Call me an arrogant mother but I detest popular "debate" because inevitably it is about anything but debate. Similarly, I simply refuse to "prove" something to somebody because: 1] to have to do so means he's not some fellow traveller on the same path to learning in the first place but someone with a contrary view, with his own agenda and therefore will automatically poo-poo whatever is said or else attach cliched labels to it.
2] he will inevitably say "give me hard proof", without realizing what it is he asks and applying strictures to the way the conclusions must be reached without applying the same draconian rules to himself.
For example, an atheist a year ago on another site said "how hilarious" when someone else put forth a Christian point of view. A three day "argument" ensued which was no argument at all.
He simply said that there was clearly no G-d and that the other would have to prove it to his satisfaction for there to be one. Where does one even start with a blinkered attitude or flawed scholastic methodology like that?
So I weighed in and presented him with piece after piece after piece - tiny fragments, each in themselves not conclusive and the whole needing to create a "most likely scenario", which is all, say archaeologists, do anyway. It wasted three days and nights and a lot of nerves.
Predictably he parroted, "I don't accept that," as each piece was presented. That is, he sat back and denied whilst I did the spade work. And on what basis did he deny?
"Well I just don't believe it. It doesn't prove anything."
"And what? One small fragment fails to prove the whole? Please!"
And for what to bother in the first place? What - did he think I was going to trawl through the combined scholarship of millennia and spend weeks and weeks collating it all, simply to convince someone who was fiercely determined not to be convinced? For the amount of hard work which that would entail, I might as well be granted a doctorate.
When he concluded, "I'm afraid I've never seen any evidence which satisfies me," I asked, "Who are you then?"
I mean, we are all merely tiny specks in a vast complex interraction going on and he says He's not satisfied? Of course he's not satisfied, never will be, if he refuses to let the evidence speak instead of contorting it to fit through his own jaundiced filters.
Look, analogously, an archaeologist goes to a dig site where he's heard there are fossils proving that the woolly mammoth existed and instead of digging and sifting, he sits and says to all the fellow archaeologists and assorted assistants, "All right, bring me what you have."
They gather ten or twelve fossil fragments for him on a tray and he looks down and says, "Nope, that's no mammoth. Doesn't exist."
Someone says to him, "Why don't you dig and find out for yourself?"
"I did, in the archaeological journal."
"No, I mean, get your hands dirty and patiently spend months and months until you find something, then piece it together with all the other fragments found around the world and in the fossil record and then come to a conclusion?"
"All right, tell me what that conclusion is and I'll tell you whether I believe it or not."
"Who are you?" mutters the fellow archaeologist as he returns to the dig.
I detest "debate" and I simply refuse to "prove" something to somebody who operates this way.
So when this blogger says that though the terrorism on the weekend was real, the terrorists real and the threat real, nevertheless it had all the hallmarks of a "hands off" approach by security whose role was playing "catch-up with the terrorist" and not circumventing known and possible threats.
And what the hell it had to do with ID cards and martial law, search and entry provisions, constricting the justice system and the smorgasbord of other draconian provisions is a logical non-sequitur.
Go to Iraq on a pretext, push the Muslims about and spit on their history, get the nutters and kill-militias moving and then, in full revenge mode, your security services can just take the foot off the pedal here and there, let one or two of the maddened thugs into the country or out of their religious sanctuary, fail to arrest, be half an hour late to circumvent, nothing which can be pinned down to the heads, you understand and the real agenda is achieved - the militarization of the country in preparation for the financial collapse, the calling in of debt and the next war between 2012 and 2020.
Don't tell me Blair and Brown are innocent in this. Was Richard Nixon? This sort of person who would bring in the type of legislation which he has is not the type not to know what's going on. It simply doesn't happen like that. Of course they fri---ng knew. These people might be pawns but they certainly knew something was going down, if not the fine detail. These people delegate badly but will do it if it's a question of sheeting home the guilt.
And if they didn't know anything, then why not? If they didn't know, then can they be trusted with more secuity powers than they've already surreptitiously signed into existence?
So, when I say all that, the auto-reply: "conspiracy theorist" is trotted out, as the catch all answer.
Sorry but that doesn't wash.
Cliches do not truth make and the likely truth is much nastier than the average person is willing to concede. You think it will be any better after Broony goes? Bush? With the Lizard Queen's forked tongue already in operation as she slithers across the U.S., having already accommodated the SPP as a CFR fellow traveller?
Why would anyone even to suggest that there is decency and self-determination at the top? Churchill said it, Woodrow Wilson said it. It's no different to advertising. Newspapers have as much editorial independence as the proprietory families and advertisers are willing to concede.
Power in Europe is no different. You pay your dues, you sell your soul, you're groomed, you're in. You find a policy platform which appeals, mutter, "Enough of talking; time now to do," "Now is the time for great change," or some other generalized inanity and yo're on the way to the statesmanship they allow you.
Keep your eye on Ed Balls.
On the other hand, you buck the trend, question the received wisdom and rock the boat at your peril and find yourself up the proverbial creek. Ask Ron or Guido.
It's all factored in and on the other side of the pond, the private Fed has the agenda set. Count the milestones - 2009, 2011 and 2012, then the biggy.
G-d help us all [if there is a G-d, that is].