Thoughts of this most dismal of days
Today, the 24th of March 2014 Anno Domini, will go down in the history of the 21st century in many nations-for all the wrong reasons.
Firstly, as was sadly predicted by many, in French local elections the extreme-right Front National (FN) made sweeping gains in many French town halls, capturing notably the town of Heinn Beaumont (a depressed industrial town similar to parts of the Belgian province of Wallonia in many ways) outright as well as many small towns dotted around France. Despite the fact that the FN's leader Marine Le Pen, has not actually moved away from its racist, anti-Semtiic, homophobic rhetoric, the FN could still top the polls in France in the European elections as a result of protest votes, some of which are coming from supporters of the Parti Socialiste (PS) led by Francois Hollande, whose ratings as French President are at a terrible 23% at this time of writing.
Secondly, the so-called Justice Secretary (more like the Injustice Secretary!), Chris Grayling, has now used his powers to ban prisoners in the UK from receiving books from outside (and also other important parcels except under 'exceptional circumstances'), even though forensic psychological evidence has proved beyond reasonable doubt that reading helps strongly with offender rehabilitation, especially given the fact that literacy and education rates are much poorer amongst prison populations in Britain and elsewhere. This outrageous and vindictive move has been rightly criticised by some of Britain's best known writers, including Anthony Horowitz, Mark Haddon, Susan Hill and Phillip Pullman. I ask you all to find petitions asking Mr. Grayling to reverse this move and sign them, and share them.
Thirdly, when I had hope that the people aboard Flight MH370 had somehow survived far away from the plane's destination of Beijing, satellite reports have confirmed that it has crashed into the Indian Ocean west of Australia with no survivors amongst the passengers or crew. Given that the location that Flight MH370 crashed into was south of Kuala Lampur, Malaysia (where it departed), and that Beijing is north of Malaysia, the loss of contact in flight, the fact there would be no reason for the plane to divert from its route to make a fuel stop as Beijing is not so far from Kuala Lampur (the ETA of MH370 for Beijing was 5 hours 40 minutes from the ETD at Kuala Lampur,according to reports) and evidence that passengers with stolen passports got on board the flight, I can safely say that Flight MH370 was definitely hijacked, almost certainly by the two people with the stolen passports who along with 237 innocent people have now died. I give my condolences to the families of the people who were aboard this lost flight.
Finally, and shockingly, 529 people in total have been sentenced to death by an Egyptian court for the murder of a police officer, even though during the absurdly short 2 hour trial the defendants were not allowed into the court and nor were their defence lawyers. It shows most clearly the shocking deterioration into a military dictatorship Egypt has fallen into, worse than even the hated and corrupt Mubarak regime that was overthrown in the Arab Spring.
Hopefully the rest of this week will get better,surely.
Regards, Alan.
Firstly, as was sadly predicted by many, in French local elections the extreme-right Front National (FN) made sweeping gains in many French town halls, capturing notably the town of Heinn Beaumont (a depressed industrial town similar to parts of the Belgian province of Wallonia in many ways) outright as well as many small towns dotted around France. Despite the fact that the FN's leader Marine Le Pen, has not actually moved away from its racist, anti-Semtiic, homophobic rhetoric, the FN could still top the polls in France in the European elections as a result of protest votes, some of which are coming from supporters of the Parti Socialiste (PS) led by Francois Hollande, whose ratings as French President are at a terrible 23% at this time of writing.
Secondly, the so-called Justice Secretary (more like the Injustice Secretary!), Chris Grayling, has now used his powers to ban prisoners in the UK from receiving books from outside (and also other important parcels except under 'exceptional circumstances'), even though forensic psychological evidence has proved beyond reasonable doubt that reading helps strongly with offender rehabilitation, especially given the fact that literacy and education rates are much poorer amongst prison populations in Britain and elsewhere. This outrageous and vindictive move has been rightly criticised by some of Britain's best known writers, including Anthony Horowitz, Mark Haddon, Susan Hill and Phillip Pullman. I ask you all to find petitions asking Mr. Grayling to reverse this move and sign them, and share them.
Thirdly, when I had hope that the people aboard Flight MH370 had somehow survived far away from the plane's destination of Beijing, satellite reports have confirmed that it has crashed into the Indian Ocean west of Australia with no survivors amongst the passengers or crew. Given that the location that Flight MH370 crashed into was south of Kuala Lampur, Malaysia (where it departed), and that Beijing is north of Malaysia, the loss of contact in flight, the fact there would be no reason for the plane to divert from its route to make a fuel stop as Beijing is not so far from Kuala Lampur (the ETA of MH370 for Beijing was 5 hours 40 minutes from the ETD at Kuala Lampur,according to reports) and evidence that passengers with stolen passports got on board the flight, I can safely say that Flight MH370 was definitely hijacked, almost certainly by the two people with the stolen passports who along with 237 innocent people have now died. I give my condolences to the families of the people who were aboard this lost flight.
Finally, and shockingly, 529 people in total have been sentenced to death by an Egyptian court for the murder of a police officer, even though during the absurdly short 2 hour trial the defendants were not allowed into the court and nor were their defence lawyers. It shows most clearly the shocking deterioration into a military dictatorship Egypt has fallen into, worse than even the hated and corrupt Mubarak regime that was overthrown in the Arab Spring.
Hopefully the rest of this week will get better,surely.
Regards, Alan.
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