Theresa May and the DUP

Theresa May’s general election gamble has resulted in a quite remarkable situation.  The Conservative Party went into the general election with a majority, but has emerged in a hung parliament.

There are 650 seats in the House of Commons, seven of which were won by Sinn Fein.  Sinn Fein's elected politicians never take their seats in the Commons, and so there are in fact only 643 MPs.  Therefore 322 seats are needed for Mrs May to secure a majority.

The Democratic Unionist Party is currently the largest political party in Northern Ireland, with ten MPs – enough to give Mrs May a small majority.  It appears that Theresa May will be able to continue as Prime Minister with their support, although what is not clear yet is what policy concessions – if any – she will need to  make in order to maintain their support for the next five years.

It is reported that there is a lot of hostility to this proposed arrangement, which is not surprising.  Labour voters are unlikely to welcome a situation in which the Conservatives are able to cling to power, and Liberal Democrat voters are unlikely to welcome a situation in which the Conservatives are able to cling to power without Tim Farron becoming Deputy Prime Minister.

However the hostility goes further than that.  Earlier today I looked at the website of the Democratic Unionist Party, and found its policy commitments to be vague and unremarkable, but consider these facts.  Northern Ireland is the only place in the United Kingdom where there is no visible abortion industry, and also the only place in the United Kingdom where same-sex marriages have yet to be legalised.  It is also reported in a national newspaper that the Democratic Unionist Party supports the return of the death penalty, and also that it supports the teaching of Biblical creation – the belief that the Book of Genesis is an accurate account of the early history of the world – should be taught in science lessons in schools.

Update: it is now reported that the Democratic Unionist Party has agreed to a supply and confidence deal with the Prime Minister.  This means that they will vote with the Conservatives each year on the finance bill (commonly known as the budget), but will not necessarily support them on every issue.

There have been protests against this deal in Westminster today, and I find it amusing that at least one protester held up a poster bearing the slogan Pray the DUP away.  To which deity does this protester want us to pray?  Surely not the same God that the Bible-bashers of the Democratic Unionist Party believe in.
 

I have already made clear my feelings about capital punishment in some of my previous posts.
 

The death penalty – who dies?

Ann Maguire:savage liberals kill again

Terror in Manchester

As I write, it is being reported that Jeremy Corbyn has blamed the recent terrorist attack in Manchester on the foreign policy of the present government.  I will not comment further, as I am not sure what exactly Mr Corbyn has in mind.

Almost exactly four years, I wrote this comment on my blog:

While I do not condone the murder of the soldier, I utterly condemn British involvement in illegal wars.

I was not at all surprised when the Manchester bomber was revealed to have been Libyan.  David Cameron as Prime Minister ordered the bombing of Libya, and Theresa May served in his government in a senior capacity.

Britain bombed Libya, and killed innocent people.  A Libyan man detonated a bomb in Manchester, and killed innocent people.  How hard is it to perceive a logical process at work here?

The British authorities are responding to the terror attack with typical uselessness.  The police are busy arresting people who may or may not be involved, but for every arrest they make, they probably miss at least one potential future suicide bomber.

MI5 have been reported as saying that they have five hundred active investigations, and I cannot help but wonder how likely any one of them is to be successful.  After all, they completely failed to prevent the Manchester terror attack, despite warning signs.

Putting troops on the streets is close to pointless, as the list of places where the next suicide bomber might strike is extensive.

There are two sensible reactions to what happened in Manchester.  The first is to accept that Britain should stop making war on other countries.  The likelihood of such a war being visited upon Britain in the guise of terror attacks is too great.

The second is to recognise that a lot of violent crime is linked to drug use.  It has not yet been reported that the Manchester suicide bomber was ever a drug user, but I would be surprised if he had never taken any illegal drugs.

It is unlikely that any government in this country will ever achieve a significant reduction in violent crime unless it first gets tough on illegal drugs.

As I write, we are approaching a general election, in which I plan not to vote.

Related previous posts include:

Terror in Westminster

Here the words of a killer - and learn

Terror in Westminster

A sufficient amount of time has passed since the terror attack in Westminster for me to feel confident about sharing my thoughts.

The facts are that a fifty-two year old Muslim man with a known history of violence drove a car onto the pavement while crossing Westminster bridge, deliberately ploughing into numerous pedestrians.  He then got out of his car in the precincts of the Houses of Parliament, and stabbed a policeman before being shot by another policeman.

The attacker – identified as Khalid Masood - died of his injuries, but by this point had killed four people and injured around forty others.

Unsurprisingly, the Prime Minister has publicly stated that Islam is not to blame.  It is also not surprising that she did not blame her own failings.  Prior to becoming Prime Minister last year, she served for six years as Home Secretary, and I have no problem in describing her as the worst Home Secretary this country has ever had.  Masood might not have perpetrated this attack had he been imprisoned for some of his previous acts of violence, yet we live in a society in which far too many violent criminals escape with non-custodial sentences - assuming that they are even prosecuted in the first place.

It is also not surprising that Mrs May has not blamed the belligerent policies of successive British governments.  She happily served in the government of the warmonger David Cameron.

The Mayor of London has received a lot of criticism for saying that terror attacks are part and parcel of living in a large city.  There are in fact around twenty cities in the world with a larger population than London, plus another fifteen or so of similar size.  How many of those cities experience anything like what happened in Westminster?

It appears that Londoners are now living their lives very much as before, and proudly so.  This is important, because terrorism normally affects us in two ways.  First, the incident itself causes death and injury and destruction; second, the aftermath is that everyday life is to some extent disrupted as a consequence.  In fact sometimes the disruption is the only consequence.  The Provisional IRA used to explode bombs in central London, but then they experimented with planting bombs at railway stations and then informing the police by telephone.  The station would then be closed, and the bomb would be located and made safe.  No one would be killed or injured, but the disruption to the rail services served as the triumph of the terrorists.

It is reported that a leading media figure has spoken sneeringly of the dead attacker, and has referred to London as the city that stood up to the Luftwaffe, but the comparison is naive.  The Luftwaffe sent aeroplanes which could be identified and shot down, and which were not easily replaced.  Masood’s deadly rampage may not have been as devastating as a Luftwaffe bombing raid, but it was achieved with very little in the way of resources.  Quite simply, almost any car in Britain could be used tomorrow as a murder weapon.

There is of course a link to immigration, and I cannot resist quoting Richard Littlejohn on this subject:

The politicians have opened the floodgates to mass immigration without insisting on integration.

They pretend every culture, no matter how medieval and barbaric, is worthy of equal respect.

This is the same Richard Littlejohn who to my knowledge has never once made a positive comment about any political party which seeks to end immigration, or about any political party which seeks to put pressure on immigrants to integrate with the wider community.  (If I am wrong about this, please leave a comment.)

The United Kingdom continues to wage war against Islamic countries, and is currently doing so under the pretence of fighting ISIS.  The downside is that ISIS has a fifth column operating in this country, and the next ISIS-inspired terror attack could happen tomorrow.  A Muslim man (or woman) driving a car could easily mount the kerb, and where will you be when that happens?

I find it astonishing that so many police officers in this country are happy to persecute anti-establishment politicians.  I have long since lost count of the number of incidents I have come across where members of anti-establishment political parties have been arrested or mistreated by the police without good reason - including the instance of a parliamentary candidate who was removed from a hustings by police because a Labour councillor did not want him there.

I do not blame anti-establishment politicians for the murder of PC Keith Palmer.  Does anyone?

Update: it is now being claimed that Masood was not linked to ISIS.  Even if no formal link can be established, then this does not eliminate the possibility that Masood saw himself as striking a blow for ISIS.

Vigilante crime is flourishing in the UK

More often than not, it seems, vigilantes are just thugs.  Merriam-Webster online dictionary defines a vigilante as a self-appointed doer of justice, but adds that the word sometimes carries the suggestion of the enforcement of laws without regard to due process or the general rule of law.

As I write, the abduction of Shannon Matthews has recently been dominating the news.  In 2008, 9yo Shannon was reported missing by her mother Karen Matthews in their home town of Dewsbury.  She was eventually found being held captive by the uncle of a man called Craig Meehan, who at the time was the boyfriend of Karen Matthews.  Matthews was sentenced to prison, as was Meehan's uncle.

Although not linked with the abduction, Meehan was jailed for possession of indecent images of children.  It has recently been reported that he has been viciously attacked by a gang of thugs, who presumably saw themselves as self-appointed punishers.

It is also reported that David Norris - one of the two men convicted of killing Stephen Lawrence in 1993 - has launched a lawsuit against the government because he was viciously attacked by three black men in prison.  It is worth noting that Norris had not been convicted of the murder at that point, and so was technically innocent.  However the attack on him would have been wrong even if it had taken place after his conviction.

As an aside, the murder of Stephen Lawrence is almost universally reported as having been racially motivated, which I won't argue with right now.  I do wonder though whether or not the attack on David Norris should be seen as racially motivated.  Would the inmates who attacked David Norris have attacked him if he - like them - had been black?  I would be surprised if HMP Belmarsh did not at that time contain at least one black inmate who had attacked and perhaps even murdered someone.

I hope that the men who attacked Craig Meehan will be prosecuted and imprisoned.  I await the outcome of David Norris's lawsuit.

The murder of Andrea Bocelli

As the inauguration of Donald Trump as President of the USA approaches, it is reported that Andrea Bocelli and Jennifer Holliday are among the long list of famous performers who will not be taking part.

My first comment is that these performers are missing out on publicity, although to be fair a lot of them are major celebrities who perhaps do not feel the need for such publicity.  Nevertheless, the perfomers who will take part - Jackie Evancho and Toby Keith - may well benefit from increased sales of their recordings.

Jennifer Holliday initially agreed to perform, but then pulled out and gave the reason that she stands with the LGBT community.   I am not sure what Doland Trump has done which supposedly has annoyed the LGBT community, but it does make me wonder about the mindset of people in that community.

I am not LGBT, but I do have bills to pay, and it is only by the grace of God that I have never been the victim of a burglary or mugging.  Am I right in concluding that people in the LGBT community also have bills to pay?  Surely it is fair to say that everyone in the LGBT community either has been the victim of a burglary or a mugging or else could be tomorrow.

There are times when it is tempting to conclude that all homosexuals put their sexuality at the centre of their existence.  At the risk of sounding homononphobic, I don't believe that.  Whatever Trump may have said concerning sexuality, I would be very suprised if not one LGBT person voted for him.  People normally vote in elections on a wide range of issues, and each person who votes has their own set of priorities.

The more worrying issue for me is that Andrea Bocelli apparently backed out of the inauguration ceremony because he received death threats.  If this is true, then I hope that the people who sent the death threats will be prosecuted and sent to prison.

I have never in my life sent anyone a death threat, and neither have I ever received one, but there are times when I wonder if I am perhaps the only person in the world who has neither sent nor received a death threat.  Examples of people who have in the past received death threats include:

• a man in London who campaigned to save some historic railway arches from demolition;
• Caroline Flack when she was dating Harry Styles;
• the American singer Rebecca Black, when she was thirteen years old.

People who send death threats, regardless of the provocation, really disgust me, and most if not all of them ought to be imprisoned.


Related previous posts include:
Another teenager dies in pre-communist Britain 
Ryan French is dead

Britain First and Niemoeller's prayer

Martin Niemoeller was a clergyman who was imprisoned by the German government in the period 1937 to 1945.  Nowadays his fame rests almost entirely on a quote which is often referred to as Niemoeller's prayer.  It exists in various forms, and I merely offer one version without suggesting it is the most accurate:

First they came for the Communists, and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a Communist.

Then they came for the Jews, and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a Jew.

Then they came for the trade unionists, and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a trade unionist.

Then they came for the Catholics, and I didn't speak out because I was a Protestant.

Then they came for me — and by that time no one was left to speak out for me.

As I write, the leader and deputy leader of the political party Britain First have accepted draconian conditions imposed on them by a totalitarian police force.  They have done this because to fight the police force in the courts would have left them exposed to the likelihood of a vast legal bill.

Much as I dislike Paul Golding, the leader of Britain First, I will admit that I respect his decision on this occasion.

I sometimes wonder how long it will be before someone in authority tries to shut down my blog.  Maybe it will never happen.  I also wonder how long it will be before one of Britain's national newspapers is the target of a publicly funded lawsuit.  Or maybe one of Britain's major church denominations will find themselves facing publicly funded lawyers in the courtroom.

Related previous posts include:
Britain First and the fiction of a free country

Theresa May: accessory to murder

Having voted for Britain to leave the EU, I was naturally pleased that the outcome of the referendum was a majority leave vote.  I was confident that the EU would collapse in due course, and that the referendum vote would therefore serve either to accelerate or to delay an inevitable process.

Nevertheless I am not optimistic.  Freed from its European shackles, the United Kingdom can now restrict immigration from other European countries.  Unfortunately we cannot expect a government led by Theresa May to take immigration seriously.

Theresa May served as Home Secretary for the whole of the six years that David Cameron was Prime Minister.  As such she was accountable for government policy on both crime and immigration.  A pledge to cut immigration to just tens of thousands each year never came close to being realised, but police budgets were cut, and criminals are the winners - notably fraudsters.  Frauds reported to the police very rarely result in a prosecution, even where substantial evidence is provided.

It is also inconceivable that Theresa May had no input into the faked murder of Labour MP Jo Cox.

As I write, a young woman has recently been murdered in Sheffield, which I'm sorry to say does not surprise me one bit.  Given that the worst Home Secretary in British history is now our Prime Minister, we must not expect the homicide rate to fall any time soon.

Related previous posts include:
A sense of the inevitable
Who murdered Jo Cox?
Tories pretend to be tough on crime ... again

Another Bastille Day bloodbath

The major news story as I write is the recent murder of dozens of people in the French city of Nice, which took place during the annual Bastille Day celebrations.

Bastille Day is the unofficial name given to a national holiday which takes place in France on 14 July each year, which celebrates the storming of the Bastille on that day in 1789.  The Bastille was a large fortified prison in Paris in which people could be imprisoned on the whim of the monarch.  In other words it could easily be seen as a symbol of state oppression.

On 14 July 1789, a mob attacked the Bastille, and was soon reinforced by a regiment of soldiers.  The attack ended with the governor being murdered, and the inmates being released.  In other words it was an act of mob rule.

As it happens, there were only seven inmates in the prison that day, and only one was a political prisoner.  Nevertheless that is a detail.  Even if the Bastille had been full to bursting with political prisoners, then its storming would still have been an act of mob brutality.

I have long wondered why the French people celebrate this act of barbarity, and I also wonder why - to my knowledge - nobody in France has ever argued for it not being celebrated.  The word stupidity comes to mind.

More than two hundred people died on the original Bastille Day - more than double the number who died in yesterday's terror attack in Nice.  It is also worth noting that the original Bastille Day bloodbath was not connected with Islam.

Wallets versus bicycles: the psychology of crime

I have learned the hard way that it is rarely a good idea to try to explain why crimes are committed.  Explanation can easily be misinterpreted as justification, and I do not want to be accused of trying to justify crime.  Nevertheless, today I feel motivated to ponder on why certain crimes are committed.

Many years ago it was reported on national television that a study had been carried out into what we might call public decency.  Wallets full of money had been left lying on pavements in a number of different towns and cities, and each one was handed in to the police station.

Also many years ago, a national newspaper reported a similar experiment, but with different results.  Bicycles were left abandoned in towns and cities around the country, and each one was stolen.

How can we explain this?  A very simple answer would be that the wallets were all found by decent people, while the bicycles were all stolen by black-hearted villains.  This explanation is unlikely ever to be misconstrued as justification.

Unfortunately, I am not satisfied by this simplistic approach, and I feel inclined to delve further into the matter.  Why were none of the wallets found by black-hearted villains?  Why were none of the bicycles found by decent people?

The second question is not too hard to answer.  I will assume that you are a decent person.  Suppose you find a wallet lying on the pavement.  People do not normally abandon wallets deliberately, and so you assume that it was dropped accidentally.  You pick it up, and hand it in at the nearest police station.

Now suppose that you find a bicycle resting against a lamp post.  People do not normally leave bicycles by accident, and so you assume that it has been left there deliberately by its owner.  You might reflect that the owner of the bicycle is foolish to leave it unattended and unsecured, but that is not your business.  You leave the bicycle where it is, and continue on your way.

Do I dare attempt to answer the first question?  Yes.  The wallets were all found by decent people before the black-hearted villains came upon them.  Theft is theft, and I am not inclined to gloss over it.  Stealing a wallet is wrong, and stealing a bicycle is wrong.