mstuk

I agree the field was weak and I did not opine as to the respective merits of either tour rather to the American poster who maintained that if you had not won on the PGA tour you had no bragging rights or some such thing . I suggest rather than taking my comment out of context you upbraid him for his !

Your arrogance is truely astounding half the worlds top 10 plays on the european tour and lest we forget this is a ranking sysytem that provides considerable assistance to anyone playing in the US full time in terms of their ability to accumulate points. In the last 10 ryder cups europe has retained the trophy on 6 occassions to the 4 of the US .

Thank you for making my point for me

It is astonishing is it not the degree of myopia demostrated by so many of the American posters to this thread , are you not embarrassed by your lack of familiarity with anything not American in origin or purvue ? Whilst I agree that Tiger Woods is a global Phenomenon and that no doubt Muhamed Ali must be recognised as possibly the best known sportman of all time I find your assertion of the likes of Babe Ruth , Michael Jordan and Lance Armstrong to laughable in the face of your ignorance regarding any sports not mainstream in America. I do not dispute that each of those men are truely great sportsmen and quite possibly unique in their achievements but at least I can consider them in conjuction with other great sportsman from sports far more popular than anything played predominatley in the United States. I feel fairly certain that in overall global terms you will find that Pele , George Best and David Beckham are all better known that Ruth , Armstrong or Jordan .

Obviously being an Englishman I could not vote in your election but it seems to me that Obama won because he promises hope that things can change for the better for all people . He engaged much more empathetically with swing voters of all persuassions and races. His team also seemed to rely less on the rather the rather demeaning negative campaigning undertaken by the republicans which it seems to me always smacks of a party that fears the message of its opponents and so attacks the character. lastly Macain doomed himself when he chose Palin to be his running mate I would have thought all but the most die hard reublicans thought twice about the idea of her becoming president in the event of the Mcains demise. Sure some people voted for Obama because he is black but many people voted for Macian because he is white and some people will always vote this way but in my opinion more people voted because of the content of Obamas character than the colour of his skin and I applaud them for doing so .

Sorry to drag you back in brother but that's in the nature of debate I guess . one point I would like to make to you given your several referances to my reading choices perhaps you should read the posts you reply to , at no pont did I agrue that the current world economic problems were caused only by George . W . Bush furthermore I never suggested that he was responsible for all the worlds violence. What I said in reply to a previous post was that I thought the gentlemen who felt his family would be safer and better off under a republican Government was making a specious arguement which ignored the evidence of the last eight years.So I am afraid to say that the only myopia appears to be yours . Prior to when your country became the victim of an act of barbaric terrorism carried out in it's own borders there is no doubt that the vast majority of non state sponsored funding for the IRA came for the USA . It was clear that the IRA was veiwed by a number of Irish americans as a group of freedom fighters rather than terrorists and successive US goverments did little to curtail these fund raising activities. I am glad you mention Hammas I believe that the Bush administration refused to recognise democratically elected officials of hammas Not a great example of democracy in action . Your points regarding Iran and North Korea with regard to the use of atomic weapons whilst having some merit do overlook the fact that your counrty is the only one to have used these weapons . Regarding Al Quaeda I would agree with you entirely they are an organisation that utterly digsusts me and I fully support the actions of our goverments in Afghanistan however dont suggest to me for a minute that Iraq has anything to do with Al quaeda . Whilst I aslo would not argue that Saddam Hussein was a tyrant who got what he desearved I am quite this was something that should have been undertaken during the first Gulf War , the second Gulf war was in my opinion motivated by a desire of US admistration to secure a more influential position in the middle east and to secure a future reliable oil supply. I will leave you to ponder a discussion that myself and a pal had the other day . We are both in our middle forties and can both remember when we were growing up the US was pehaps the most admired and respected country in the world , how did the US become one of the least respected and most disliked countries in the world in the space of 40 years ? To get back on track Barrack Obama gives me hope that the situation can be reversed and I pray to God that he can achieve this because that will make the world a better place for all of us .

Living in London I am well aware of the acts of terrorism carried out by the IRA , apparently many of your counrtymen were not until 9/11 however given the amount of fund raising that went on in the US. As to your assertion that George Bush's policies have not caused more violence in the world well thats just plain laughable.

Well we can't overlook the current economic situation since it has been created by an almost total lack of regulation of the capital and derivatives markets in the USA allied with almost completely unrestrained lending also in the US. As to your second point it should be clear even to the most patrotic of Americans that your foreign policy during the Bush years has made the world a much more dangerous place and indeed it could be argued had contributed more to this situation than anything else.

It seems to me that under the Republican president of the last 8 years you family are worse off financially and live in a world that is far more dangerous for them so I consider your arguement to be rather specious I am afraid.

I think the other issue it seems to me is that having a single behind you can be quite off putting do you let him through even though there is nowhere for him to go ?

Well in that case why not allow people to own a nuclear bomb its the same arguement you are making just on a greater scale is it not? The Iraq example seems frankley rather inappropriate given the situation and the reasons for it . I am pretty sure most of the people who have perpetrated all the recent school shootings both in the US and europe were not criminals before they acted , they did however have access to automatic weapons .

Seems odd that you would have such a strident view and feel the need to confirm it in writing given you have never seen one of the two players ever play . Surely in the absence of first hand experience one must simply look at the respective acheivements of the two and that being the case at this time the answer can only be Jack Nicklaus . the question is not who is the worlds greatest player now the question is not who will eventually become the worlds greatest player

well he has to win 5 more majors to be europes best ever and he is still a young man so I agree he could well become the number 1 majr winner this side of the pond . Always has been a mystery to me why he has not won at Augusta he is long off the tee and a great putter exactly what you need to win the Masters.

so why did you bring him up then ?

I have my doubts that Tiger will even enter the Masters.

True story , many years ago whilst in NY for a oboard meeting I attended the rangers vs the canadians at madison sq garden . It was my first taste of ice hockey which was enlivened by the fact that as soon as we sat down I caught the puck , did not know what it was at first but caught it . Our chairman sitting one seat to my right said " i have been coming here 25 years and never caught the puck you have been here 25 seconds and have you SOB! It was the only time all night I ever saw the damm thing !

I think the answer is self evident any 20 hcap who can hit a 300 yrd drive slices into the heavy rough on the right or hooks into the heavy rough on the left on almost every tee , they lose 5 balls a round and never make more than 2 greens in regulation , which they then 3 putt. So they can hit a 300 yrd drive big deal .

This is manifest nonsense the whole point to dark matter is that it does not interact with matter in the baryonic universe other than on a very weak scale certainly infintesimally smaller scales than those required by electromagnetism.

This is not entirely true if one accepts that the expansion of the universe is being driven by dark energy . If one accepts that position then one has to also ponder that energy is being created in violation of the second law of thermodynamics .

You are of course entitled to your opinion however should you ever come to the UK to play consider how much richer your experience is by having access to St Andrews , Turberry , Royal birkdale , Ballybunnion , Lahinch and all the other great championship courses and compare that with the US.

I have made this point before and I will make it again , it is an absolute disgrace that in the United States most private clubs do not offer the facility to allow visitors some sort of access to the course . Here in the UK I can think of only three courses that have this sort of policy and not one of them host any sort of major event. Golf was not meant to be the preserve of the few and I am glad that to an extent we have eradicated that notion in the UK and I think it's very sad that you have not managed to in the US.

I thought it was beneficial to have rust on one's wedges since it improves the degree of spin imparted , is that not so ?

well thats a well reasoned construct related to the topic under discussion well done !

I was under the impression we were discussing Boo weekleys inciting the crowds during the course of playing the hole , I have no problem at all with the way the US fans behaved only hios actions

please give examples of european players inciting crowds during the play of a hole and i will recant and apologise