[Kuruharan]

To the decision making hierachys of Gondor & Arnor, Palantir conferences must've ensured a degree of familiarity and cultural comparrison?

Umm...I doubt it. For whatever reason, the palantiri do not seem to have been used much to maintain communications between the realms, even though that was part of their intent. And for whatever other reasons the relations between the two realms did decay. Arnor was busy with its disintegration and Gondor was concerned with its glory and then later with its own problems. They just really don't seem to have had that much to do with each other. It is certainly true that Gondor did precious little to aid Arnor (or what was left of it) during the days of its power, when it was certainly possible for them to have done something to help. They just don't seem to have been particularly concerned with each other.

That is one of the problems that I see people having with the palantiri. People are excessively impressed by them and assume that they were used for all kinds of things. In this particular case, the evidence seems to suggest otherwise.

Ultimately in defence of not just the Dunedain, but of all free-folk, which the Lossoth undoubtably were. In short, to use another mans words:
"By the blood of my people are your lands kept safe"
Some might say he had good cause to be more than a little bitter with these folk, all safe and non-comitted in their snug icecaves, whilst the rest of the North suffered valiantly resisting Angmars evil.

A few points about the Lossoth.

I'm going to go out on a limb and say that they probably lived one of the most miserable existances on Middle earth.

They were most certainly not snug in their ice caves (a contradiction in terms). They did not live in caves but in something akin to Eskimo villages. Also, for the most part, they lived on the northern peninsula of the Ice Bay of Forochel. What Arvedui ran across was actually only a camp.

They were, just by the nature of their environment, poor, resource starved, and there were likely very few of them. They apparently had little armament, judging from the motive given to them by Tolkien. There was little that they could contribute to a glorious defense of the North. They lacked the capability.

And as for them being "Free People," the information about them is a little dubious. They were in regions formerly dominated by Morgoth, and usually only peoples affiliated with Morgoth seem to have dwelled in the far North. They are also called "strange and unfriendly." Shades of the description of the Dunlanders. Judging from their situation I think that the Lossoth probably just wanted to be left alone. And considering their environment, even Sauron was probably not going to bother them too much, aside from the usual signs of submission. What did they have besides that he could want? And for that matter, it would not even be easy for him to get to them, since most of his servants had a disinclination to be near the sea.

I've often pondered his mindset when he made the decision to ride alone to Mordor for single combat with Angmar. Imagine coming up to the gates of Morannon, whoa! any thoughts?

The man was rather unbalanced with a very flimsy grasp of his duties.

And he went to Minas Morgul, not the Morannon.