Good morning, Michael.
I appreciate the political joke. I also feel the rage, the impotence in the realisation that, like your donkeys, we are all being led by the nose to suit the whim and needs of the powers that be.
Today's early morning news is filled with reports about BP, the released 'bomber' and now-we-send-it-now-we-don't letters to the British Poodle. Dear Lord, are there still people out there who believe any of it? From leaks which may or may not be real and may not even be leaks, deals which may or may not have been struck, it is all a swamp of lies and deceit.
The release of that man with supposedly terminal cancer. Either way, it does nothing for the loss of those who died in that horrible aircraft and on the ground where it fell; it just reopens the wounds and represents a dripping roast for an industry built around the event. I have often watched the father of one of the victims - I have a lousy memory for names - and he seems a cultured, educated man but is far from convinced that the guy plonked in jail was guilty. This morning, it was the turn of another person, an equally well-spoken and articulate lady who lost people to the event, who never faltered once in her interview, and as very carefully addressed the issue of guilt.
But wait, the best is yet to come: nothing to do with the English, all the doing of those rebellious Scots! As if.
There is something extraordinary about western justice: we say someone is innocent until proven guilty. And that proof comes down to what - opinion of a dozen non-specialist people sitting around getting bored, possibly mentally challenged by what's going on, angry and keen to resume their normal lives as quickly as possible? Evidence that may be perfectly valid, crucial and real is denied if it can be shown to have been obtained improperly (whatever that means - surely it should be the value of the evidence, not the method of finding it that counts), and the circus rumbles on. Just another very rewarding game for those who live by knowing the rules.
Your donkeys may or may not end up being sacrificial, but had you shown young sheep instead you might have made the political poster of a lifetime, the new Che...
Rob C
