????

I think the utterly useless Prince Charles would tick most boxes...

..and, of course, the bald, short sighted pub singer

Good for florists mind

100

At a straight forward level deriviatives are an effective risk management product agreed Snorky - what's happened with them for 15 years is not and much of our economy has been based on the latter!! Don't worry Snorky - The crowing left will get a real shock soon when they see how dependent they have been on the hated city to keep their 'Diversity Officers' in ?40K a year jobs. Among the biggest sinners in this sorry state has been government - and our great man for a crisis GB - that have spunked the gains of our spivs on dole, 'Diversity positions' and other massive increases in Public Sector salaries (see Doctors) without ANY improvement in services or investment in our infrastructure. We've all been on a massive binge on cars, houses, etc, etc and now it's pay back time, and that, my friends, is a FACT.

erm, Jeremy how much do you know about derivatives as that effects my response - I don't want to patronise or bamboozle.... since the early 90s mortgage deriviatives have been sliced up and sold on as safe investments (with backed AAA ratings) these safe 'assets' have then been used by the banks and other financial institutions to raise further capital - this is 'gearing' or 'leverage'. Some say that banks have in effect been allowed (by other banks) to raise upto 35 times their asset (including these paperless mortgage deriviatives) position - imagine getting a mortgage for 35 times your income! This capital is all electronic/on paper so not 'real' and this is has then been taken back out to the market (credit market) to sell and then be sold on again by said fiancial institution to raise more money to bolster up its 'asset' position etc etc...that's basically the same principle as pyramid selling. Anyway, the bottom line is that now these $1 assets are now going forabout 9c on the open market and many organisations/pension funds/banks/etc etc thus had hugely inflated values that have now gone...no winners just losers, and mainly you and I. Effectively imagine that the global economy has just opened its wallet and taken out 30% of its cash and burned it - no transfer, no productivity, just money that wasn't really there but we -individuals/governemnets/banks/pension funds- thought that we had just gone...gonna painful for everyone, but worse for us, this country and city have benefitted enourmously from this false position as we were part inverntors and certailnly willing participants in the massive self-delusion that has now gone...for good.....

the fact that TFL use the word "Alight" for "get off"...I'm always thinking to myself "ooh I must alight at the next stop"

Yes, I have happy memories of the Old Den....avoiding bottles on the Old Kent Road..."Chimminee, chimchiminee, chim, chim cherooo..we smashed your pub up at quarter to two" etc.... ..I miss the old football (no irony)...but I wouldn't have taken my kids!

A pity the football's crap because the Championship's far more exciting and unpredictable.....C'mon you Owls ;-)

er....if the Hammers beat Hull I think they go above Man U.... Annasfield I know you're not a plastic

Isn't the Premiership sooooo exciting...the top 4? The usual suspects and as sickengly their legion of plastic fans going on about their 'footie' teams.. *pukes

Don't = two words

I always had a bit of a worrying 'thing' for Tessa Sanderson (but not Fatima Whitbread I hasten to add)

What happened to the fight?

So acting as a global guaranteer of trade in commodities will make up for the massive loss in all the trad Investment Banking revenue we've generated since Big Bang, the 10 years plus of pyramid selling of deriviatives that has pumped billions into our economy and as importantly has (falsley) stood as an asset on GB PLC's balance sheet...er and that includes your and mine properties, pension funds and investments, all the 'sophisticated' investment vehicles such as hedgefunds...all replaced by the fact that we can still be counted a decent gurantor of chinese pork-bellies? Come on Hugenot, the almost 20 year old party in the city of London has ended as has the boom in international finance, of course we'll still have expertise and a share but of a massively diminished global market with very little appetite for sophisticated value adding (I tried to write that with a staright face)financial products. Massive bonuses, huge tax revenues to the government, massive contribution to our balance of payments....all gone for good in the last few months. Shit, I'll expect we'll be taking the cotton wool out of those closed mines and learning to make things again pretty damned soon. We have a very tough few years ahead....Singapore won't escape unscathed either fella but will be better than us....

And what's your counter argument then Jeremy? Other than abuse and blind optimism...Come on economic sage

Slade JaffaCakes TopGear The Spectator

Yes - it's like Wife Swap, and as about instructive, they're really going to pick a 'normal' set of people as that would make riveting TV

The house of cards that has underpinned the UK economy for 20 plus years, Financial Services (15% of UK GDP) and especially the very high value add bit eg Investment banking - and clever associated investment vehicles - has, in case anyone hasn't noticed, been exposed as a long running pyramid selling schemes on a global basis. London's position as the global finance centre is now outdated and f*cked and the associated jiggery pokery (auditing/legal/venture capitalism)which underpins much of London's wealth and income is also f*cked...and yet East Dulwich is somehow in a unique position to escape the carnage that will be the next 2 years and the slow overall recovery of our economy hopefully into new areas of enterprise that will be the next 10? Pray how? We are mostly in for a decline in real incomes, massive falls in asset values (houses, pensions, endowments)that's going to last a fair old bit....this isn't a recession it's a fundamental shift......hey, maybe we'll be better people for it...

Nope I'm a darkhaired bstard

mmm...woman and the old 'intelligent, sensitive man' shite again...I've heard it soooo often and then the said lady leaves with the tall, glint in his eyes, darkhaired, basteward, time after time after time.. methinks etc You just really, really, really do wish it was that way ladies...but you know it's a load of old bull

I think the situation in East Dulwich is trivial and irrellevant...the whole country is fucked for 10 years plus

It shows how out of touch GB and politicians are if they think this slimeball can make things better just because he's a sharp political operator,, a) He's never done a proper job b) He's where he is today because of who his family are and bugger all else (also see Milliband) c) Even the political job's he's done he's been shit at d) Puke

It's a largely white and almost uniquely for the South East largely working class city...so most people on here would find it appalingly chavvy and common.....in reality, it's a decent place, with scary but largely decent inhabitants with a feel of a northern town

Give it 5 years and you'll get an above a shop one bed roomed flat on LL for twenty of your english pounds