and so are many others - fed up withe leftists of this world telling the MAJORITY how they should think and that includes being branded racists if we dare say a black man committed a crime. If we say a white man committed a crime where are the cries of "racist" then?

The whole b.....y thing's lopsided and it's time rational common sense again prevailed. Those of us on the so-called right of politics are usually the conservative common sense level headed ones - it's the 'left' that makes it the purpose to disrupt, revolt and overturn established ways and traditions. What is the first thing these revolting revolutionaries do when they depose the established government ? They open the prisons and let out all those incarcerated without a thought as to why they are there in the first place. It doesn't matter if they're the scum of the earth, the former government put them in gaol so they have to be innocent.

I remember Joan BAEZ singing about people in gaols in the sixties and how they ought to be all released and I thought, "typical idiot idealistic revolutionary menace".

" perhaps there should be a barr on voting if there is any history of convictions in the family" -what a damned silly comment to make. The criminal history of a man dies with him - if he committed murder that does not make his son a murderer.

Dear Rog....pure nonsense...

I surmise you're of the left. As they say in the courts, "I rest my case".

left? right? who gives a ........

Hi Dav,

I personally believe that after a person has "paid their debt to society" in whatever measure demanded by the justice system, they should have their voting rights restored. But there are many, many ultra-conservative people in the US who would not agree.
Of those in our American criminal class, I would say an almost immeasurably small number were convicted for stealing food to feed their starving families. Most of our criminal "poor" are arrested with $100,000 in cash in one pocket and a bunch of crack cocaine in the other.

Denying the unemployed the right to vote would likely be a very poorly received idea here. Although in practice, we all know that working class folks are the modern day slaves and the wealthy, although they cast only one ballot per voter just like the poor, wield their power thru unlimited campaign contributions.

Charlieost,

Yes, I am an American. I think your theory on America invading other countries when they don't like their election results may have a grain of truth but is mostly tinfoil hat wearing conspiracy theorist type stuff.
True, our foreign policy has tended to include pounding the crap out of countries who harbor, train and support terrorism. I'm OK with that to some extent, however I wish my government would do much less of it.
I suspect that you and your countrymen have benefited greatly from the reduced threat of terrorism at the expense of the American taxpayer... so you're welcome.

ric-mac

Our American press is very lopsided. They tend to unmercifully skewer Republicans and overzealously coddle Democrats. Having said that, I consider myself neither Republican or Democrat, but Independent... Libertarian if you like. We do have one media outlet "Fox News" owned by british media magnate Rupert Murdock. Fox News or "Faux News" as some folks call them, is basically a propaganda machine for the Republican party. On the other hand, CNN are literally the lapdogs of Obama.

Molly,
We let Brits influence our politics as well. Ever heard of a fellow named Rupert Murdoch? He owns and controls the largest Republican leaning media propaganda machine "Fox News" as well as "The Wall Street Journal."
No, I have never heard of Bob Diamond.

You have still not answered my questions on whether people should be denied a vote forever because they have commited some misdeamour in the past,

'Those of us on the so-called right of politics are usually the conservative common sense level headed ones'

Yeah sure - Thatcher, Reagen, Pinnochet...........

Besides that you are still talking about blacks and Hispanics when I never mentioned them in the first place - My point was the voting ban encompasses all races and religions and therefore affects whites as well,
Who exactly are the leftists telling you what to do?

My last comment btw was said tongue in cheek as obviously I dont think it is a good idea either, as the thought of somebody being accountable for their ancestors crimes is prepostorous - Dont think it would take much for the Right in the US or Oz to latch onto though if they thought it would deprive the 'leftists' of voters!

Hi Timothy,

I'm glad you agree that once somebody has paid their debt to society they should be free to vote,
Furthermore the idea of denying the unemployed a vote is a throwback to landowners and serfs,
There was one poster on here recently who thought it was a perfectly reasonable idea despite having periods of unemployment himself.
When Obama was pushing through his healthcare reforms there was tv footage of a guy demonstrating against free healthcare for all people who broke his leg in a scuffle on the demostration.
Turns out he was unemployed and had no health cover. The cost of fixing his leg came to over 1000 dollars and he was asking the public to donate towards his treatment in hospital precisely because he had no means of paying himself!

Hi Timothy. It is quite wonderful to read your posts as it gives me a great insight into the way situations can be viewed froma different angle. When I mentioned American troops invading a country because their masters did not like the goverment that these people elected I was refering to Grenada during the scum Reagan administration.

American foreign policy and interference in the politics of other countries has contributed to the problems with terrorism throughout the world.

Would you guys just stay home please. I understand that only ten per-cent of Americans ever leave their country. If you could get that down to no per-cent the world would be a safer place.

Best wishes, Charlie.

Charlie,
I'll re-visit this point, although I don't think it was lost on you.
I agree that Americans should stay home!! I get a sizable chunk taken out of every hard-earned paycheck to pay for troops being sent abroad to places I don't give two shiites about... also, BILLIONS of dollars just handed out freely by the American government (robbed first from the taxpayers) to aid foreign countries.
I apologize if I sound heartless... but I prefer that the money I earn goes to aid me... and my family. If I wish to help some underprivileged person financially, then I'd like to pick them myself.
I am in whole-hearted agreement with you that America should keep to themselves.