ckdstudent

Yes, I suppose you do get into wars eventually, when its in your own self-interest to do so after you've been attacked. Of course if you hadn't got involved then America would have been facing the entire world and have lost, no matter how powerful you consider your country to be. Who cracked the Enigma code again?

We don't have accents, that'd be everyone else with one of those. Police state? I must've missed something. No offense but I've never seen anything to suggest any real oppression. Now in a police state the police would probably carry stun guns, machine guns, pepper spray, wear bullet proof armour, and so on. Most of ours don't even carry guns. Please tell me the Americans aren't like their beer! The reason the stereotypes survive, and this isn't just the States and England but all countries, is that when touring people seem to almost try to live up to their stereotypes, doing things they'd never do back home out of some universal instinct. And yes, I'm as guilty of this as anyone else as I proved when I was almost ill after asking for tea and being given some herbal stuff.

Our guard is formed by relaxing the arms down by the sides, making a fist, then bringing the rear fist up to sit by the chin and the front up to shoulder-level in a v-shape. At least that's the technical guard, as time goes by and people advance in ranks the guard tends to start to 'float' which is very rarely an advantage an more often simple laziness, so closest to the boxing style. The lazy guard works when you're training with people who aren't as good as you, which is why seniors tend to pick it up, unfortunately it doesn't work against someone as good or better.

Fried chicken tastes so good though.

Depends on the type of fighting actually, for most brawling then probably men would win, having more sheer aggression. For anything requiring a level head and calm I'd have to say then the woman would probably have the edge.

He won the popular vote, not the actual one. Besides, which president gets into power makes very little difference anyway. Switzerland, due to the fact that their banks (used to anyway) promise absolute secrecy, so its a great place for drug barons, government officials, high-level Enron managers, and so on to hide their gains. Also has approximately a 51% income tax rate, but you can't have it all. So why do they check my passport each time I visit? More to the point if America is an idea that every American holds then why do they have so much trouble agreeing on what it means? A terrorist attack had to be carried out to prove he was the right man for the job? Lets all hope we don't get too many more like him then. Isn't religion meant to be seperate from the state in America, in fact wasn't it one of the founding principles? Seems to me like we've got more seperation between the two over here. Which god exactly is he blessed by? Tell that to Vietnam, or Cuba, or China, or any of the others you've got trade restrictions against. Not saying I don't necessarily agree with you, but there's a lot of people who don't share your point of view. Look around at the people in ghettos, the poor, the homeless, those who've been chucked away by the capitalist system. No, yours is not the best out there, and its not even close to perfect. The duty, it is not a right. It is also a known fact that those who most desire power are those least suited to hold it. Whose peace exactly? I wonder, perhaps because America always insists that it doesn't need help and continues to pursue an isolationist policy? I suppose this help includes funding anti-British terrorist organisations like the IRA in your spare time? Bombing pharmaceutical factories in breach of international law in retaliation for embassy bombings? Putting trade restrictions on countries already suffering? Rebuilt them? Which cities would these be? And did you rebuild the people who were killed in them? I'm not trying to be anti-American, I kind of like the country, there's a kind of innocent naivity and youth about it, with patriotism still fresh in people's minds and people still going on about how old this or that house is (I live ten minutes away from a medieval castle and one of the oldest churches in England), but it is not a perfect country, and it is not the best country, people often neglect to consider that not everyone in the world is American, now matter how hard America is trying to change that.

All men are mildly autistic, making it harder for us to associate emotion with action. Autism is a physical phenomena, not psychological, upbringing has some effect but in essence men are simply less capable of showing their emotions. Strength-wise take it back to stone-age times and evolution through history. In general (please don't take offense at this, its true) women were the gatherers, cultivating the fields and harvesting. Men were hunters, going out, slaughtering animals (and each other). These two occupations suit different physical archetypes, a hunter should be aggressive, vicious, unemotional (try feeling bad whenever you shoot a deer) and able to generate power quickly. A gatherer needs patience, a good sense of time (seasons for example), and calm. Both need stamina and all-round fitness. Oh, and incidentally a recent study discovered that being 'muscle-bound' (Shwarzenegger style) is considered unnattractive and even repellent by the vast majority of people. Much preferred is toned muscles rather than sheer bulk.

There's something called the Geneva Convention, take a look at it sometime. There is absolutely no reason any nation's military should be exempt from prosecution for war crimes under an international court.

Best economy? Enron? And that other company? Two of your biggest have just collapsed, nearly taking the stock market with them. I'd hardly call America the most advanced either. What are the evidences of advancement? Perhaps a way that the state cares for all people in medicine, pensions and so on? That'd be Germany. Maybe a place where everyone is trained in the weapons which they own, and which has never been involved in a war since Roman times. That'd be Switzerland. America is certainly not the most advanced, merely the richest and with some of the biggest weapons.

When it's done well (Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Romeo Must Die, The Matrix or A Man Called Hero) then its great. When its done badly I just don't want to see it. (Iron Monkey pushed the boundary).

Jet Li - definitely, in Lethal Weapon 4 they had to slow him down to give Mel Gibson a reasonable fight scene with him, and get his techniques on film. Jackie Chan - probably. He can certainly pick stuff up and hit people with it effectively.

Lemme see, it took me ten years, the bare minimum that it can take anyone in my art is three years.

We're expected to keep our do-boks clean and ironed, or at the least wrinkle free. Whenever we go out after a class or anything most people just chuck on a t-shirt or something and leave the do-bok trousers as they are simply to save time. Respecting your uniform though? I can see the reasoning behind it, and its not necessarily a bad thing, we just don't do it. Same as you might treat a tracksuit. You'd want it clean, and you'd probably want it ironed for comfort and so you look a little smarter than you would otherwise, but after training you wouldn't particularly worry about folding it up because its only going in the wash anyways.

I once heard a wise man say 'Train with a partner, practice alone'. To be honest there's a lot of debate as to whether you can learn from books or videos, the most common opinion I've heard is that while you can refine techniques using them you actually need to know the techniques first so that you know what's being talked about.

I don't do point fighting. And I said I'd do whatever was necessary to walk away from the fight. That includes ignoring insults, tripping someone over, punching them and then running, or yes, whacking them over the head with a bottle. I just find it amusing that people get so upset over a sport.

And that ladies and gentleman is the species known as footballus huligani dumbassus. A common feature of European sporting grounds, often congregating around bars and only voicing their war cries when in a group or at a safe distance. Its a game. They make the best calls they can, sometimes they make a mistake. Get over it.

Yes, and if you lose by keeping your honour you keep the medical bills. With regards to people attacking me I'll take fear over respect anytime.

Taking a fight to the ground in a nightclub is not a good idea, particularly if its crowded. For one thing you've got the bouncers to worry about, and then add in the crush of people all around waiting to accidentally step on you, fall on you, whatever. By the time you're finished you'll have half the club out for your blood.

I couldn't care less about looking weak. I just want to be the one to walk away from the fight. Honour is massively overrated, the people you're fighting aren't going to be fighting with honour, why should you?

Depends, if the person I'm up against is better than me with their hands then I'll try to stay distant and throw kicks. If they're better with their legs I'll usually step close and throw punches. If they're better at both I tend to go for stand-up grappling with traps, elbows, knees and a take down before running away.

But in American football you carry the ball, you barely use your feet. Hmm, maybe that says a lot about the language.

Whereas they call their version of rugby football because...uh...why do they call it football?

That does deaden the nerves, and to a degree causes microfractures in the shin which then calcify to make the bone stronger.

The shin is a very solid bone, you're unlikely to break it.

Probably not because they were watching football (soccer is the American version and this is the football world cup) but simply because so many people were watching some people were bound to happen to die at that time.