Hulleye Comes By!

back in 2006, i wrote about the death of habeas corpus and what the lack thereof means to the general population globally, and how the US has done much to ignoring the rights of americans in this regard. seem like great britain is following suit and bob geldof (from the boomtown rats, live aid and the wall fame) has come up with a very serious and in-depth op-ed in the telegraph on what it means to be living in an orwellian world and how pathetically the rights of average citizens are being stolen away from us.

Still today, 800 years later, Magna Carta resonates: “To no man will we deny, To no man will we delay, Justice and Right.” Is that not grand, worthy of your vote? Is habeas corpus to be traduced in one sad moment of political expediency? Do we not clearly deny and delay Justice and Right when we imprison a person for 42 days without charge?

What existential threat do we face greater than those of the past 800 years? What great terror exists today that not civil war, not world war, nor recent other terrorisms could make our forefathers change the fundamental basis of this state? What is so dangerous that our oldest statutes could be upended for such a ha’p'orth of momentary panic?

What terrorises the terrorists is our civilisation. What those unthinking fools of fundamentalism fear most are the freedoms our representatives now strip away. This “war on terror” is against Islamist forces that reject the Enlightenment.

How can we ever succeed, if we side with our opponents in rejecting those ideals? Every moment we are spied on by the invisible watchers, every time we are monitored, every time we are logged on databanks, they win. And every time we accept it, we lose.

Why should I carry an ID card? I own my identity - nobody else. The war on terror is no answer. ID cards did not stop the bombers in Germany or Spain. Nor does it diminish crime, nor illegal immigration. And if for some mad authoritarian reason they are introduced, stand by for a brisk trade in false British ID cards.