大象传媒

"The two opening speeches in this afternoon's debate on 42 days were not a great Parliamentary occasion which will stick in the memory."

"One perhaps significant intervention came from the DUP's former mayor for Belfast Sammy Wilson, who suggested that the government's 42-day measure, the Parliamentary and public debate that would surround its use, would provide terrorists with, in Margaret Thatcher's old phrase, the "oxygen of publicity".

Can whoever wrote this see me after school, so that they can re-write it in English, with rather more attention to grammar ??

Re# 1.
I've noticed that my own English has been on the slide recently, and I'm always glad that people with better usage than mine can correct me; but any failings in this piece went over my head I'm afraid, and I thought the report captured the drama of the occasion very well.

ON THE USE OF 'USAGE'

ABUSAGE

When wanting some juice without seedage
To my sieve and its use I paid heedage
The instructions for USE
Said: 'Just sieve the damned juice!'
Of 'usage' there just was no needage.

Hey Grumpy Jon! I like your failurings almost as much as wot I like mine.

Mr Crick, no doubt you will be able to tell us tonight just how much taxpayers' money has been used by Brown to buy the votes he needed to scrape a victory which would not have been possible without the unanimous support of the DUP MPs?

I would support detention for 420 days, let alone 42, IF THERE IS EVIDENCE TO SUGGEST IT IS NECESSARY. I know 42 days is only 14 more days than is available now, but I find it very hard to see objective justification for it.

The terrorist threat is severe, but no more severe (and probably auite a bit less severe) than some of the things which have faced this country over many centuries. Yet even in those eras, our fundamental principles remained intact.

I simply can't understand how other western democracies can manage to deal with this without such a period of detention without charge, yet we can't. I find it hard to see it as anything other than the government trying to look tough for its own political ends.

MENTALITY MATTERS

So often we are told that this or that politician is brilliant, when all we can see is a very odd person. Remember George Brown?
I am convinced from my 71 years, and my intense scrutiny of this Brown, that his burning desire is to out-Blair Tony, to get his own back for being out-manoeuvred by that Machiavellian rascal.
That was Gordon's primary objective in standing his ground on 42 days; to emulate Tony the Believer who, having decided, had 'no reverse gear'; well - mostly.

A lively debate on the 42 days issue to be found on the blog said Gavin Essler ...

Well 3 of the 6 are about grammar for heaven's sake (me I'm with grumpy-jon on that).

Of the other 3 only SupremeChancellor's number 5 is cogently on-topic that I can make out and I'm with SupremeChancellor on that too if it matters.

I don't buy the argument about needing the time to decrypt files. Commonly used encryption systems such as PGP can't presently be broken even with the most powerful super-computers (most likely we will have to wait for quantum computers but so far they can only count up to about ten). I read that argument more as saying we need the time to break down (rendition, water-boarding so on) the detainee and extract the key from them.

The debate should really be about torture I suspect.

Afghan piece tonight excellent I thought.

IMPORTANT MESSAGE TO LORDBEDDGELERT
'detainee ... them': yes I know the case doesn't agree but wtf and what to do without gender neutral pronouns or whatever they'd be if we had them? But here's, a misplaced comma to be getting on with.

so we have trashed Magna Carta (did she have to die in vain?) and a lot of Habeus Corpus but as long as we are in bed with a certain downmarket tabloid, the majority of the British people who would go for public hanging if there was vote on it so we should all feel cleansed but I don't. I feel ashamed that we have alligned ourselves with people like Causcescu and other tyrants that believed in throwing away the key for 42 days and more. The former AG, the judiciary and the official opposition were all ignored. Brown will pay a heavy price for this and never will the DUP's accounts be so scrutinised as in the weeks to come. What a grubby charade parliament has become.

yes to the question!

42 days - oxygen of publicity?

42 days means- 42 days in solitary confinment surronded by angry Mi5 agents with no evidence against you and your friends and family being gradually radicalized

thanks for the corrections of information!

from robson90 @ 6.00pm on 15 June 2008!