I don't know the identity of all the firearms officers involved at the tragic scene of the death of Jean Charles de Menezes, but I certainly know the identity of one. I am told that I would know the others, but that is enough for me. Of one thing I am certain: that to a man they are decent, right-thinking men who are devastated by the whole issue. Their torment continues with no end in sight.And this is where the spin comes in. Noone has said that C12 or C2 aren't decent human beings at heart, that they haven't been crushed by their involvement in one of the darkest moments in the history of the Metropolitan Police. But that doesn't mean that their shooting of a fundamentally innocent man was lawful, nor that they shouldn't be punished for it. Decent people do bad things for a variety of reasons, which are sometimes are adequate defences, but shooting a man 7 times in the head with no warning and without reason isn't one of them. C12 said he shouted 'armed police' - 17 witnesses disagreed and so did the jury at the De Menezes inquest trial. C2 said he heard a surveillance officer on the bus De Menezes travelled to Stockwell tube station on, positively identifying him as failed suicide bomber Hussain Osman. The surveillance officer in question denied this in court. He also said he made the choice to open fire because he approached him in a threatening manner. The jury's response to the Coroner's questions implied they believed he lied too.
As for the officers involved, they are victims too, of crushing pressures. Were we asking too much of them? What will they do if a similar situation occurs again? Can we afford to dilute their resolve? They deserve and need our support as well our sympathy. Mark my words, if this pressured and scrutinised task becomes any harder, these volunteer officers may begin to fade away.Sorry? How are they victims when they colluded in the smearing of an innocent man for three years? He didn't behave in a threatening manner, he wasn't acting suspiciously beforehand and looked nothing like Osman. He wasn't wearing clothes out of keeping with the season, nor did he leap the barriers at the station and resist arrest, all of which have been claimed by those involved. Can such behaviour be justified through 'crushing pressure'? What if it were your friend, your brother, your boyfriend, your husband? It might as well have been. The marksmen haven't been overscrutinised since the killing - quite the opposite. They are being held, at least in some quarters if not legal ones, to account for not doing their jobs adequately. Former Deputy Assistant Commissioner Brian Paddick gave testimony that they even breached Operation Kratos (the Met's shoot-to-kill policy):
They didn't, which even under Operation Kratos, makes this an unlawful killing. But the inquest coroner Sir Michael Wright prevented the jury from issuing such a verdict. Although Roger Gray and other former and current police officers might wish otherwise, it does mean justice hasn't been done and far from feeling sympathy for C12 and C2, we should expect them (not alone, I'll grant) to face justice for their actions."The policy says that if the firearms officers have any doubt that the suspect is a suicide bomber, they should shout a warning and react to how the suspect responds," he said. "But if there is no doubt, then you can fire a critical shot without warning. The evidence is that they didn't shout a warning. Yet we have a surveillance officer saying he didn't get a proper look at Jean Charles when he left the flat and surveillance officers with varying degrees of certainty as to whether it was [terror suspect] Hussain Osman or not. There was ambiguity and no code word."
In other words, there was so much confusion that the officers should not have been sure. So they should have shouted a warning.
For his oral histories, Terkel interviewed his subjects on tape, then transcribed and sifted. "What first comes out of an interview are tons of ore; you have to get that gold dust in your hands," he wrote in his memoir. "Now, how does it become a necklace or a ring or a gold watch? You have to get the form; you have to mold the gold dust."Genius.
The successor to the Austrian rightwing populist Jörg Haider, Stefan Petzner, has shocked the staunchly conservative country by revealing in a tearful interview that they shared a "special relationship".It's always the paradox with the far right - that they can't help being what
Petzner, 27, who was confirmed yesterday as the leader of the Alliance for the Future of Austria (BZO) after Haider's death in a car crash two weeks ago, made the admission on Austrian radio, effectively confirming long-standing rumours that he and Haider were lovers.
Outraged by the interviews, the party felt compelled yesterday to dismiss its leader amid reports of his alleged role in Haider’s tragic death. Local papers said that, on the night of his accident, Haider and Mr Petzner had a row at a magazine launch party.
All proceeds from Newman's Own salad dressings and snacks go to charity. Newman gave away $120m in 2005 and 2006, Fox News reported earlier this year.
"Wow. That's a shock. It's like being told Santa Claus isn't real," he told "Extra." "Unbelievable."But he did offer some words of support for the singer: "Good for him. If he said it, it's the right thing for him. Good for him." Cowell added that he didn't think the singer's fans should be shocked by the revelation, saying, "I don't think anyone cares. Let's face it: It's 2008. You know. Who cares?"
He's right of course. The attention grabber though is that Clay, American Idol runner-up in 2003, has just become a father. May he and his son be blessed with success and happiness.
Sir Terence Etherton, pictured, will be the first openly gay judge to be sworn in as Lord Justice of Appeal when his appointment is confirmed later this month.It's a very important development for an area of civil society marked by both significant homophobia and an even greater expectation of homophobia. He's not notably the first gay judge, but the Court of Appeal has only 36 members, and is the second highest court in the land, making this quite important. As the article goes on to show, it puts him in line to become the first out gay law lord.
One of the most interesting things about him is that he was the first High Court judge to announce — in The Times in February 2006 — his entry into a civil partnership.A real, non-self-hating progressive. We can only hope that our horribly unrepresentative criminal justice system will be influenced by an ever more diverse judiciary.
In e-mails serialised in The Times newspaper, Davies said Russell Tovey, who appeared in Alan Bennett's play The History Boys, would fit the role.
The creator, who leaves the show next year as lead writer and executive producer, said he thought Tovey was "going to be huge" and is "amazing".
I'll admit if I had my own way I'd get Hugh Laurie - British, older (but not that much older), has the comedic chops, and House has proven he can draw from a much darker (and odder) seam too. But he's just had a massive payrise, so I don't think that'll happen any time soon. Tovey though is interesting, not least because he's gay.
"Every time DeGeneres and de Rossi visit de Rossi's family in Australia, their rights, protections and status as a married couple will cease to exist," Mr Furness said.
"It is shameful that Portia de Rossi's solemn marriage vows are dishonoured in this way by the government of her home country."
Two men in the US state of Georgia say they have found the body of a Bigfoot, the legendary ape-like creature that has been subject of decades of hoaxes.
"I'm special. Made in the image of God, in the creative mind of God, creative as God is, who made me. That's the difference between the ape and me."It's a great quote which Richard Dawkins teased out of Bonifes Adoyo, an evangelical minister in Kenya, when discussing the latter's apparent opposition to a museum displaying the oldest human skulls. But why oppose the display? Because it was to be done in acknowledgment of evolution. And that's where the 'special' comes in. I've had online arguments aplenty recently with similar evangelicals who are similarly convinced they're special because they believe it. Science and evolution however show the complete opposite - that it's staggeringly vain to believe we're special in any way. We're sophisticated, that's true, but that's because of Darwin's theory of evolution through natural selection; we're a lucky twist of fate.
"There is no goal it (evolution) just happens."A wonderful riposte once again by the famed, militant atheist. It must be hellish for a theist to think that there's no point to any of this. We do what we do, we arrange our common existence for the most part to our best mutual advantage for our best individual gain, and then we die. We are sophisticated though, and we can theorise, question, philosophise and judge. It's our constantly questioning nature that's the most difficult aspect of our humanity to live with, whilst being our greatest asset.
Batman, as we know, tries to overcome evil. Sometimes he punches and fights, but his violence lacks the sadism of the Joker. The Joker takes delight in the torture of others. He violates because he has nothing to preserve; he's prepared to lose, and delights in the corruption of civil society. He's sarcastic about humanity. The tension lies in whether pain will eventually force otherwise good people, such as Batman, whose violence is in the service of good, to abandon decency and kindness.You have to wonder whether she's even seen the film. The moral message which radiates from the film is that even in a state of anarchy and lawlessness, good wins. The third act scenes where the Joker tries to get two ferries of Gothamites to kill one another, shows prisoners less likely to kill innocent people than even the most rabid right winger. The Joker's shown quite conclusively not just to be morally wrong but a complete idiot. He thinks society will reflect his anarchistic, morally absent worldview if pushed just a little bit too far, but he's wrong. Bruce Wayne fights for that, Jim Gordon fights for that, and that Harvey Dent fails suggests more of a problem with our elected officials than our fellow citizens.
The day that I saw the film last week, another teenager was shot dead in south London. I have seen the Joker's sadistic, victimising smile – and his nihilism – in some of the young children I work with. It's always born of catastrophic familial abuse. The abused child watching this film will recognise the elation of the Joker at making the shift from victim to violator.Wrong again. The Joker plays mindgames with the origin of his grin, hinting initially that it was caused by family abuse, but then contradicting that story many times. It would be an enormous shift from the book to make the Joker's madness (for that is what it is) a result of abuse, rather than being an inherent psychological disorder. That you can laugh at some of the scenes involving him is a reflection of black humour - what the Joker does is never funny and the laughter is a symptom of discomfort rather than fellow feeling. Batmanghelidjh is suggesting that The Dark Knight is some sort of abuser's charter and that's about as stupid as the Joker.
What worries me even more than the violence was the lack of human compassion surrounding it. Human life is presented as worthless. For me, the apathetic bystanders who facilitate violence are more disturbing than the Joker himself. His perversion, at least, has a sad logic to it. The indifference of the onlookers, though, is shocking.Err this is even more stupid. The point of the Joker is that compassion is alien to him, as it doesn't sit with his worldview - it probably doesn't help either that he's insane. But no human compassion? Really? Batman throwing himself off his own roof to save the love of his life? Jim Gordon doing anything to protect his family? Bruce Wayne sacrificing his own happiness and chance of a future, to protect people he doesn't even know? He even sacrifices his alter ego's reputation in order to save Harvey Dent's so that people can still believe in the good of elected officials ahead of vigilantes like him.
It's a metaphor of our time. The day that I saw the film last week, another teenager was shot dead in south London.It isn't anything of the sort, and maybe it should be. Given that there's noone out there making any measurable difference to the lives of young people, who are murdering one another in ever greater numbers, maybe we do need a Batman, a Jim Gordon, even a Harvey Dent to cut through the crap. The root causes of teen violence has nothing to do with movies like The Dark Knight.
A year ago Miliband famously predicted that we would soon be yearning for Blair again. That is certainly not what most of the Labour party feel. They supported Brown for the leadership, expecting a move away from new Labour. Tired of Blair’s adulation of wealth and of the United States, they looked for a fresh commitment to social justice.And he's quite right. Miliband isn't offering anything of the sort. He talks of 'belonging', of 'modernising', whilst ignoring the diviseness of the policies which he offers no respite from.
Every member of the Labour party carries with them a simple guiding mission on the membership card: to put power, wealth and opportunity in the hands of the many, not the few. When debating public service reform, tax policies or constitutional changes, we apply those values to the latest challenges.And yet New Labour does put power, wealth and opportunity into the hands of the few; this is a complete lie. Poverty isn't being combated in any meaningful way, and it's far from the only 'value' being ignored. 'Protection' policies allow the perception of crime to be hyped up far higher than it actually is. We're so afraid of the paedophiles lurking around every corner or every mouse click, that we fail to see abuse where it's really occuring and become paranoid about the wrong people. Asylum seekers are blamed for their own persecution, as New Labour reformulates the world around us into something it isn't, as worker protection offered by the EU continues to be rejected by a government timidly kow-towing to the corporate world. David Miliband, despite what he might say, offers no 'change' from this. Portillo continues:
Last week Bob Marshall-Andrews, the veteran Labour rebel, called on Brown to fire the foreign secretary. He is absolutely right, although if Miliband survives the weekend it may already be too late.He is indeed right. Miliband's intervention was a thinly-veiled attack on Gordon Brown's authority (admittedly what little there is left of it). A Miliband leadership challenge, if successful, would ignore what Portillo rightly points out is an important lesson of modern history. The Conservative Party and electorate as a whole would much rather now have had the chance to have had Margaret Thatcher voted out, rather than evicted. Her authority had similarly dipped, through similarly falling completely out of step with the country, had clung to power for the sake of it, rather than continuing to offer substantial change, and had tried to legitimise the arrogance which is now (in many quarters) her legacy. Yet in flip-flopping to Major to Blair now Brown, none of them ultimately satisfying anyone, the country was denied a clear picture of the social and political alternatives before it. Blair paints himself the heir to Thatcher, as Cameron does to him, but New Labour has turned out to be a shallow sham, with politics not having truly moved on from the Thatcher era.
Four out of 10 Muslim students in Britain support the introduction of sharia into UK law for Muslims, according to a YouGov poll. Almost a third of them said that killing in the name of religion was justified; 40% said they felt it was unacceptable for Muslim men and women to associate freely; and nearly a quarter do not think that men and women are equal in the eyes of Allah.
A quarter of Muslim students said they had little or no respect for homosexuals. As for whether British Muslim servicemen should be allowed to opt out of hostilities with Muslim countries, 57% said they should and a further 25% said they were not sure.
More than half of the Muslim students were in favour of an Islamic political party to support their views in parliament. A third don’t think or don’t know whether Islam is compatible with the western notion of democracy, and a third said they were in favour of a worldwide Islamic caliphate based on sharia.
Alarmed? From the words, you're clearly supposed to be. An Islamic political party? What a terrible thing. Next thing you know we'll have a Calvinist as Prime Minister...and a quarter of Muslim students with little or no respect for gay people? Why not try canvassing Christian students and see if you get an even bigger number! And speaking of Christians, Muslim servicemen should 'opt out' of hostilities with Muslim countries? Gosh you'll get civil registrars and policemen trying to opt out of their secular duties next.
What follows inescapably from this is that religious people and their views should not be officially recognised in groups. Religion should not be allowed a public space or public representation. This is hard for those of us who used to love the muddled Anglican compromise; it means the disestablishment of our national church – if it doesn’t self-destruct first.
The challenge of other, fiercer and more divisive convictions has forced the issue; multiculturalism has been subversive. There must be no more religious schools – personally I would leave those that exist alone. There must be no public recognition of religious associations as representatives of anything or anybody: not on campuses, not in student unions, not in government consultations or in parliament.
Absolute hogwash, and I say that as an atheist. Whilst I agree that Church and state should indeed be separated, this argument is tantamount to advocating that all MPs should be atheists, which is ridiculous. But for religion to have no public space at all would be insane. In a recent talk I watched by Bishop Gene Robinson, he and Sir Ian McKellen jointly argued that we can only progress together in society - that means atheist lobbyists working alongside gay bishops, that mean civil rights and religious rites side by side, but not one excluding the other. Only by making the civil and religious spheres distinct can we see the deficiencies in both and how each can aid the other.
Sure it's past time for the sake of fairness in society (for Muslims and non-Muslims alike) that disestablishment should take place, but to then say that religion should as a result wither on the vine would be ignorant. And to exclude religion from places of learning is downright inane. I agree that it should not be the means of learning (you're right, I think faith schools should be stopped - by which I mean Anglican and Catholic ones too), but not to allow its free expression by those best able to articulate it would be the most dangerous act of extremism of all.
Yet how can young Muslims fit into a liberal western democracy if they believe things that are intolerant, illegal and, in plain English, unBritish?
There's that fear thing again - the writer blaming Muslims for attitudes widely held by Christians. Want Islamophobia? That's how it's transmitted. Try attacking the levels of domestic violence and rape perpetrated by chuchgoing Christians. Try attacking the Christian Institute for trying to change the law to allow religious opt-outs such as Lillian Ladele's disgraceful example in Islington. And for that matter if we really don't like dictators maybe we should try to oust all of them rather than just the Islamic ones.
"Heinz is a global company and we respect all universal rights. The advertisement was intended to be humorous, not designed to cause offence to anyone. Clearly it failed in its intent to amuse and that is why we took the decision to withdraw it."
"We're shocked that an innocuous ad should have been withdrawn in this way. I can't imagine that Heinz would respond to protests about black people featuring in their adverts."
He added: "Mr Brown likes to talk about Britishness - fundamental to Britishness is being free. He should come out and argue the case."
Mohammad Sarwar, Labour MP for Glasgow Govan, has also decided to back the government after he was given an undertaking that anyone locked up for as long as 42 days and then released without charge would receive compensation on a day-by-day basis.
Television executives have given Britton some time off, although they are
said to be privately angry that she was not open about the operation at an
earlier stage.
"Virgin Media is the first ISP to publicly address the problem. It is a socially responsible ISP and I think other ISPs will look at this and see progress. I am very encouraged they have engaged with us. They understand the rights of musicians," he said.
The Business minister, Shriti Vadera, said: "This is a very welcome first step ... to educate consumers about unlawful file sharing, which damages our vibrant economy."
Other influential backers of the Senate climate change bill include 13 leading US energy companies and California's Republican governor, Arnold Schwarzenegger.
"If a T-shirt had a rude word or a bomb on it, for example, a passenger may be
asked to remove it," he said.
"We are investigating what happened to see if it came under this category.
"If it's offensive, we don't want other passengers upset."
"To my big bro. As much as I used to piss you off and call you names, ask for lifts everywhere, I loved you so much and I know you didn't know it. I looked up to you so much ... I thought you were invincible."
Harriet Harman, the Labour deputy leader, acknowledged there were "discordant voices" in the party but insisted: "The overwhelming majority of people in the Labour Party – and I speak to constituency chairs up and down the country in my capacity as deputy leader – are solidly behind Gordon Brown and what he stands for, which is a strong economy and fair society. He is the man with the experience to make sure that happens."
The Sustainable Development Commission, chaired by Sir Jonathon Porritt, said there were big question marks over the environmental and economic arguments underpinning the proposals for British airport expansion.
Mr Leigh (Gainsborough) said the use of "admixed" embryos, using genetic material from both humans and animals, would cross an "entirely new ethical boundary," and turn the UK into a scientific "rogue state".
The Sexual Orientation Regulations have been criticised by some religious groups who say people will not be allowed to act according to faith.
There are signs that things are changing. Several leading rap artists, including top seller Kanye West, have admitted that homophobia is rampant in the industry and they have spoken out against it.Dean, however, hopes that hip hop will soon put its homophobia behind it. He says the music changed dramatically from hip hop's roots in nightclubs and parties to a celebration of urban violence and gang life as 'gangsta rap' became the norm. Homophobia grew up alongside that musical shift as most successful artists used songs that idolised guns, drugs and crime. 'We need to get hip hop back to those party roots and away from the gangsta rap culture,' he said.
I really wish that were true, except there seems to be such a vested interest in promoting and maintaining this 'gangsta' culture, with all its components (like violent homophobia) that I can't honestly see that changing any time soon. For the life of me I don't understand why that culture isn't changed, but it would have to either change by government pressure - which wouldn't work - or would have to come from the ground up, and it's only gay campaigners who are doing that so far.
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