It is now an archive for my newspaper and magazine pieces. My blog can now be read at: www.spectator.co.uk/stephenpollard
Politics, economics and culture from the master. Unmissable.
Melanie Phillips home page
Melanie Phillips' peerless blog. Read, and learn.
Daniel Finkelstein's Times Comment Central
A daily must-read.
Tim Worstall
Lots of interesting nibbles - and a ruthless swatter of economic gibberish.
Harry's Place
Must-read left of centre blog from writers who understand the threat to the West.
Clive Davis
Always interesting selection of culture and politics, from an Anglo-American bent.
Samizdata
Libertarian blog, packed every day.
Norm's blog
The thoroughly sensible thoughts of renowned left-wing academic Norman Geras, Professor of Government at Manchester. And cricket, too.
Public Interest
Peter Briffa's inimitable take on The Yazzmonster and other assorted demons.
Reform
The public sector reform group; their website is an invaluable source of data and ideas.
Centre for the New Europe
The leading European public policy think tank.
Developed by:
| February | 07 |
| 2005 |
Sorry for the interruption to normal service; it is now resumed.
Let's begin with a terrific piece by Alasdair Palmer yesterday on the Belmarsh detainees (or, perhaps I should now say, 'releasees'). I won't try to summarise it; suffice to say that Palmer goes through the publicly available evidence against them. Do read it, and you'll see why this is his final paragraph:
The only people who are pleased with the present legal mess are the Islamic terrorists. "Delighted" is how a senior official from the FBI described them to The Sunday Telegraph. "They're laughing at you! They can't believe how easy it is to get the English legal system to tie itself in knots for the benefit of the brothers engaged in violent jihad. They know, because of what your courts have decided, it's going to be easier for them to execute a terrorist outrage that kills hundreds, if not thousands, of people in Britain. I tell you: they're laughing."
MessageSpace
Yes, those Al-Quaeda terrorist atrocities in Britain. Which amount to, er, zero.
Yes, these chaps seems very unpleasant (a whole £800 to the Chechen rebels!) and we should find a way of dealing with them properly. I agree. Sadly, this pretty much excludes grabbing people, locking them up and then throwing away the key. However much it sticks in the throat of the Metropolitan Police, trials are important and we would like to keep them rather than simply detaining people because they 'look shifty'.
William
There's nothing in Stephen's piece demanding locking these people up. What is clear to me is that these people are able to preach violence against the west and others with no fear of any consequences. The asylum laws are potentially putting lives in danger both here and abroad. The government's only solutions seem to involve relieving everyone of their civil liberties. This is clearly intolerable and yes, it must be the source of considerable mirth amongst the terrorist classes. The decision is stark. We can allow these people to foment hatred and violence, we can allow the state to take away some of everyone's civil liberties, or we can amend the asylum laws to allow us to deport those who abuse their refugee status by withdrawing from the relevant UN convention.
I agree with the last commentator.
As for the FBI complaints, while they are quite correct, perhaps the Americans would now care to reconsider how they and the Irish Republic provided effective sanctuary for Provos on the run.
Having lived through 25 years of the IRA's ministrations to my native city, I too find it a little difficult to stay awake at night worrying about where al-Qaeda will strike next, or should that be "first"?.
But even the Law Lords don't seem too impressed by the appalling, imminent threat of the complete destruction of our way of life by "Islamofascists". Which just goes to prove, as Melanie Phillips would say, how unbelievably vile, disgusting and corrupt... oldest hatred... unashamed enemies of civilisation...self-loathing... is this a thousand words yet?
I'm not sure that I agree with you: surely 7/7 was a work (indirectly or not) of the Al-qaida unbrella group of franchise terrorism.
In respect of the anti-terror laws, of course we have to protect ourselves from violent political extremists. Surely we can trust courts with decisions about whether people are a threat to society. I don't trust our security services (or would it be fairer to say political system) to provide a proper dossier, though. Do you? You don't ask James Bond to testify in court (he would only try to seduce the court stenographer), rather he secretly furnesses the expert witnesses with a bit of undercover background info, hard documentary proof should do the rest.
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