Terror Probe, sounds painful.

An imitation Kalashnikov rifle and fireworks have been seized by police investigating alleged terrorism in connection with the G20 summit.

Three men aged 25, 19 and 16 and two women of 20, from the Plymouth area in Devon, were held after the 25 year old was seen allegedly spraying graffiti.

A number of imitation weapons were seized in searches of several premises. Assistant Chief Constable Paul Netherton said the weapons were “not major” and “probably not even lethal”. The arrests were an “isolated incident” and local people were not at risk. The arrested people have not been linked to any religious group.

Detectives are investigating the possibility those arrested were planning to mount protests in London against the G20 summit of world leaders.

All five people are being held under the Terrorism Act.

Why are they being held under the terrorism act? If they were going to protest at the G20 in London, why aren’t they being held for public order offences?

Don’t trust others? Report them…

We’ve been having a met(Metropolitian Police) Anti terrorism campaign in the UK for the past few weeks, here’s one of the adds:

There are a few others. Is it just me or is this fear mongering on a grand scale? There’s a lot of invasion of privacy going on at the moment, all in the name of crime prevention/anti terrorism, Dna databases, Registering your foreign travel details, stop and search, arrest for just taking pictures, CCTV cameras etc.

Anyway heres another take on the above add:

And another:

And another:

And finally:

And on another subject:

And finally for good measure:

More pictures can be found at the rather excellent BoingBoing site.

It’s Politics.

I wonder, is there a book that teaches people how to be politicians? I know there are many books on politics that you can find in a book store, but I’m talking about something like a step by step guide, or an idiots guide, how to talk and act like a politician and how to break your own rules like a politician.

Take the Canadian Prime Minister for instance. Stephen Harper has called a snap election for October. His Conservative party doesn’t hold the majority in Parliament and has to rely on the opposition parties to pass legislation.

Mr Harper has recently said that the Canadian Parliament had become “Dysfunctional”. An opinion poll held last week suggested support for his Conservative party had grown over the summer.

So he calls an election.

Only by doing so breaks Mr Harper’s own fixed-date election law, something he had said was necessary to prevent prime ministers calling elections when polls indicated they were in a favourable position.

It will be interesting to see if Canadians vote for someone who clearly can’t stand by his own Law.

Adult Entertainment…

You know you hear about those silly laws that ban someone from doing something? Like in the Uk it is illegal to die in the Houses of Parliment.

But one particular law surpasses anything I’ve seen before. The banning of sex toys.

“Alabama’s (it had to be) Anti-Obscenity Enforcement Act prohibits, among other things, the commercial distribution of ‘any device designed or marketed as useful primarily for the stimulation of human genital organs for any thing of pecuniary value.’” Under this law one could stroll down Alabama’s southern streets selling semi-automatic rifles and dildos, and be arrested for the dildos.

Haven’t they heard of the phrase “make love, not war?”

Is an extra eight months enough?

An inmate’s bid to escape by digging a hole through the wall of his prison cell has earned him a further eight months in jail.

Daniel Vail, 25, was convicted at Exeter Crown Court of attempting to escape from HMP Exeter in April 2007. He was already serving a two year sentence for wounding and grievous bodily harm.

The court was told  that he had dug a 3ft by 2ft (91cm by 61cm) hole in the wall behind his upper bunk on the second storey of the prison. He hid debris in cupboards and used his bedding to cover the hole when he was not working on it.

Vail was wearing two sets of clothes when he was caught by warders who were led to the cell by the thumping and scraping sounds as he dug. He said he found it “all quite amusing” as the wall was falling apart in his cell.

“This was an extremely stupid offence. You were bound to be caught,” Judge David Ticehurst told Vail.

What was he thinking? Not a lot by the looks of it.

“Hard on” art…

An art gallery is facing a trial at crown court over claims it displayed an indecent statue of Jesus Christ.

The Gallery in question was the Baltic centre in Gateshead in the UK. It depicted Jesus with an erection, the statue was displayed with other “Icons” such as Mickey mouse and ET all with erect penises. The statue was part of Baltic’s September 2007 to January 2008 exhibition by controversial Chinese-born artist Terence Koh, “Gone, Yet Still”.

A private prosecution is being brought by Christian group member Emily Mapfuwa, 40, of Essex, on the grounds the statue outraged public decency, causing harassment alarm and distress to the public.

Eh?

Was anyone else who saw it offended? There doesn’t appear to be any other complaints, so lets get to what this prosecution is about: As a Christian it offended her. It’s as straight forward as that.

It does seem that the artwork is in the mould of a Damien hirst: cause a bit of a stir, make a name for the artist, but it would appear that the public doesn’t care about a statue of Jesus with an erection.

To me the person bringing this prosecution hasn’t yet realised that Chrisianity no longer a dominant belief in this society, so how can the public be outraged? My view is that everyone must be free in this country to practice their religion, but at the same time everyone must be allowed to be free from religion if they choose to be.

I know some will say that it should be against the law to criticise religious belief and this statue could be classed as offensive to Christians, but many of those same Christians would regard me as a “Sinner” and as such I’m going to hell in a handcart, yet they don’t find that what they believe might be offensive to others? As far as I can see, from a lifetime of observation is that in the Bible there are writings that are predicated on an intolerance of other peoples feelings/opinions.

If people of any religious persuasion feel that their religion must be protected from criticism by law, then their religious conviction is simply not strong enough to take that criticism.