No it's not, the post is actually quite an good description of what the poster appears to have been doing and offers the poster some good advice into the bargain.

I don't think so, Didn't the British lay waste to Peking at the end of the 1800's due to a disagreement between the Chinese Emperor and themselves over whether they should kow-tow to the Emperor ?

It sounds to me like you need to get yourselves a Maggie Thatcher, she was able to sort out the corrupt mining unions here in the UK good and proper.

You seriously took 30Kg of gear for a one day hike ? WTF for you masochist.

That sounds like a pretty reasonable offer, given the success the US has had capturing Bin Laden in the years since.

I see one fault in your logic. Rewarding warlords with "peace-time hush-money" only sets precedence for other countries at conflict with the United States

Almost certainly true but nevertheless exactly what the US is already doing. You can clearly see in these documents that the local warlords are more than happy to accept "compensation" when the US accidentally slaughters there people. It's higly likely they are equally willing to accept large monetary gifts in order to not offer support the Taliban, or stop growing poppies etc etc.

The British were trying specifically to not conquer Afghanistan for a number of reasons. All they really wanted was a buffer state between India and Russia ruled by interests sympathetic to the British. Unfortunately the first attempt was commanded by an incompetant and aged buffoon who was scared of refusing ridiculous requests from their Afghan proxy to pay out bribes and keep the British troops well out of the way of Kabul in a makeshift encampment at the mercy of elements and with insufficient food.

The second attempt was much more successful and Russian plans for invasion of India scuppered for good.

Even with ID cards you still need to provide proof of address to open a bank account. One of the people who did buy one explained this on Radio 4 this morning. He used his driving licence so in fact it turns out that having an ID card did not make opening bank accounts any easier.

Yeah, ramp up that TERROR, turn the dial to PANIC !

Are you scared yet citizen ? Are you ...

I'd like to second this opinion.

You'll be bored out of your mind after a week in London, never mind two, so get out and explore the rest of the British countryside.

Perhaps avoid the Lake District at the moment though.

No chance.

Guess what, people designing systems on which peoples lives actually directly depend do not simply rip out some old box from an office when they need a new server.

Likewise any system like the stock exchange, in situations like that companies don't care how much money they throw at stuff and since it's their money they're going to be losing if it goes wrong they are generally very careful indeed about randomly hooking up critical infrastructure to the internet.

Accenture and the other big consulting companies have a horrendous track record [yafla.com] for building failed projects at a very high cost. The moment someone says "let's hire Accenture to build this" is the moment the costs go up dramatically.

Indeed they do and one of the reasons for this is their reliance on subpar Microsoft technolgies which they seem to be tied to even when, as in this case, much more effective technology exists elsewhere.

Reeks of nationalism !

Is there anything wrong with being proud of the country you live in ?

Both you and the other guy do seem to think we live in some of sort of ideal world which, as I pointed out, we don't. If you completely open the borders and let anyone in who wants to come then what you're going to end up with is a massive underclass unable to function properly in the country their living in whilst the countries they came from are completely emptied as everyone leaves. That is surely far far away from any sensible method of building an ideal world yet one which, curiously, you and the other guy seem quite keen on. Basically I think you're both just unrealistic and are having difficulty seeing the things the way they are rather than the way you'd like them to be,

Yes those ones, the ones in the back of the trucks are, when they are discovered by the police told to report immediately to their nearest immigration centre for processing and then left to go on their way with the police trusting to the immigrants honour that they will do as instructed. Needless to say a lot of them subsequently go missing never to be seen again.