Blair joins the attack on Britain’s Muslims (tags)
Prime Minister Tony Blair has placed himself at the head of an ongoing and sinister campaign against Britain’s Muslim minority. This week he used his monthly press conference to solidarise himself with former Foreign Secretary Jack Straw’s attack on the veil or niqab, telling reporters that it was “a mark of separation and that is why it makes other people from outside of the community feel uncomfortable.” He also backed the decision by Kirklees council to suspend the young teaching assistant Aishah Azmi for refusing to remove her veil in front of male staff.
Alan Dershowitz's Sinister Scheme: Paradigm? What Paradigm? (tags)
Dershowitz's claim that civil liberties require new government powers is eye-catching and remarkable for its initial appearance of absurdity. But tiresomely enough, he never resolves the apparent absurdity. There is no reconciliation of civil liberties with the kind of measures Dershowitz proposes. We can accept Dershowitz's defence of freedom, or his advocacy of new and rather sinister government powers. But we cannot accept both. One of these angles is there for appearance, one for content. It does not take much analysis to work out which is which.
Contradictions, anomalies, questions mount in UK terror scare (tags)
A British court on Wednesday extended the warrants for 23 people held since August 10 in connection with the alleged plot to blow up commercial airliners flying from Britain to the US. An additional person was arrested Tuesday. The judge issued his ruling late in the evening following a closed-door hearing that lasted most of the day.