(no subject)

[tree_and_leaf]

It's going to be perfectly legal for my government to detain suspects for 42 days without trial.

Dear God. What is happening to the country?

This is not what a free country looks like.

Comments

A parcel of rogues in a nation.

[wemyss.livejournal.com]

Defeating these people is insufficient. I refer you to Belloc on the politician's funeral.

[penguinity.livejournal.com]

Mine (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7444406.stm), too (http://www.nbc4.com/news/15574438/detail.html). :(

What is happening to the country?

Its continuing towards the logical conclusion of its policies about safety/security vs freedom? It's happening this side of the Atlantic, here (http://www.balloon-juice.com/?p=10595) and in Canada as well.

[anna-in-the-sky.livejournal.com]

I hate what is happening in most "western" countries right now. All of this so-called security legislation will not lead to any more safety, but certainly to more injustice and less freedom. It makes me so angry I don't even know what to say.

[garpu.livejournal.com]

*sigh* Things have to get worse before they get better? So I keep telling myself.

[helflaed.livejournal.com]

We are repeating all the mistakes of the seventies and eighties but on a much,much bigger scale. I did my law degree during the fall out of the court of appeal's decisions on the Birmingham six, Guildford four and Maguire seven. We thought it could not happen again. We were wrong.

[mrstater.livejournal.com]

God, it's terrible.

[fpb.livejournal.com]

You are wrong. The reason why, I already stated in wemyss' journal, and I don't want to repeat myself. "Ye blind guides, who strain at a gnat, and swallow a camel!" If you want to get disgusted at Brown's lawmaking, why not at least do so at the law that allows hybridization of human and animal cells, instead than at a commonplace and desperately needed anti-terrorist provision?

[rivrea.livejournal.com]

Security is one thing; the state of law apparently another one. I really hope Germany won't be following that example.

[lilliburlero.livejournal.com]

What makes you think it's needed? That's a genuine question. I read your comment on wemyss's journal* and I don't think you've really made your case there. The existing 28-day provision hasn't been extensively used, and there seems to have been no case when police have had to release a suspect prematurely (which, I must concede, is not to say that such a case is impossible, but it does suggest that the terrorist threat is not as great as it's being made out to be). Very few people with expertise in the field are arguing for the extension and even many of them think it is a provision that might be necessary in the future rather than being immediately necessary. Surely the bulk of an investigation should be done before arrests are made? however dangerous the suspect might be, he is still innocent in the eyes of the law. It seems that in some cases, like that of Rizwaan Sabir that tree_and_leaf links to, the possibility of holding someone for much longer than the normal 96 hours has led to really shoddy police work. I don't know all the facts in the Sabir case, and the internet coverage doesn't tell the police's side of the story, but it's hard to see why they arrested him in the first place.
I don't understand the relevance of the hybrid embryo issue: there's plenty of opposition around to that too, and opposition to issue isn't exclusive of opposition to the other (myself, I'm not bothered by hybrid embryos).

*btw, to: tree_and_leaf I will remove this comment if you feel it's dragging debate in from another journal: just ask. I'm not on wemyss's flist and I'd feel a bit odd commenting there.)

[snorkackcatcher]

In itself it's bad, but might be acceptable as an emergency measure. (Then again, the current situation is not in any meaningful sense an emergency.) When you consider the ratchet effect and that it may be used as the new starting point for further bad ideas, it's worse.

[prelud.livejournal.com]

You call that a gnat? You are wrong.

[fpb.livejournal.com]

I thought I had made the need clear enough, but evidently you are not convinced. I will try to clarify it here, but this is the last I will say about it - I have too much experience of repeating the same thing fifty times because someone "does not understand".

The relevance of the hybrid embryo bill is that, in the scale of evil, it compares to fourteen extra days' detention as the Himalaya compares to a pebble. A man who could bear to watch that monstrosity forced trough Parliament and then resign his seat to fight a by-election on this issue is a moral moron. The best description is in the Gospel: "Ye blind guides, who strain at a gnat, and swallow a camel!"

As for the need of not just 42, but 90 days of detention, you should know that no police leader will raise his head above the parapet on this, except for retired ones like Lord Stevens, who have nothing to lose. Lord Stevens has backed it withough hesitation. So have retired members of the secret services. You evidently imagine that some magic procedure can gather evidence from as far as Yemen, Afghanistan, Pakistan or such-like within 28 days of the arrest of a man whom the police have reason to regard as dangerous; and that once the magic limit of 28 days have passed, it is proved that he is not or has never been dangerous. Coming from a country that has had to fight the mafia and terrorism for decades, and that has succeded at it, I tell you that you are living in the Moon. If investigations into international terrorism or crime could be concluded in 28 days, neither terrorism nor crime would be worth doing.

And now I dare say you will remain unconvinced. That is sad, but I do not have the time to do more than register what I think and know on the matter.

[fpb.livejournal.com]

I really hope that Germany, which already has a major problem with low-level Islamic crime (honour murders, street thuggery, etc), will not be forced to learn too late after the blood of a few hundred or thousand infidels has been shed. Because terrorism is going to go on, and there is quite literally nothing you can do to change that. All you can do is fight it.

[fpb.livejournal.com]

Considering that in one day in July the current enemy murdered more people in London alone than the IRA could manage in four years, and that official report suggest that dozens such plots are being hatched every year, I wonder what you would call an emergency.

[fpb.livejournal.com]

I am profoundly impressed by the level of reasoning, nuanced argument and adherence to facts set out in this lengthy and carefully-thought-out response.

[prelud.livejournal.com]

*shrugs* I don`t care. Responding to someone who has his own entry in the Fandom Wank wiki was a bad idea anyway.
http://wiki.fandomwank.com/index.php/FPB

[legionseagle.livejournal.com]

My God! What with the anti-Semites and the Islamophobes dropping by to comment here, if you happened to be playing Bigot Bingo now might be the ideal time for you to shout "House!"

[lilliburlero.livejournal.com]

Well, you're right about one thing. I'm not convinced. I think we're going to have to agree to think one another irretrievably misguided differ.

Rather a bold accusation, don't you think.

[wemyss.livejournal.com]

I'd be very surprised to see it justified. Who, pray, here do you consider 'Islamophobic' and who, an anti-Semite?

[rivrea.livejournal.com]

First of all, I think your implication that street-thuggery in Germany is somehow a specifically "Islamic" problem is polemical and offensive.

Secondly, I consider it also dubious, to put it mildly, that you seem to imply that I am willfully ignoring both honour crimes and possible terrorist threats in my country. Well, I am not. I just don't see how the former (i.e. honour murders) are of relevance with regard to the bill tree_and_leaf was talking about. It would neither help to prevent those nor is it even needed as the evidence is often quite sufficient in these cases to convict the guilty party within the existent boundaries of the law.

The same applied, by the way, to the one attempt of a terrorist attack on German soil so far. In my opinion, law enforcement should rather concentrate on using the instruments they already have; there is no need for populist politicians to cry for more security measures and law & order or for constant fear-mongering and hostility. For me, the latter is already a tiny victory for terrorism.

Oh, and I also regard this debate as over now. Consider me narrow-minded or adverse to freedom of speech or whatever you want, but I don't have the energy right now to get into a discussion with someone who will insist on dragging unrelated topics into the conversation. (See your comments on the hybrid embryo bill above. I am opposed to that bill, too, by the way, but I still think your line of argument was completely out of place here.)

Kthxbye.

Re: Rather a bold accusation, don't you think.

[legionseagle.livejournal.com]

Well, I accept that by your standards I am "superficially educated" but what my 20 years of practice as a solicitor and my First in Law from Oxford has taught me is that for formal purposes one could very well justify an allegation of anti-Semitism and Islamophobia against someone who publicly stated that Group A was eugenically inferior to Group B, if i) Group A happened to include a substantial majority of the Jewish populations of Manchester, Leeds and Bradford; ii) also included practically all the Gujerati and Bangledeshi populations of Lancashire; and iii) one of the determining characteristics of Group B was its adherence to the tenets of the Church of England.

Of course, YMMV and evidently does.

I suppose one cd do.

[wemyss.livejournal.com]

As I have never held or expressed such views nor heard nor seen them from any other commenter in this thread, I fail to see the relevance.

It is, by the way, 'Gujarati' and 'Bangladeshi', I believe.

Re: I suppose one cd do.

[legionseagle.livejournal.com]

I see (snaps fingers). When you talked about the "better-bred" classes, as opposed to the "superficially educated, aspiring urban mill-worker classes" you weren't after all suggesting that the "better-bred" classes were eugenically superior to the urban mill-worker classes?

Of course, as I am "superficially educated" you can see how I might somehow confuse "better-bred" with "eugenically superior". I really am so, so sorry that I made that mistake, though. I really am incredibly sorry I got caught up in such confusion and happened of make such an appalling gaffe.

Oh, and thank you for the notes which I will include in my spell-checker.

[calapine.livejournal.com]

Marvellously put.

[very-improbable.livejournal.com]

My country's government has been holding people without trial for some six years (http://www.aclu.org/safefree/detention/closeguantanamo.html). It remains to be seen whether the recent Supreme Court decision, establishing that the right of habeas corpus does in fact apply to those persons, will effect actual change in that policy.

[tree_and_leaf]

I agree with you about the law; don't feel obliged to remove the comment, though I don't want the post to turn into a flame war about embryology...

[tree_and_leaf]

Actually, the hybridization bill makes me profoundly uneasy, but I a) think that the injustice is greater in this case and (b) believe that the anti-terrorism law is neither commonplace nor much needed; indeed, it's likely to be highly counter productive. Even leaving the legal principle out of it didn't work in Northern Ireland, and it won't work now.

[tree_and_leaf]

"Hard cases make bad laws" - and hysteria about potential hard cases make even worse ones, it seems.

Re: I suppose one cd do.

[tree_and_leaf]

I have no idea what the background to this is, but I'd appreciate it if personal animosity could be kept off my journal.

ETA: having now got a clearer idea of the context, I must say that while I disagree with weymss on a number of things, mostly involving Thatcher, I cannot see any grounds for considering him a racist, whether of the anti-Semitic or the Islamophobic variety. If I thought he was a Fascist, then I wouldn't want him on my flist; as it is, I like him.

[tree_and_leaf]

Well said, and thank you for remaining sensible and good mannered (incidentally, I love the neo-fascist tinsel icon, and it's most appropriate)

[tree_and_leaf]

I hope so. I've always thought that the attempt to create a separate category other than 'prisoners of war, to be treated in accordance with the Geneva convention' and '(suspected) criminals, to be treated in accordance with criminal law' was legally dodgy as well as morally untenable.

[tree_and_leaf]

Well, yes. I'd rather live with the risk of being blown to smithereens, but an awful lot of politicians seem to have difficulty with this attitude.

It's v depressing.

[tree_and_leaf]

It's sickening, isn't it?

[tree_and_leaf]

I'm afraid I can't, at the moment, see much sign that things will get better, since if Brown does lose the next election, we'll end up with Dave Cameron, who is liable to be even worse.

[tree_and_leaf]

Yep. And the worst of it is, it's liable to drive moderates, or those who are merely vaguely sympathetic, into the arms of the extremists.

[tree_and_leaf]

It makes me ashamed to be British; and the worst of it is, it's stupid as well as wicked (I'm not sure if I ought to feel that that makes it worse, but I do).

[rivrea.livejournal.com]

Huzzah for Lois McMaster Bujold quotes!