You may enjoy this post by ME Synon on the Spectator blog:

http://blogs.spectator.co.uk/coffeehouse/2013/03/cyprus-this-isnt-a-tax-its-a-bank-raid/

Chávez goes

But stays, embalmed,

To haunt us

In Cuba,

Castros shudder

Extract from UK official guidance to the police on firearms law:

"Applications for the grant of a firearm certificate for the applicant’s, or another’s, protection, or that of premises, should be refused on the grounds that firearms are not an acceptable means of protection in Great Britain. It has been the view of successive Governments for many years that the private possession and carriage of firearms for personal protection is likely to lead to an increase in levels of violence. This principle should be maintained in the case of applications from representatives of banks and firms protecting valuables or large quantities of money, or from private security guards and bodyguards."

It is a bipartisan view of Labour and Conservative parties that a person in need of armed protection should look to the police to provide it. This reflects the underlying UK philosophy that, in a democracy, the state should have a monopoly of the use of force. This contrasts with the US view, which I understand to be that the citizen needs the right to bear arms in order to protect himself and his family from his fellow citizens and the state.

A fundamental cultural and political difference.

"We" will not be forced. Who is this "we"? You speak as if you own the whole USA.

Many of you, people of faith, believe that homosexual acts are wrong. Why should that belief of yours determine what my rights are? I don't share your faith and I reject the idea homosexuality is abnormal and homosexual acts wrong. As I have said before on Ricochet, my sexual orientation is normal and natural for me and millions of other gay people. I defend your right to live your lives as you wish; please allow me to do the same. But I can't live my life as I wish unless I have legal recognition of my relationship, as you do. Although for Christians (including gay Christians) marriage is a sacrament, marriage as a social and legal institution is not historically a religious but a secular institution. No church should be obliged to marry same-sex couples, but same-sex couples must have the right to marry, and those churches that wish to do so should have the right to marry them. Equality before the law is a basic human right and the fight for that equality is indeed a fight for civil rights.

So Cathy Ashton was charmed by a suave Iranian? Cathy Ashton would be charmed by a chipmunk in a tuxedo.

I suppose I'd laugh a little more freely if I didn't suspect that some of those held responsible for the launch failure were in the process of being tortured to death.

Mea culpa: When I wrote that Mali still had institutionalised slavery, I was confusing Mali with Mauretania - inexcuseable, because I do know the difference between those two countries. My apologies.

The rest of what I said may well be nonsense too.

I do still think it's a good thing Gaddafi has gone.

Algeria have dealt ruthlessly with Islamists over the years. The al-Quaeda group who have moved into Mali are small in number. The Tuareg rebellion has been going on for ages. The men cover their faces because they ride camels in the desert. The women don't, but are also veiled. It doesn't make them Islamists. It makes no sense at all for the Tuareg to roll over and let al-Quaeda control the territory they have been fighting for for so long.

Like Saddam, Gaddafi had to go.

And I don't take at face value *anything* that the French do or say in or about Africa. 'Perfide' is the word for them.

Maybe so. When you get rid of a dictator like Saddam or Gaddafi, you create massive instability. It's the price you pay. Except that the people who actually pay are the ones who were paying while those monsters were in power.

From what I read this morning, the Tuareg rebels (who have been in rebellion for years) are not Islamists, and are putting up a fight against al-Quaeda (for it is they, and they have been in Algeria all this time, regrouping, without us apparently being terribly bothered).

Yes, it is bad that a democratically elected government is ovetthrown by a military coup. But Mali has a long and troubled history, with slavery openly practised. The country hasn't been at peace. If the Tuareg carve out a territory for themselves, that isn't the end of the world. Having fought all these years, I can't see them just handing it over to al-Quaeda. Let's see what happens.

I think the writer of this piece is a snob. Where is the evidence (for he adduces none) that there is a positive correlation between level of education and sensible voting decisions? And anyway, who decides what's sensible? One might equally argue that our rulers are in general over-educated and lacking in common sense. As for the internet and mass media: they change the way the game is played, the most important aspect being that information that was once the preserve of the highly literate is now widely and openly available. That's a good thing. I can't speak for the US, but in general I think (and of course this is only my view) that the UK electorate has shown itself to be pretty sensible in recent years, in two ways: voting out incompetent governments, and resisting the blandishments of political extremists - which is why we are all, across party lines, so upset by George Galloway's bye-election win in Bradford West.

I don't accept we have weak policing or sentencing and I don't want to get into that discussion. This thread is about the police raiding people's homes, and people getting shot. I'm saying that in the UK the problem of innocent people getting shot by the police is far smaller. The reason, I surmise, is that your law enforcement agencies are out of control in a way that ours are not; and because so many Americans (citizens and police) have guns, more people get shot. I accept some (many?) of you believe the police have no right to raid your home in any circumstances and you have a right to shoot them if they do. I'm just saying that that means a lot of people get killed. Here, we prefer to do it differently. That's all.

In the UK if you brandish something that looks like a gun (e.g. a kid's toy gun), the police are entitled to assume it is a gun unless it's quite obvious that it isn't, and if you get shot, that's down to you. As you probably know, our police don't routinely carry firearms (a routine neighbourhood police patrol would never be armed) but guns are issued, and used, when necessary, and patrols can call for armed backup to an incident involving firearms. Every case where a gun is fired is investigated internally by the police, and if anyone is injured, even slightly, externally as well. We don't have armed cops knocking down doors and firing wildly, but if you show a gun, you may well get shot. Your gun will be held illegally - police know if guns are licensed.

See above. It's you who have a problem with trigger-happy police, not us.

It's extremely rare here for anyone to be shot dead by police. When it happens it's headline news. Police officers have been charged with murder. And searches require a warrant. It sounds like you could do with a bit more of what we have, not less.

And in every instance where a civilian is killed by a police officer, there is a full investigation by an independent review body.