@ Ed Blackshaw

"They were smart enough to blow up everything EXCEPT you. How much smarter do you want?"

Fair point. I just always figured I had matching shields or something.

@Mithvetr

"I always wondered why the game-blitzing, one-shot weapons you used to get in old Spectrum and Amiga shooter games were called 'smart-bombs', when clearly they were dumb as bricks."

They were smart enough to blow up everything EXCEPT you. How much smarter do you want?

letters and/or digits

@AC 13:58

"Or is he saying "I'm an idiot who can't read beyond the headlines"?"

Well. yes, pretty much. I'd think that was fairly obvious. He's an attention-seeker who can't see past the end of his nose. He wants to hit out at 'authority', so he hits* what looks like authority to him. His childishly simplistic ideas about politics give him a reason to feel all big and growed-up about doing something that, let's face it, any idiot could do given the right scripts.

(* Well, I say 'hits'. More like 'flails at'.)

@ Martin 6:

"I can think of a few ways to scam people if you own this process."

True enough. It would be a good idea if website operators - including public services - could be persuaded to educate the public about how the Internet works. For example: you don't commit any information to the Internet if you don't think you can control the damage when it's made publicly available.

@ Cameron Colley:

"You may well jest, but the last time I looked the number for the police was not 999 but some 0898 number or something"

I doubt it. 0898 was discontinued in the Big Number Change in 2000. You may be thinking of 0845, which is a national rate number (as opposed to premium rate) used by a lot of forces for their non-emergency lines. Many, like my local force, are now switching to 0345 which provides contact at local rate from anywhere in the country and is cheaper for mobiles*.

(* 'Cos who needs nouns when you've got a handy adjective to use on its own instead?)

@ John Naismith:

"You'll find that most people regardless of religious "beliefs" behave much the same in the UK - they don't give a fuck about anyone else."

Hang on, woah. Are you implying that you think the people of the UK should behave like those prissy 'civilised' types you get in those foppish European countries? Like showing 'respect' and 'compassion', following 'rules', and all that lah-di-dah rubbish? We don't take kindly to that sort of thing around here. Next you'll be telling us you think we should be saying 'hello' or some shit to our neighbours instead of telling them to fuck off and smashing their windows. You know you, right? I bet you weren't even properly pissed up when you were typing that shit, were you? Probably been drinking 'in moderation', or some such frilly cosmopolitan crap.

@ AC 15:37:

"US only fire smart bombs into Pakistan. Smart bombs, are by definition, intelligent."

Yeah. I always wondered why the game-blitzing, one-shot weapons you used to get in old Spectrum and Amiga shooter games were called 'smart-bombs', when clearly they were dumb as bricks.