'Nother Solent

That said

, "The people have spoken, the bastards" is a beaut of a line and Come The Glorious Day we shall spare Mr Pound on those grounds alone.

Tony Martin's Law: Update

Stephen Pound, the MP who rashly said he would try to steer the Today listeners' choice of new law (whatever it might be) through parliament, had a painful interview on TV today. (Channel 5, I think.) His main strategy seemed to be to say that because the literal meaning of the words on the listeners' ballot would allow you to shoot dead a kid who stepped into your garden to retrieve a ball, that made every conceivable alteration of the present law self-evidently insane. Somehow I doubt that similar deficiencies in whatever unimportant words were chosen to identify the rival proposals would have proved insurmountable if the voters had gone for an option more congenial to him. If you are reading this Mr Pound, do try to remember that you are a Member of Parliament. Proposing, scrutinising and amending the text of new laws is one of the things you are paid for. To aid you in this task you can call on the services of skilled Parliamentary draughtsmen, not to mention the many barristers and legal scholars in your own party. I'm sure you'll manage something. Off you hop, then, and tell me when it's ready.

True in Toronto but false in Kispiox.

Moira Breen tussles with a cold and the limits of science in a free society. Her long-running interest in the Kennewick Man case sparked the post.

Sometimes she's cruel...

If you've ever wondered how certain academic types manage to justify sneering at Baptists while honoring any other (non-European) spiritual belief - well, they don't manage to justify it. But this is as fine an example of an attempt to justify it as I've come across.

Sometimes she's kind....

It is also true that the engagement of non-Europeans with the troubling truths of science will be an experience distinct from that of Europeans - from whose culture, after all, contemporary science evolved, and who particpated in an intellectual tradition, extant for millenia, that truth is best approached by reasoned argumentation. But to state these truisms addresses nothing and settles nothing. Whatever the difficulties of that engagement (and they can be very harsh and painful indeed), science is not culture-specific, and all must eventually come to terms with what science has to say about the world - not only because that is a natural response of thinking, curious human beings ("how do I make all I know fit together coherently?"), but because no culture is static and sealed, and truth claims will inevitably contest.

But cruel or kind, she's on target:

I no more want "experts" ruling over our private lives, no matter how true their claims, than I want what are essentially anti-blasphemy rules limiting speech and free inquiry.

Beyond parody.

Jackie Ashley wants to nanny you. When I wrote all that guff about not wanting to "add to the profits of fat-cat Big Calendar shareholders" I was joking. But our Jackie was serious when she wrote this:

The crucial point which critics of the nanny state fail to mention is that individuals and families don't stand alone. None of us lives in a neutral social space, unharassed, and free to make wise long-term choices. Whatever the philosophical ideal, in the real world we are bombarded by corporate messages cajoling us and our children to consume and borrow. We are inhabitants of the more, now, spend-it, eat-it society, which - let us not forget - boosts the profits of the multinationals.

Get working on audience research.

Radio 4's "Today" programme is the world epicentre for snobby progressivism, right? Maybe, maybe not. In some poll or other where Today listeners voted to choose the new law they would most like to see enacted, the favourite was a law allowing householders to use any means to defend their home against burglars.

Or if you think that ecologically sound bio-fuel belongs back in the horse,

you could read Tim Blair on why Test cricket is like the free market.

And a Happy New Yea...

on second thoughts, let us challenge the surrender to capitalist consumer-culture assumptions implicit in that wish. Quite apart from the ethno-centric and patriarchal Christian overtones implicit in the designation "2004", why does one have to have a new year every year? No doubt multi-national corporations are very happy with this planned obsolescence! But if you want to conserve the planet's dwindling stock of years, why not join with committed friends all over the world and recycle an old year? Many activists find it very satisfying to keep lovely vintage old years such as 1972 or 1968 running on ecologically sound bio-fuel rather than add to the profits of fat-cat Big Calendar shareholders. Happy old year.