“Is Tony Blair’s Government Guilty of ‘Developing Something Close to a Criminal Policy’?”

We need a special edition of the Catch-Up Service, just for the Questions to Which the Answer is No that I have missed.

Number 691 in the series, above, was asked, in the arresting present tense, by the Pacific Free Press, 6 August (and that was before Blair was being blamed for the riots), of a Guardian report, 4 August. The “criminal policy” quotation is from when the question was originally asked (number 42 or thereabouts) by that model of rhetorical restraint and judicial judiciousness, Ken Macdonald:

The real question here is not whether a single individual was somehow solitarily complicit in torture. It is, rather more seriously, whether Tony Blair’s Government was guilty of developing something close to a criminal policy.

Moving on:

Do we need exorcism?

BBC Sunday Morning Live (above), 7 August. Number 690. Thanks to Citizen Sane.

Is Israel officially giving up on democracy?

Asked by Al Jazeera, 6 August. Number 689. Thanks to Matt Hoffman.

Does Labour need its own tea party movement?

Luke Bozier, 4 August. Number 688.

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• MrsBrownatHome

  I am afraid that I, too, think that Blair will never face trial although I am quite convinced that he should.

• MrsBrownatHome

  Hmmmm.  If you think Blair was ahead of the game then I really have to wonder what game, exactly, was he playing.  To my mind, it is a treacherous one.  Yep, I will give you unique because everyone is unique but never missed.  More thankfully aware that he is there no longer.

• moody river

   Hmmm. Then again, YES. Definitely.

• moody river

  You mean greatly messed.

• trottitout

  Dullards like you don’t do metaphor. Perhaps that’s why you are such a Blair fundamentalist. When things get clever Blairsupporter and his ilk get defensive and deflect like mad because they can’t cope with the truth.

• BlairSupporter

  @trottitout:disqus

  Yes, Your Honour. I wasn’t suggesting that anyone should consider that using a loaded gun against a former prime minister was entirely understandable. I was speaking metaphorically. Of course I was.

  “And apart from you and Rentoul, who exactly is greatly missing him? Apart from those with a loaded gun at the ready that is…”

  METAPHOR definition: A figure of speech in which an implicit comparison is made between two unlike things that actually have something in common.

  (Which two unlike things with something in common were you referring to? Personally I interpret your words as an incitement to violence. And this easy irresponsibility would  NOT be interpeted as metaphorical by the susceptible. It only encourages the “right” to inflict violent retribution where grievances are felt or perceived. As has happened in recent violent riots leading to 5 deaths. IMHO. Got a good lawyer?)

• highlandjock

  ‘Smarmy’ is exactly right!
  How anyone can have been taken in by the lying of Blair, goodness knows, but ‘Blairsupporter’ has achieved this distinction, in spades. He’d make a great ‘mark’ for the ‘Hustle’ team.

• http://pulse.yahoo.com/_3QU3JZ4Y6K25CYRPBI7V26DDCM jop

  Who cares about Blair? yesterdays news (bit longer than that)

  Bad thing is that there is a bad copy in Nr 10 now…

• smike e

  jop “Who cares?”

  It’s difficult to explain this to someone whose comment gives the impression of someone possessing the ethics and moral life span of the species Drosophila, but let’s see:
  Only those who care about someone bringing about the needless, illegal, slaughter of over one hundred thousand people through lies and deception, amongst other things.

  And including those who might only care about the impact the deed had on our economy, particularly when the person in question is a recent ex PM of Britain.

  In answer to your question though, I would think millions and millions of people in this country alone seem to have been left with a deep-rooted disquiet about the deed. ‘Deep-rooted’ being a perhaps incomprehensible concept to some.
  Needless to say, I wouldn’t wish lawlessness on the streets to flare up at any point in time, including January; when it might distract from the re-scheduled release of the Inquiry findings. That would be a most unfortunate coincidence.