Bans don't work

Gun crimes in the supposedly "gun free" paradises of England and Wales, which have a total ban on firearms, are up an astounding 89% since the liberal Labour party there regained power in 1998 in part on their plaintive promises to "do something" in the wake of the Dunblane tragedy.

Yeah, let's copy that plan.

(Link via Unc)

Here comes the slippery slope

"WASHINGTON – Health insurance plans must cover birth control as preventive care for women, with no copays, the Obama administration said Monday in a decision with far-reaching implications for health care as well as social mores.

The requirement is part of a broad expansion of coverage for women's preventive care under President Barack Obama's health care law. Also to be covered without copays are breast pumps for nursing mothers, an annual "well-woman" physical, screening for the virus that causes cervical cancer and for diabetes during pregnancy, counseling on domestic violence, and other services."

We will first stipulate that having some of these services made more available to women will most likely result in a net benefit for both them as well as society in general.

That's not the point.  

Lots of things would be of great use to people if the government were to force private companies to give them away for free - cars, computers, you name it.  That doesn't happen, of course, because the Constitution does not give the .gov that redistributive power.  Similarly, nowhere in that document is a provision giving the Feds the authority to force people to buy products (such as health coverage) they may not wish to own or the ability to tell those firms which of their wares they must give away instead of charge for, as we hope the Supreme Court will eventually point out.

We predict that this is just the first in a long series of coverage mandates, and that sly Washington bureaucrats will slowly and patiently deem more and more items to be vital and necessary over time until everything is eventually provided gratis.  And then we'll be Great Britain, where operations for such things as cataracts, hip replacements and tonsillitis are now deemed to be "non-urgent" and thus denied until the patient basically can no longer see, walk or swallow.

Of course, there really is no free ride, as the first article notes:

"Although the new women's preventive services will be free of any additional charge to patients, somebody will have to pay."

Dig deep, peasant.

Bush-league antics

The British government gave a fantastic dinner at Guildhall in London yesterday in honor of both the close relationship our two countries share as well as the dedication of a statue of President Ronald Reagan in honor of the 100th anniversary of his birth.  The event was well-attended by important luminaries of all political ideologies from both nations.

One person, however, was notably absent - U.S. Ambassador to London Louis B. Susman.  He was a complete no-show at the party in what many people are considering to be a deliberate snub of the festivities.  Why would people think this?

"Ambassador Susman is, of course, a long-standing Democrat fundraiser, nicknamed the vacuum cleaner for his skill at sucking donations out of the wealthy. And his efforts to fill Obama's campaign pockets was said by many to be his main qualification to come to London."

Nice to know we have such professional, competent people representing America's interests abroad.

Apparently honoring a former Republican president's birthday is beyond Mr. Susman's capabilities, to the harsh chagrin of even some Democrats who were present at the soiree: 

"'Our ambassador should be here,' said Lynn de Rothschild, the American entrepreneur who is married to Sir Evelyn de Rothschild and was one of Hillary Clinton's key fundraisers in 2008 as well as a supporter of several Republican presidential candidates. 'This was an historic dinner to mark Reagan's centenary and to celebrate him as the man who ended the Cold War. What could not be more important?'

'Why is our ambassador not here on Independence Day? No excuse. How is it that America is not represented in this room by our ambassador? It is appalling that no representative of our government is in this room. This has the feel of petty partisanship.'"

We agree with Mr Rothschild.  This was a true embarrassment and an outrageous slap in the face to a well-meaning gesture by the British government.  After all, July 4 is the day we declared independence from them in the first place.  They didn't have to celebrate any of this with us, yet they freely chose to host the festivities.  For our ambassador to blow it off with no explanation is the height of arrogance and rudeness.

Do your job, Mr. Susman.  You are supposed to represent the entire United States of America, not just the nakedly partisan politician who named you to your current position.  A personal apology from you would be very appropriate right about now.

Dying? Suffer

Great Britain's National Health Service, the utterly bankrupt and completely mismanaged government-mandated health care scheme that Dear Leader and many liberal Democrats in Congress wish us here in America to ultimately emulate, has as many as 100,000 terminally ill people on its rolls who aren't getting the palliative care they desperately need:

"Meanwhile, 97% of hospices do not receive all the funding they need for the NHS services they provide, and some patients are victims of "rationing" towards the end of the NHS financial year."

Translation - these people simply die in agony because there's no money left to give them proper pain control, nursing care and other necessary end-of-life services.

Hmm.  "Rationing".  Seems like that word has come up before, only to have Obamacare supporters pooh-pooh away as ludicrous the inevitable result of imposing a single-payer health system.  Try doing the same thing to these suffering Brits and see if they think the concept is so far-fetched.

We just can't wait for this kind of top-notch medical care to become the U.S. standard as well.  

The Jack-Booted Thug(s) of the Week...

... are the Customs and Border Protection agents who on May 26 made a shipful of 2,000 elderly British tourists on a 72-day dream cruise wait in line for seven hours with no food, water or lavatory access, all to simply be cleared for entry into the Port of Los Angeles for a one-day visit.

According to the passengers, most of the reason for this completely unacceptable wait was the addition of a bunch of wildly overreaching security checks, in apparent direct retaliation for some of the cruisers daring to complain about the already-long wait since they had already been given advance clearance to enter the U.S. and their itinerary had already taken them to nine other American ports:

"The fingerprints of both hands were taken as well as retina scans and a detailed check of the passport as well as questioning as to their background."

Because, you know, elderly wealthy Brits champing at the bit to relax and spend their money in our country are a well-known source of terrorist zealots.

Here's the part that earns these CBP goons this week's coveted award:

"When one lady asked in desperation whether she could use a bathroom, one immigration official is said to have replied: 'Do it over the side, we won’t mind.'"

Way to represent our nation and welcome guests to our country, Zippy.

Even the cruise line itself admits that the incident happened pretty much the way their passengers said it did, although the company was a bit more PC about it:

"[A company spokeswoman] added: 'The delay in immigration procedures was largely to blame on issues with the Customs and Border Protection (CBP) computer systems, not aided by the verbal approach that a minority of our passengers, clearly frustrated by this delay, took with the local immigration officers.'

'The US has a record for the most stringent and thorough security and entry requirements in the world, and they felt the need to enhance their security checks further, which they have the power to do.'"

Then those particular agents need to have that power permanently taken away from them.

We would do well to learn from their mistake

Britain's always on-the-cusp-of-failing National Health Service, the polished turd of a government-run health care scheme that Dear Leader and many in Congress want America to emulate (despite our country being far larger and more populous than England as well as trillions of dollars more in debt, not to mention the fact that Obamacare is patently unconstitutional), is failing even harder these days:

"Andrew Lansley [England's Health Secretary] says the core values of the NHS are under threat as never before from a “financial crisis” that will see annual health spending double to £230 billion a year without urgent reform.

While insisting he would never privatise the NHS, Mr Lansley warns that its future as a universal service, available to all and free at the point of use will be at risk “within years” if radical change is blocked." 

So a privatization solution appears to be forever off the table there, even as the masters in charge of that farce admit that their pet program is unsustainable and will soon collapse, rendering basic health care unavailable to the very peasants who are supposedly paying for it (we imagine the likes of Mr. Lansley and Her Majesty the Queen will still be able to be seen for their ailments in a reasonable time frame).  Sounds like things are going just swimmingly for the Brits, and that we of course should immediately strive to be just like them in terms of solutions to our health care woes.

Still want our bankrupt Federal government, which has a long track record of never instituting a program that's been run efficiently or under budget, to be in charge of funding and running your health care?

English-style Nanny-statism is rapidly "spreading" to other European nations

Marmite, the extremely healthy British spread made from brewer's yeast, is now banned in Denmark "under legislation forbidding the sale of food products with added vitamins as threat to public health." 

The nutritious food in question had been outlawed in 2004 along with other apparently toxic health hazards such as Rice Krispies and Ovaltine but had somehow slipped under the radar until quite recently, when the Danish Veterinary and Food Administration noticed that it was still being offered for sale at a small English-themed shop in Copenhagen and demanded an immediate halt to its availability.

"'I don't eat it myself, I don't like it but Marmite was one of our best selling products. Not a day goes by without someone coming in and asking for it,' said Marianne Ørum, the shop owner. 

'All the English people here are shaking their heads in disbelief and say that it is insane. I agree but it is the law. It's becoming impossible to run a business in this country. We are not allowed to do anything anymore. It is the way Denmark is going.'"

Those Brits sure don't have much room to complain, seeing as how their own home nation is so consistently ahead of all other countries when it comes to such nonsensical bans.  One wonders when England itself will finally get around to removing its homegrown product from sale because of such spurious "health and safety" considerations.

Pre-crime

Two of admittedly the politest and most deferential cops we've ever seen nonetheless show up at the London home of free-speech activist Charlie Veitch the day before last week's royal wedding and arrest him for allegations (not even formal charges) of "conspiracy to cause a public nuisance" and "suspicion of aggravated trespass", despite Veitch himself confirming the day before at Scotland Yard that he had no outstanding warrants.



Translation:  You rabble-rousers aren't going to put a damper on our worldwide PR event, and we're willing to violate your rights in order to ensure a trouble-free day for our inbred masters.

Great Britain - where you can be dragged downtown and locked up for something you might do.

No more bumping on the English bumper car ride

The "health and safety" shock troops in the Nanny-state paradise that used to be Great Britain once again get their padded selves all worked up at the prospect of some of their subjects actually having fun:

"Staff at all three Butlin resorts in Bognor Regis, Minehead and Skegness are instructed to ban anyone found guilty of bumping into each other in the electric cars equipped with huge bumpers.

Bemused customers who assume that the ‘no bumping sign’ is in jest are told to drive around slowly in circles rather than crash into anyone else for fear of an injury that could result in the resort being sued." 

Sounds like a real swingin' time. 

"[Resort director Jeremy Pardey] said the rules are 'pretty vigilant' to avoid anyone being hurt, although customers are not asked to wear crash helmets."  (emphasis ours)

Good Lord.

Only in Britain

Trash collectors in Stockport, England refused to empty 74-year-old grandmother Kay McIntyre's compost waste bin after she and her grandson filled it with weeds from her garden because "they claimed the plants had too much mud stuck to their roots."

Ms McIntyre filed an official complaint over the incident, and in response a low-level bureaucratic functionary actually showed up and dug through her bin to verify that the dirt-to-weed ratio was within acceptable parameters (which it indeed was).

It must be so heartening for those British subjects to learn the insane lengths to which their government is going to ensure their "health and safety".

By the way, here's the entire trash sorting process for that particular town:

"In addition to their green bin for garden and food waste, householders in Stockport are issued with a blue bin for paper and card, a brown bin for plastic bottles, glass and cans, and a black one for everything else."

4 large wheeled bins for every household.  How efficient (and attractive).

British "health and safety" strikes again

Some people laughably referred to as "risk assessors" in England have proposed banning fire extinguishers in common areas of apartment buildings in that country because, unbelievably (or not, this of course being Great Britain), "they are a safety hazard".

Apparently these insane Nanny-state officials want the subjects over there to merely race for the exits while wetting their pants instead of taking the responsibility of putting out minor blazes themselves before they rage out of control.

What are those peasants supposed to do if, say, such a fire happens to be blocking the only exit of a high-rise building?  Put a kettle on and pray that firefighters aren't otherwise occupied?

"Dorset Fire and Rescue defended the move, saying: 'Obviously, in some cases, an extinguisher could come in useful but, with new building regulations, every escape route should be completely fireproof.'"

And the Titanic was unsinkable.

The future of your health care if Obama gets his way

"Former NHS [National Health Service] director dies after operation is cancelled four times at her own hospital"

Four times since last June, nine months ago.

Sad, patently ridiculous and completely unnecessary.  This poor woman was as good as murdered by the incompetent bureaucrats at this health "care" facility.

Stories such as this one out of England are unfortunately all too common in countries which have socialized (and thus rationed, generally bankrupt and usually criminally mismanaged) single-payer health care systems in which career government workers with no medical background alone decide what and how much health care a person will get.

This is exactly the kind of Ponzi scheme that Dear Leader (as well as many other liberal Democrat politicians) wishes us peasants here in America to suffer under, as the president is on record stating that a single-payer system is his ultimate goal, with the current (and bad enough in and of themselves) Obamacare provisions being merely an incremental stopping-point on the journey to Marxism Lite:



Their wonderful "plan" for us suddenly doesn't look so good anymore, does it?

More of that old time British Nanny-state insanity

British subject Andrew Richardson was working on a remote Texas ranch in 1981 when he was bitten by a rattlesnake.  Once he recovered and went back to work, his boss lawfully gave him a .22 caliber revolver with which to dispatch other snakes, in order to prevent a repeat of his unpleasant experience.

After leaving to work in the Middle East a year later, Richardson completely forgot about the pistol and it ended up in a shoebox in storage back in England along with many of his other household items until 2008, when he turned the contents of the storage unit over to an auctioneer for sale.  A worker found the pistol when inventorying the items and contacted the local police.

Richardson, a person with no criminal history who was by then working in Massachusetts, got five years in an English prison for his 27-year-old innocent error.

Here's the part of the story that illustrates perfectly how the draconian penalties being meted out over there are actually more about the British "authorities" controlling the subjects through fear and intimidation than about any so-called gun "safety":

"During the prosecutor's questioning as to why I hadn't handed it in during the 2004 amnesty (I was working abroad at the time and didn't know about it), the judge inquired whether I'd considered throwing it into a stream. The air thinned in the courtroom as 40 people sucked in their breath in shock. My reply was along the lines of: 'I thought that would've been the most careless thing anyone could do, your honour.'" 

How can a jurist be so hopelessly stupid?

Richardson fortunately was released after serving only eight months once his appeal was granted, but he isn't by any means the only law-abiding British person to be caught up in this kind of legal nightmare.  There's this fellow:

"Then there's the tale of the senior bank director. An avid countryside sportsman, he attended a shoot in Essex one Friday, but instead of going home to Surrey, stayed in his Belgravia house over the weekend as he had city social engagements. His 12-bore [shotgun] was locked in the gun cabinet on Friday evening, but a nosy neighbour who saw him carrying it indoors, secured in the right place, called the constabulary. He was arrested and imprisoned: his licence address was Surrey, so locking it up in Belgravia constituted both unlicensed possession and concealment."

And this poor lady:

"A 73-year-old charity shop proprietor found a package of old clothes outside her shop, with a handgun wrapped in them. She closed the shop and took it straight to the police, whereupon she was arrested for possession of a lethal pistol, and imprisoned on remand pending trial."

Jailed for doing the responsible and moral thing.  That will surely encourage the peasants to engage in more of the same behavior, no?

We're sure the violent crime rate in England dropped noticeably once these dangerous businesspeople were safely locked away, even though at the very same time "22% of youths caught carrying concealed handguns in London were let off with a caution."

These are exactly the sort of repressive, unfair, freedom-sapping and ultimately doomed-to-fail policies that rabidly anti gun politicians such as Chuck Schumer and Carolyn McCarthy as well as organizations like the Brady Campaign and Violence Policy Center envision for this country, which is why Second Amendment advocates fight so hard to prevent that nightmare scenario from ever becoming reality.

Catchup Monday

Clearing the desktop of a few wayward stories:

1.  Rep. Anthony Weiner, D-NY, a fervent House champion of Dear Leader's "one size fits all" health care Ponzi scheme (including the very contentious public option), is now arguing that New York City is "more equal" than everyone else and thus deserving of a waiver from having to struggle under that onerous burden of a program: 

"Weiner, who is likely to run for mayor of New York, said that because of the city’s special health care infrastructure, his office was looking into alternatives that might make more sense."

But nobody else in the country should be allowed to, of course, except for the various entities who wanted this execrable legislation in the first place:

"'The administration needs to make this argument more forcefully,' he said. 'A lot of people who got waivers were … people who are our friends.'"

No need, sir, we peasants have already received that message loud and clear.


2.  Police in Birmingham, England have mistakenly raided the same wrong house an unbelievable 41 times over the past year and a half, making an innocent couple's lives a living hell: 

"Matthew Jillard and Claire Hayes told last week how they have suffered 18 months of their home being mixed up with another 100 yards away."

This is a clear indicator of how beaten into submission the average English subject really is, because had the same circumstances happened to us our lawsuit against the idiots down at the local cop shop would have been filed after the second incident, much less allowing the apparent buffoons to rack up double-digit dangerous (not to mention illegal) invasions of our home.

Aren't some of these officers who participate in these multiple mistaken raids smart enough to think "Hey, we've been here, oh, thirty or so times before and it's always a mistake.  Maybe we should double-check with HQ before stepping square on our dongs once again."

The couple, who have lived at the address for over 10 years, has now announced that they are moving to avoid further harassment.  We don't see why they are the ones who have to leave:

"Last night West Midlands police said: 'Despite measures put in place to prevent such an occurrence, it appears human error has led to officers attending the incorrect address. We will be contacting them to apologise and discuss the matter further.'"

How about canning some of the idiot administrators who keep authorizing the continual abuse of these innocent people?  We imagine that sort of needed action would bring these sorts of inexcusable "errors" to an abrupt halt.

Today's TASER Travesty

"A police officer tasered a north Queensland [Australia] man up to 28 times because he believed the device, which emits a shock of 50,000 volts, did not cause pain, a coronial inquest has heard.

Senior Constable Craig Myles told the inquest into the death in custody of Antonio Galeano he used the Taser repeatedly because it was not having the desired effect on the 39-year-old."

"Constable" Myles apparently is also either an amnesiac or somehow has made it to adulthood without being able to make a reasonable estimate:

"The officer told the inquest he remembered using the Taser eight times against Mr Galeano but conceded it was possible he deployed it 28 times - as data recorded by the device suggested."

Maybe someone should TASER him 28 times in a row, as we imagine any lingering doubts about the device's ability to cause pain or the exact number of times he was shocked would be immediately removed from Myles's pea-sized brain.

How's that "knife control" working out for you, England?

Not very well at all, it seems.

BBC News reports that no less than 19 men were arrested the other day for engaging in a series of melees using "knives, hockey sticks and other weapons" in broad daylight right smack in the middle of Trafalgar Square, one of the must-see places in London for tourists.

Until now, that is.

"Officers are studying recordings from several CCTV and traffic cameras located around the square."

All of that ubiquitous Big Brother-style public surveillance going on in today's Britain didn't do diddly-squat to prevent these violent acts, but weakly only serves to give the cops a small chance to identify the thugs responsible for the mayhem.  We're positive that's of pretty small comfort right about now to the victims.

This is the Nanny-state, we remind everyone, whose benevolent "leaders" concluded that a near-complete ban on the legal ownership of firearms didn't go nearly far enough in accomplishing their ultimate goal of completely disarming the law-abiding populace, so a few years ago they enacted a ban on carrying even small knives in public for self-defense and other lawful purposes, complete with an "amnesty period" for people to turn in contraband blades (these particular brutes must have unfortunately forgotten to hand over theirs).

That insane policy, of course, only ensures that the regular peasants there are utterly defenseless from the criminals such as these who pay no attention at all to such legal prohibitions, as the events of the other day prove without a shadow of a doubt.

Naturally, this being Great Britain and all, every one of the alleged miscreants has now been released on bail, despite at least some of them committing multiple stabbings during the fracas.

The bobbies undoubtedly need that jail space to lock up the poor blokes who unluckily get nailed for possessing a pocket knife in public.

More dispatches from the madhouse across the pond

A couple of quickies from the criminal-coddling Nanny-state paradise that used to be "Great" Britain:

1.  Police in Kent and Surrey, England, have strongly advised homeowners in that region to remove the wire mesh that most have placed over their shed windows in response to a recent increase in garden thefts there.

The cops have informed the incredulous residents that such measures are "dangerous" to thieves and that they could be successfully sued if the miscreants somehow injure themselves whilst climbing through such protected openings.

"Last month Samantha Cullum, a mother-of-three, of Brasted, near Sevenoaks in Kent, had her whole shed stolen when thieves lifted it on to a lorry."  (emphasis ours)

Boy, a little mesh really made a huge difference there, didn't it?

"Dave Bishop, of Tatsfield, said: 'The law is so stupid, and you never know what decision judges are going to make.'"

The solution's quite obvious, Mr. Bishop - simply vote out the idiot lawmakers who insist on continually favoring the "rights" of criminals at your expense.


2.  17-year-old star athlete and fashion model Samantha Sadler of Halton, England was severely injured last June when a teenage "yob" for no reason at all threw a brick through the rear window of the car in which she was riding.

Sadler suffered a fractured skull, broken eye socket and broken nose, and still suffers to this day from double vision.  Her dual careers in athletics and modeling are in serious danger of being ended forever due to her lingering injuries.

The feral youth in question, "who cannot be named for legal reasons" (naturally)?  He was allowed to plead guilty to assault and was fined a mere 200 pounds ($321) and placed on probation for a year.

"A spokesman for the Families Against Crime campaign group said: ‘This is a shocking sentence. So often these cases end up in a plea bargain to save time and money at the expense of a proper punishment and justice for the victim. The system needs to be changed root and branch and this is a prime example why.'"

Just as in the first case, the solution is exceedingly simple - the law-abiding subjects over there need to vote out the politicians and judges who enable such outrageous miscarriages of justice which serve to embolden the criminal element, because the lawbreakers there know they won't face any serious consequences for their harmful actions.

We'll see if the law-abiding residents of that asylum ever wake up and rescue their nation from this kind of institutionalized madness.

How embarrassing for those charged with upholding traffic laws in Ye Olde Nanny State

The police departments of two adjacent communities in England, Staffordshire and Cheshire, have had a grand total of 238 car accidents in the last 18 months. 

In their own parking lots.

The careless cops over there have cost their taxpayers close to $200,000 in total damages over that short period, and here's the only mention of discipline we can find in the article: 

"Now some officers have been told to improve their driving standards."

Wow.  We're certain that mild scolding will certainly make them look where they're going next time.

These are the very "professionals", mind you, that are given special powers and charged with enforcing traffic laws and writing tickets to the peasants of that country.  How are they supposed to accomplish those tasks when they can't even make it out to the road without getting in fender-benders?

Freudian

British Prime Minister David Cameron, discussing that country's desperate need for yet another "reform" of their bottomless pit of a socialized medicine scheme, calls the National Health Service "second rate" on a BBC radio show, then immediately tries to change his comment to "second best", as if the clarification really matters. 

We think Mr. Cameron had it pretty well nailed on his first attempt to describe the bankrupt debacle they've got going over there, .

Second best to what, by the way?  The U.S., no doubt, at least until Dear Leader's own Ponzi scheme drops us to somewhere between Romania and Papua New Guinea in quality.

PM Cameron's take on what it's going to take to fix the system, which is costing the subjects there over 158 billion dollars (U.S.) a year for the "privilege" of long waits for access and substandard care?

"'We need modernisation, on both sides of the equation. Modernisation to do something about the demand for healthcare, which is about public health.'

'And modernisation to make the supply of healthcare more efficient, which is about opening up the system, being competitive and cutting out waste and bureaucracy."  (emphasis ours)

Wouldn't the logical endpoint of such reforms be... privatization?  Which we in America already have, along with what is universally recognized as the best health care in the world.  So why should our country suffer through the exact same 60-year failed experiment that England is presumably getting ready to mercifully end?

Free speech must be curbed to protect free speech

UK Guardian columnist Simon Jenkins, writing about Dear Leader's speech on the Tucson tragedy, deplores the fact that Americans have and regularly use their natural right of free speech mostly unconstrained by government regulation (what this has to do with a paranoid schizophrenic finally erupting at a perceived enemy we have no clue at all, since there's not an ounce of proof that Loughner was influenced even a little by political speech from either side) and begs "the handsome one" (oh, please) to do something about it.  He then hypocritically dives right ahead and gets in a little printed-word bashing of his own:


"Foreigners are always surprised by the US's capacity to speak right but somehow not do it"



Americans are always the clueless idiots of the world, aren't we, at least until the elite nations that are always putting us down once again need bailing out or rescuing.


"Washington must contain more wisdom and talent than anywhere on earth"


That statement right there proves without a doubt that Jenkins knows absolutely nothing about the United States.

Mr. Jenkins goes on to accomplish the impressive feat of  reversing the course of his argument in the middle of a column by complaining that Britain's 2003 Communications Act as well as the BBC code of practice on balance are too "authoritarian" for his sensibilities.  He then immediately doubles right back and somehow wants us to swallow such nonsensical bromides as "Freedom can only flourish in a climate of discipline" and "Free speech cannot exist without chains". 

Maybe for you, pal, but we'll take our natural rights such as free speech and self-defense unrestricted by meddling autocrats, thank you very much.  We've seen what happens all too often when those in charge decide that the peasants are grumbling just a little too loudly about the policies being put into place for their supposed "benefit".

We suppose we shouldn't be particularly surprised at Mr. Jenkins's position, though, since his ridiculous statements are coming from a subject, not a free citizen.  Judging from the many dissenting comments his piece has garnered from fellow Brits, though, we have hope that the common peasants there are finally starting to realize just how many of their rights and freedoms they have given up over the past five decades or so, and are beginning to want them restored.




UPDATE:  The winning comment on the Guardian's site comes from reader SpeaksForBoskone:

"One cannot shout fire in a crowded theatre"

You should, if there's a fire. And there is.

Amen.