That the law is an ass is a universal truth known unto all men! But sometimes its pure daftness leaves you giggling. Take for example these idealistic but terminally dim 'youfs' and 'youfettes' who keep falling for all that Islamic spiel and who go trotting off like lambs to the slaughter to fight for IS in Syria. Our 'Plod' duly arrange for them to be arrested and as and when they can, no doubt at huge cost to the tax-payer, they have them brought back this country to be charged with, er, well, not too sure actually, but something like 'aiding and abetting terrorism'. Of course, the fact that they have not actually carried out any terrorism means that when they go up in front of the magistrate they have to be released on bail, free to roam our streets!
Then there are those ex-servicemen who didn't get quite enough 'muck 'n' bullets' in Afghanistan and who volunteered to join the Kurds in fighting the IS organisation in Syria. One of them was killed the other day and he was almost treated as a national hero. But what's the difference, I wonder? Why aren't the 'old Bill' having them arrested on their outward journey and sent back here to face the full wrath of the law?
In 'the good old days', the 'Plod', or at least the experienced ones, when coming across a punch-up outside a pub between, say, Liverpool/Arsenal fans, or Jocks against Irish, would normally stand well back out of sight and let each side knock six bells out of each other before moving in at the last moment to arrest those too dazed or drunk to resist. In other words, they recognised that there was nothing much to be chosen between the participants and so allowing them to fight to a standstill, or perhaps, to a mutual falling down, was the best policy.
In my bleak and cynical view there is nothing to be chosen between the factions fighting in the Middle East, they are all more or less despicable and if they keep themselves busy over the next few years slaughtering each other then they will have less time for mischief-making over here, and indeed, I am perfectly happy to send over any of our home-grown Muslims daft enough to wish to join in. In fact, the more they kill of them the better I will like it.
In the meantime, I await with some amusement the decision by the 'Cocklecarrots' as to exactly what crime these young men have actually committed, as opposed to the murder they might nurture in their hearts. I often think of murdering various people, most of them not a million inches from Whitehall, but until now I always assumed that there was no such thing as a 'thought crime' in this, our septic Isle!
