Man, the US sounds like a nightmare. I don't know why 'socialism' is such a dirty word there - your lives would be immeasurably improved if you adopted even a tiny bit of it.

25 days holiday is standard here in the UK, and you don't 'use those up' if you get sick. The very idea of a total allowable number of sick days is bizarre, frankly.

It must be noted that not all peadophiles are adults.

Also, what might be considered peadophilia in overly socially conservative countries such as the US might be perfectly legal in other countries. You do realise the age of consent varies throughout the world? It's 13 in Spain, for instance. I know it's 18 in some states in the US, which seems ludicrously late to a lot of Europeans, so *maybe* Stallman is talking about have sex with a 16 year old (which is fine), or someone who is under 16 having sex with someone else underage.

Having been to a number of counts, I can assure you that there is very little opportunity for these serial numbers to be linked to voters. There are many, many people around the papers at all stages, from the moment you vote to after the election is decided. Linking the numbers can only be done with an order by an Electoral Court if fraud is suspected. The papers are destroyed 12 months after the election.

Of course, in theory someone *could* get hold of the numbers and counterfoils, but I would argue that the risk of this when voting in person is way, way less than using postal votes. Postal votes are easily the largest source of fraudulent and intercepted votes in the UK.

Their civil liberties promises were just about as true as their 'no NHS reorganisation' ones.

They lied to get elected, and they lied big - about pretty much everything. They don't care about the deficit at all, they only care about making the UK suit their ideology, i.e. neoliberal free markets with the government morally judging everyone and deciding who is 'worthy'. Same old Tories.

Or you could vote for the Green Party, who would stop all of this nonsense and actually have a chance to implement it.

You realise that absolutely everything the Tories said to get elected was a lie, not just that? Same old Tories.

Actually, our Health Secretary (minister) Andrew Lansley is cutting funding and systematically destroying healthcare, so no, not all ministers will argue that their area is the most important.

No, that's not what I'm saying at all. The private companies shouldn't own any of it, just as here in the UK (although that is rapidly changing).

The UK's NHS is consistently shown to be one of, if not 'the', most efficient healthcare system in the world, and yet it's (currently) the one with the lowest level of private sector involvement among the developed nations. There is no evidence at all that private companies make things more efficient - in fact the evidence points the opposite way.

This is one of the many reasons why any private healthcare model is broken. As soon as there are financial incentives for anything the care of patients, both donors and recipients, is secondary.

I give blood and have a donor card. I do this willingly knowing that I am helping society. If my donated blood or organ was the source of profit for some company, would I donate? I don't know, but I can't see why some company should make a profit out of something I donated.

Private healthcare is a scourge. Nobody should be made bankrupt by illness, or even have to worry about it (financially). In the UK our NHS provides whatever you need, regardless of means - it's just a shame that the current government is in the process of destroying it as a reward to private healthcare companies who funded them at the last election.

UK taxes are by no stretch of the imagination 'excessive'. The poorest pay far more than the rich as a percentage of their income. We have a massively regressive tax regime, but then that's what you get when you have a government of millionaires and a public who are easily fooled into blaming the poor for everything.

If there isn't a candidate that represents you, stand yourself. What's stopping you? There is never a good excuse not to use your vote - if you don't vote nothing will change.

Expensive mess? The NHS is actually one of (if not 'the') most efficient healthcare systems in the world, whatever our present government might want you to believe: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/10375877

Actually, BR was both more efficient and much better for the UK economy. I just happen to have written a piece on this very subject a couple of days ago: http://www.dominictristram.com/2012/01/05/rail-fare-increase.html

...except that is exactly what they're not doing when the companies go bust, even when they are much more efficient when (briefly) run by the state.

The last government didn't do this either, despite a motion suggesting exactly this being passed by 2:1 at the 2004 Labour conference.

Unlikely, seeing as the three largest parties don't support renationalisation of the trains.