Not accepting Sagan's great quote doesn't make it less true; it is a matter of the purest logic. In addition, Occam's Razor fits perfectly with atheism and a belief in science, the laws of nature and evolution as these are the simplest explanation for who we are and how we came to be.

There's a strong element of truth however, to what he's saying; six pro-union candidates versus three nationalist (PSF/SDLP/Alliance). The maths is obvious and will cost unionists dearly, especially when we get to the Westminster elections. Robinson and Nesbitt need to wake up, smell the coffee, put their egos away and establish a policy of agreed candidates.

The Conservatives should get the message that outside of a few pseudo-unionists in Holywood and Bangor, nobody on the unionist side will split the vote, especially for a party which states that it has "no strategic interest in NI"! As for the TUV; many of us may well sympathise with the rhetoric, but the split unionist vote is handing seats to republicans. It seems that unionists have learned little from the fleg situation.

I'd say "yes" to that. In fact there are very few calls for inquiries or human rights investigations into the murders of Soldiers and Police officers. Their grieving relatives bury their dead with dignity and accept that what they were doing carried a large element of risk.

I buried three colleagues, whose killers' have been identified to me, several of them being alive and well and now prominent members of PSF. I don't bleat about it and I don't need an inquiry to tell me the facts, that they died whilst doing their duty and accepted the risks.

Crossan was a ruthless, bloodthirsty murderer, would have killed me in a heartbeat and you to, if you'd disagreed with him.

Human being?

The words "horses' mouth" seem apt.

In reply to your question, I don't nor wouldn't want to represent loyalist paramilitaries of any brand, as I consider them all to be scum in the same manner as PIRA/INLA/New IRA etc. It's disingenuous at best to suggest that I would. Unionists have made many gestures of peace over the intervening years since the GFA. From Paisley displaying a publicly close relationship with the former O/C of PIRA in Londonderry, through Peter Robinson at a GAA match and the DUP agreeing to share in government with PSF, to UFF/UVF decommissioning. Innumerable numbers of loyalists have been involved in cross-community events and forums over this period

Most (unbiased) biblical scholars now accept that the historicity of this person called "Jesus" is questionable at best. Cameron's claim therefore, is that he is continuing the work of a deluded self-invented, would-be deity called Yeshu Ben Pantera, the illegitimate son of a soldier, who was stoned then hanged under Pontius Pilate for preaching sedition to the Jews. Not a great achievement!

Or forty, or fifty,.........

I don't get this; I advocate sending our kids to the same schools and removing the barriers between them and you call me "bitter", you label me as "sectarian"! My apologies on the Haass thing and I have a first from Queens in Social Anthropology.

My daughter is married to a "fenian", my two best and oldest mates in the world are "fenians" and I regularly accept invitations to attend chapel. I sent my son to a mixed school and my daughter to an integrated school, which is probably more than you did in the name of cultural diversity. My son grew up playing on a catholic football team and none of us are in the orange order or the fleg protest movement.

We ARE the moderate members of working class Protestantism, this is a good as it gets and you have completely mistaken Protestantism for patriotism. My track record in "working for peace" is thirty three years long and has run out of patience with nationalists and republicans who acknowledged the state of NI in the GFA, but can't even bring themselves to say the words. This shows the agenda; first try to bomb the bastards into a united Ireland and if that doesn't work, manipulate them into it by clever politics. Unionists like me have given all they intend to give and we do not give our politicians permission to "compromise" any further. Perhaps it was the fleg thing (which never should have flown 365 days a year anyway), but unionists, loyalists and bro-British people in NI have woken up to the fact that their Britishness is under severe threat and about time too.

I want a "shared future" with nationalists, but not one in a 32 county socialist republic. You'd better get used to dealing with unionists like me who are not prepared to compromise any further, because I represent the majority in working class unionism/loyalism. Not a bone in my body is Irish and never will be, I even wear a Scotland top on six-nations days and I will never call myself "Irish", no matter what the political circumstances are.