We're OUT

[Borchester]

Paddy finds a sandwich with two wires stickin out of it. He phones the police and says "Bejesas I've just found a sandwich dat looks like a bomb."
The operator asks, "is it tickin?, Paddy says "No I tink it's beef"

There is an American site I use. They are really decent folk and PC beyond belief. I will post your joke and see what happens 

[Thomas]

anyhow the thread has wandered a bit , but what i want to know is....are we still out the eu or what?

Anyone anywhere reporting any signs of the sky falling in or anyfing like that?

[Thomas]

Tea all over screen 

[DeppityDawg]

Paddy finds a sandwich with two wires stickin out of it. He phones the police and says "Bejesas I've just found a sandwich dat looks like a bomb."
The operator asks, "is it tickin?, Paddy says "No I tink it's beef"

Tea all over screen 

[Thomas]

Paddy finds a sandwich with two wires stickin out of it. He phones the police and says "Bejesas I've just found a sandwich dat looks like a bomb."
The operator asks, "is it tickin?, Paddy says "No I tink it's beef"

[Thomas]

Where they ate all the spuds.

In 1838 the British regular army totaled just over 91,000.

Nothing wrong with a few cheerful lies Gerry, but yours are really obvious.

Builders in Dublin made a grusome discovery when they knocked down a wall in an old house, behind it they found a skeleton with a medal around its neck, the medal said 'Irish Hide and seek Champion 1910

[Borchester]

Y. To ensure the food got out the British army had 200,000 troops in Ireland.

Where they ate all the spuds.

In 1838 the British regular army totaled just over 91,000.

Nothing wrong with a few cheerful lies Gerry, but yours are really obvious.

[Thomas]

Yes times were hard, but the difference being IRL was emptied of food, there was nothing there. It was mass genocide, plain and simple.

It was but it wasnt the english peoples fault as cromwell is insinuating.

It was the westminster elite , which is why 63 countries kicked them out and were glad to see the back of them.

If you look back on the thread and read a wee bit of the history of england , and what we were talking about the french , or more properly the norman french , you will see england suffered its hardships too in the immediate three hundred years after the conquest of england historically.

William the firsts harrowing of northern england and his slaughter of the english people in 1069/70 was one of the most brutal periods in english history ,and similarly regarded as a genocide.

I dont think anyone is saying the an gorta mor was caused by simplistic reasons , like running out of totties when your cupboards are full and then starving . similarly it wasnt caused by the ordinary english people.

No one with any sense blames some poor bugger in a bedsit in manchester or elsewhere for the starving of half the irish nation. Half the english hate westminster and their politicians as much as , if not more than the scottish or irish.

[GerryT]

No Gerry the rich and powerful took it,meanwhile in England a poacher desperate to feed his starving family would be hanged or if lucky? be transported.

Were you to go out at night with a a blackened face that too was a capital offence as were many others that would not merit such treatment.

Yes times were hard, but the difference being IRL was emptied of food, there was nothing there. It was mass genocide, plain and simple. Out of a population of 8m, 1m died and 1 to 2m emigrated, That's 1 in 3 people affected. To the best of my knowledge England was NOT going through a famine at the same time. To ensure the food got out the British army had 200,000 troops in Ireland. You can't compare what went on in England and Ireland at that time.

[Thomas]

I am not suggesting that the 1840s were much of a fun time for the Irish Tommy, although I am a bit dubious about the figures. It could be that the death toll was even higher. We just don't know. Cecil Woodham-Smith (I think), made the point that the population of Ireland was already falling before the 1840s because of large scale emigration. How true that was I do not know. Woodham-Smith was a magnificent writer, but I am not sure how accurate she was is hard to tell.

Sorry borkie , no sure i agree , i think thats a cop out to be honest. Like i said , an gorta mor is another story , and no point going into it all once more , i have made my personal view on the subject clear time and again.

Everything i have read says ireland and england population for many different reasons were absolutely sky rocketing in the first half thereabouts of the 19 th century , even scotland and wales. Unlike the constant wars of the 18th , the poor mortality rate , economic hardship etc etc , the 19th century saw better medicine , treatment , mass exploitation of the empire , better farming methods and a whole host of things that contributed to the population explosion.

Many european nations were the same as well , for similar reasons.

Irelands massive fall in population was and remains a complete anomaly in that period.

England makes up 40% if the land of these islands , of which something like three quarters of england is arable , so you traditionally had less of a popualtion than the other three celtic nations put together all through history.

The moderm period with england  having 80% of the popualtion is a complete historical anomaly , and of course isnt sustainable for many reasons.

Still, a plus for Scotland. As I posted earlier, in the 1840s the Scottish potato crop rotted in the ground but now British gardeners will be putting in orders for Scottish seed potatoes for the Spring planting.

I tell you Tommy, your spuds may be shit but your salesmen world class and that is the bit that counts

.

Sure borkie , but this old internal market shits alarms me a wee  bit. I want scotland to be a global trading nation , and drag its exports away from the uk market.

As patman usually says , thats the old empire trick of forcing nations to be captive audiences while westminster controls their trade , and in the past dictates price.

No point in having the best salesmen in the world or loads of mineral wealth and a strong economy while westmister plunders it.

I quite like the idea of independence what the irish have .

the paddies arent doing too bad for themselves , are they?

Their gdp growth the last i looked End 2018 was 6 times bigger than the uk economy controlled by westminster.

int it amazing what you can do when you are independent of westmisnter? On top of that their popualtion has grown  by three times as much as scotlands in percentage terms  over the last 15/ 20 years.

Im liking the sound of this independence lark borkie i must say.

[Borchester]

..but by feck borkie , i think you will be hard pushed in european history to show the loss of popualtion that ireland suffered as a result of the great hunger in any other country including scotland.

FFS the graph itself which cover almost 900 years of history  , only has the bubonic plague in the mid 14th century that comes anywhere close to the demographic devastation ireland suffered in 1840 onwards.

I am not suggesting that the 1840s were much of a fun time for the Irish Tommy, although I am a bit dubious about the figures. It could be that the death toll was even higher. We just don't know. Cecil Woodham-Smith (I think), made the point that the population of Ireland was already falling before the 1840s because of large scale emigration. How true that was I do not know. Woodham-Smith was a magnificent writer, but how accurate her figures were is hard to tell.

Still, a plus for Scotland. As I posted earlier, in the 1840s the Scottish potato crop rotted in the ground but now British gardeners will be putting in orders for Scottish seed potatoes for the Spring planting.

I tell you Tommy, your spuds may be shit but your salesmen world class and that is the bit that counts 

[Thomas]

I was just having a smile, it was the English I tell you, except the ruling class were French and Norman and had been for hundreds of years.
Which even Rob Roy inadvertently pointed out on another thread.

it wasnt inadvertently sheep . it was intentional.

Geoffrey Chaucer probably spoke French from his earliest age, for when he was born, the custom was still as Ranulph Higden (died 1364) described it a few years earlier:

    Children in school, contrary to the usage and custom of other nations, are compelled to drop their own language and to construe their lessons and other tasks in French, and have done so since the Normans first came to England. Also, gentlemen's children are taught to speak French from the time that they are rocked in their cradles and can talk and play with a child's toy; and provincial men want to liken themselves to gentlemen, and try with great effort to speak French, so as to be more thought of.
    (Polychronicon Ranulphi Higden monachi Cestrensis . . . ed. Rev. Joseph Rawson Lumby, [Liechtenstein] Krause Reprint, 1965 [Widener: Br 98.86.1].)

http://sites.fas.harvard.edu/~chaucer/language.htm

I think you will find it was borkie that was bumming up his french hero edward plantagenet sheep.

[Sheepy]

No Gerry the rich and powerful took it,meanwhile in England a poacher desperate to feed his starving family would be hanged or if lucky? be transported.

Were you to go out at night with a a blackened face that too was a capital offence as were many others that would not merit such treatment.

I was just having a smile, it was the English I tell you, except the ruling class were French and Norman and had been for hundreds of years.
Which even Rob Roy inadvertently pointed out on another thread.

[Borchester]

During the potato blight there was enough alternative food in Ireland to feed the Irish 3 times over, plenty of fruit,veg, beef, deer, pork, wheat, barley, honey etc..  but the English took it for themselves. Back then we Irish were under British control, their answer to the starvation was to send more Army troops to protect the food being exported to England so it wasn't stolen.

Oh stop whingeing. If it were not for the famine and Cromwell Ireland would not have any history

[cromwell]

During the potato blight there was enough alternative food in Ireland to feed the Irish 3 times over, plenty of fruit,veg, beef, deer, pork, wheat, barley, honey etc..  but the English took it for themselves. Back then we Irish were under British control, their answer to the starvation was to send more Army troops to protect the food being exported to England so it wasn't stolen.

No Gerry the rich and powerful took it,meanwhile in England a poacher desperate to feed his starving family would be hanged or if lucky? be transported.

Were you to go out at night with a a blackened face that too was a capital offence as were many others that would not merit such treatment.