Magere Hein

Colour me sceptical, but I don't believe a word of that, nor of the leukemia story. regards, Hein

Don't do that! Old age is a killer. regards, Hein Which MH, the contemplation or the reaching? Both, but the reaching is the dangerous part. regards, Hein

In Good Omens (the funniest book I've read in years) Pestilence has retired and his job has been taken by Pollution, a rather nasty type, IMO. War, of course, if only because she's a readhead. regards, Hein

PR rarely results in a majority parliament, although it's possible, as Malta shows. In the Netherlands Pim Fortuyn's perfect election propaganda landed him 26 (of 150) seats in the Second Chamber of the States-General and caused quite a stir. A government with his party (LPF) as a coalition partner was formed. Those seats in parliament were taken by a bunch of political fortune seekers and both the 'party' and its fraction in parliament disintegrated in weeks, the government in months. New elections were called, and LPF was reduced to 8 seats. If elections were held now, LPF would get a single seat. It's obviously heading for extinction and several parties, old and new, are trying to mop up its electorate. Exactly, although that can happen with a hung parliament as well, as Hitler's appointment to chancellor (and the consequent Reichstag's suicide) in 1933 shows. A .sig I use for Usenet postings goes: "Governments, like diapers, must be changed often, and for the same reason." There are some more observations: Once elected, MP's suffer immediate and unrecoverable memory loss. People who want political power aren't fit for the job. Politicians don't look further ahead than the next election. Good question. I've voted, if at all, for four different parties, all of them at the left side of the political spectrum. At the moment I'd be hard pressed to make choice. All Dutch political parties seem to be in a state of panic. They're are willing to sacrifice personal and political liberties for a sense of security from terrorism and political violence, possibly the most dangerous road to take. As Benjamin Franklin wrote: "Anyone who trades liberty for security deserves neither liberty nor security". I feel flattered by this suggestion, but I'm not volunteering for the job. I'm far from convinced that we need states and national governments at all. I apologise for the long . regards, Hein

Don't do that! Old age is a killer. regards, Hein

I'm all for it. There would be a 'hung' parliament with no overall majority, so no decisions could be made, so there would be no interference in our lives. That's not true. I understand that Britons think PR is against both nature and God's will, but hung parliaments and coalition governments do work. Of course there are some drawbacks. Coalition negotiations after elections can take forever and the largest party in parliament may be barred from the coalition. Your "first past the post" system isn't perfect either. The fact that 40 % of the vote can land a party a huge majority of parliament seats seems a bit unfair. regards, Hein

What a strange system! In the Netherlands you're required to take your poll card to the polling station and trade it for the ballot papers. Postal voting is only possible for voters who live abroad. We have a system of voting by proxy for absentee voters which is prone to fraud, but in practice it works reasonably well. regards, Hein

Which reminds me: how's Stephen Hawking doing? regards, Hein

The writing or the playing? Both. regards, Hein

Pim Fortuyn. I've noticed a few similarities with RKS: in politics out of vanity, populist ticket, veiled racism, arrogant piece of shite. Fortuyn was shot nine days before general elections. 8 days to go in the UK... regards, Hein

Shenandoah Valley, VA doesn't quite fit in my travel plans for that week. regards, Hein

According to this article, she was underneath him Where was Megan Marshak when Vice-President Nelson Rockefeller Died? As the readers may have noticed, that article is on the website of Sam Sloan, a colourful person, some might say kook. He also plays and writes about chess, not particularly well. regards, Hein

Aha, the "California Über Alles" routine. What's next, kill the poor? regards, Hein

My model assumes all candidates have the same probability to die. I'm aware that's an oversimplification, but I can't think of a way to reliably assign personal probabilities to my model, and it keeps the calculation simple. I just eyeballed the previous lists. Even though most hits are in the upper half of the list, rank on the list doesn't seem to be a reliable indicator of the chance a candidate will cark it. The number of appearances on the lists by some of the candidates hints to that as well. I can stick the previous years in a spreadsheet and try and analise the patterns, but that's a considerable amount of work. regards, Hein

Are we bored at work then? How on earth did you guess? regards, Hein

My calculations take care of that. If there's interest, I can post the formula. My model is valid, but statistically naive and very sensible to streaks of hits ans long droughts. I'm working on calculating confidence intervals, which should improve the usability. regards, Hein

Back on our favourite subjects, are we? regards, Hein

The new Our New Friends seems a good choice. A sample page: regards, Hein

I created a spreadsheet today to estimate the total number of hits this year from the number of hits so far. With John Mills gone, it estimates 17 hits this year. I'll have to check the maths, so take this with a grain of salt, but if this trend holds, 2005 will be a record year. regards, Hein

Another dead drummer. They're dropping like flies! regards, Hein

But is he a celebrity in the DL sense of the word? I don't know. What's worse, I don't know him. A web search shows that his working in Nazi-Germany ruined his reputation in the Netherlands, after which he was forgotten there. regards, Hein

Her mum might have lived 24 years later but she had Alzhimers's Disease for the last 10 of them, or so we are lead to belive. This fact was hushed for years by the royal household, but after she died it became clear Juliana had been completely potty in her last few years. This doesn't mean much for the longevity of Beatrix. I expect she'll be head of state for another five years or so. She may well live in her nineties. Both her parents lived long, she has no serious health problems and she has the best health care avaiable. regards, Hein

A little more detail: in May she's to undergo surgery for a knee injury. I suppose she'll be around for a while. She's only 68. Her mum quit the job at 70 and lived another 24 years. regards, Hein

I don't have the vote in UK elections, but if I had I wouldn't know which party to vote. There might be a few more. There's at least one communist lurking somewhere and possibly an anarchist. regards, Hein

A fine candidate for Deathlist 2006, I'd say. regards, Hein