I am acutely conscious, from vast experience in opens, that guys around, say 2100 or more can definitely play chess and that one often has to work very hard to beat them.
Modern Chess is too much concerned with things like Pawn structure. Forget it, Checkmate ends the game
I know that with perfect play, God versus God, Fritz versus Fritz, chess is a draw.
Chess is ruthless: you've got to be prepared to kill people.
If your opponent offers you a draw, try to work out why he thinks he's worse off
We have a large underclass in Britain, and a fairly low standard of education. Our best universities are extremely good, but a very significant proportion of the British population that comes out of compulsory schooling with very low standards of education.