London Bombings

[Hugo]

I'm hardly one to embrace the herd, Hugo, but the human race spent quite a few eons working its way up from anarchy to civilization and I see no logic behind your desire to return from whence we came.

You confuse anarchy with disorder or chaos. They aren't synonymous. All States are created through war and conquest, so a Government is not order and peace but the end result of violence and chaos.

[theloniusfleabag]

Dear Argus,

Like it or not societies function far better within an ordered environment where all know the rules. Likewise business requires stability and order

Hugo believes the 'rules' (and currency) can be privatized too, but I am old enough to know people better than that.

[Argus]

I'm hardly one to embrace the herd, Hugo, but the human race spent quite a few eons working its way up from anarchy to civilization and I see no logic behind your desire to return from whence we came.

You confuse anarchy with disorder or chaos. They aren't synonymous. All States are created through war and conquest, so a Government is not order and peace but the end result of violence and chaos.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Main Entry: anarchy

Part of Speech: noun

Definition: lawlessness

Synonyms: chaos, confusion, disorder, disorganization, disregard, hostility, mob rule, nihilism, nongovernment, rebellion, revolution, riot, turmoil

Antonyms: law and order, lawfulness, order, organization, rule

Source: Roget's New Millennium™ Thesaurus, First Edition (v 1.1.1)

Copyright © 2005 by Lexico Publishing Group, LLC. All rights reserved.

[Black Dog]

Documents contradict police version of tube shooting.

Investigation papers, leaked to ITV, suggest the Brazilian was restrained before being shot eight times.

The leaked documents appear to be from the Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC) inquiry into the shooting.

...

They contradict initial eyewitness reports that suggested Mr de Menezes hurdled a barrier at Stockwell tube station and was wearing a padded jacket that could have concealed a bomb.

The leaked documents now suggest the Brazilian had walked into Stockwell Tube station, picked up a free newspaper, walked through ticket barriers, started to run when he saw a train arriving and was sitting down in a train when he was shot.

Scotland Yard had said on the day of the shooting - 24 hours after the 21 July failed attacks - that "his clothing and his behaviour at the station added to their suspicions".

Despite eyewitness reports that the suspect had worn a large winter-style coat, the version of events in the leaked documents suggested he had in fact worn a denim jacket.

[mirror]

I am joining the list of people supporting the suggestion that Sir Ian Blair resign:

Sir Ian, you must go now

This is likely to remain the case even after his crassly worded interview — “Houston, we have a problem” — in the News of the World. His poor choice of phraseology nevertheless affords me the rare opportunity of consistency. A fortnight ago on this page I contended that manned spaceflight should soon be abandoned. So now should the Metropolitan Police Commissioner.

There are, to be fair, a number of superficially decent arguments for the opposite course of action. It has been pointed out that the loss of Sir Ian at this stage would be “disruptive” to the continuing investigation. It has been observed that it was not he but his predecessor, Sir John Stevens, who introduced the “shoot-to-kill” policy and it would be harsh to blame Sir Ian for its evident failure in this episode. It has also been mooted that for him to go would constitute a “victory” for some supposed “enemy”.

I do not find any of this convincing. It is hard to reconcile the notion of Sir Ian’s hands-on presence at the helm being so vital given his own admission that it was 24 hours before he knew that an innocent man had been shot at Stockwell station. Sir Ian was Sir John Stevens’s deputy at the time that “shoot-to-kill” was adopted and, even if he did not hear of that initiative until 24 hours after it had happened, is linked to its adoption. He could have amended or revoked it at any moment and must take responsibility for its implementation. And it is a bizarre world in which one quarter of the press believes that Sir Ian’s departure would be a victory for left-wing lawyers while another thinks it would be a triumph for right-wing constables who do not care for a man who knows more about the works of Graham Greene than the work of Dixon of Dock Green.

By contrast, the case against Sir Ian’s conduct is rather more robust. His claim that he was “in the dark” about the de Menezes shooting until 10.30 the next morning is astonishing. There were television reports from “police sources” that the man killed at Stockwell was not one of the four suspects of the failed July 21 bombings being broadcast from mid-afternoon of the day that it occurred. Mr de Menezes carried documents which identified who he was, where he lived and what he did for a living. That the Commissioner was not more inquisitive about the man into whom his officers had pumped eight bullets is staggering. It is not exactly a confession which should leave the public confident about his competence.

Then there is the issue of the briefings that the police gave the media about their victim. These were not merely inaccurate but deliberately embellished. Sir Ian swears that he had nothing to do with them and, less persuasively, that he could not correct them later. I have no grounds to dispute his account yet it is irrelevant what his role was. In the aftermath of what was obviously a catastrophic mistake, sections of the police felt at liberty to “spin” their own story and in recent days the surveillance branch and the firearms squad appear almost to be at war with each other. None of this would have taken place under a Commissioner who was respected by those beneath him. The strong and lasting impression left is that Sir Ian is not in control of those notionally under his command.

Finally, there is precedent. Incidents such as these are, properly, rare in Britain. One newspaper investigation yesterday could highlight only 14 examples in a decade where the police have killed an individual in conditions that resulted in their decision being disputed.

In the vast majority of these, the person concerned had a potential weapon, carried an imitation weapon or had seemed to have a weapon in his possession. The closest comparison to the de Menezes tragedy was an instance of mistaken identity in January 1998, when a man was shot by Sussex Police despite being naked and unarmed. Negligence was admitted, and the Chief Constable, Paul Whitehouse, felt compelled to retire.

It will be parried in response, perfectly reasonably, that the atmosphere in London on July 22 was “highly charged”. It plainly was, and to some degree still is. It is precisely in highly charged times that cool heads and clear, consistent, credible leadership are essential. This awful saga is not about, as Sir Ian put it, “Houston, we have a problem”, but “London, we have a problem”, and that problem is the personal credibility of the Metropolitan Police Commissioner. He increasingly resembles David Bowie’s Major Tom in Space Oddity: “Here am I floating round my tin can/Far above the Moon/Planet Earth is blue/And there’s nothing I can do.” What he could and should do is stand down.

[mirror]

Prescott takes a swipe at Sir Ian

I wonder how much longer they are going to stonewall over this police cover-up!

[mirror]

Heat rises on London police chief

This is certainly becoming an ugly international incident.

I mean how long do you try to protect someone's job after they have really screwed up, and by that person remaining in their position it casts aspirations on your entire organization? That is the very issue which is at stake here. Sometines it is better to bit the bullet sooner than later, before you have destroyed your credibility and seriously damaged your reputation.