Monthly Archives: July 2008
The Fraud Office Goes to Work
The Serious Fraud Office won its Law Lords appeal today against a court ruling that it acted unlawfully in halting a corruption inquiry into a lucrative arms deal between Saudi Arabia and BAE Systems. The Serious Fraud Office (SFO) took … Continue reading
Filed under British Foreign Policy
Bil’in’s Victory
Following last September’s Supreme Court ruling, the Israeli establishment has finally agreed to raze a portion of the Separation Wall around Bil’in. Despite a very modest ruling by the court, who simply said that the pathway of the wall should … Continue reading
Filed under Israel and Palestine
Israel’s Terrorists
An article in Saturday’s Times examines an old Irgun pamphlet issued by the Israeli prime minister and Nobel Peace Prize winner Menachem Begin. In the document, Irgun tells British troops: “It is unavoidable that many Jewish soldiers and many British … Continue reading
Filed under Ethics, Israel and Palestine
Building on the Arguments for the Legalisation of Drugs
In an excellent post on knife crime, Lenin points at an interesting correlation between the rate of knife crime and the enforcement of drug laws. What about drugs? Andrew Resignato at Florida State University has summed up a wealth of … Continue reading
Filed under Social Policy
On Chavs and Political Correctness
Tom Hampson and the Fabian Society should be praised for kickstarting a dialogue which has been sorely missing from the UK over the past few years, and condemning the widespread use of the word ‘chav’. As Ste Forshaw argued in … Continue reading
Filed under Social Policy
Why Government Policy on Gangs will Fail
There’s a new report out which states the bleeding obvious. The government will ignore it. From the Guardian: By failing to understand this basic structure, the researchers say, police mistakenly target and sometimes harass individuals who, though gang members, are … Continue reading
Filed under Social Policy
You Can’t Handle The Truth
The Times reports today that, in an important settlement, the MoD has agreed to pay over £2.8 million to the family of Baha Musa, an Iraqi who died in UK custody. Whilst the Times rather callously focuses on the strain … Continue reading
Filed under British Foreign Policy
Coincidence and Luck
I’m sitting at home suffering from what my mother has snidely referred to as ‘man-flu’, and so haven’t found the time to do a review of Marxism 2008. In the meanwhile I highly recommend Monbiot’s article from last week in … Continue reading
Filed under Climate Change
