It is customary not to speak ill of the dead – or at least those of recent demise.

However, in some cases it would be rank hypocrisy to follow that tradition. Today is such a day. (Only it’s not so much speaking ill as speaking the truth.)

Frankly, I was sickened by what I can only describe as an outpouring of smarm on the BBC News attendant on the announcement of Margaret Thatcher’s death. She may have been the longest serving but she was also the most contentious and divisive Prime Minister in recent British history. The second part of that assessment has been getting brushed over.

All this was after what can only be described as an ongoing softening-up process by the hagiographic treatment of Government papers relating to her premiership released under the thirty year rule. My previous thoughts on those are in some of the posts here and on Thatcher’s legacy here.

And I had to laugh when some Tory sycophant said she paved the way for Britain’s economic recovery. She it was who dismantled financial regulation, who encouraged not only “me”-ism but greed, short-termism and the pursuit of profit above all else. In many people’s eyes she turned selfishness into a virtue. As a result she set in train the conditions that made the banking crash of 2008 not only possible but inevitable. How can anyone in today’s economic circumstances mention “Britain’s economic recovery” with a straight face?

And this wasn’t the worst. The worst was she demolished that society which she said didn’t exist. The Britain I grew up in was a more caring, more compassionate place than the one she has bequeathed us. A symptom of that was the selling off of the social housing stock without any provision being made for – indeed a ban on – its replacement. The result was a continuing boom in house prices and, latterly, of private rentals making it all but impossible for young couples to buy a starter home or to rent at reasonable rates. Any present crisis of homelessness is directly traceable to that decision. I do not blame anyone for taking advantage of the opportunity to buy “their” council house, it made absolute financial sense for many who did so, but in effect it licensed the stealing of public assets for private profit – as was the selling off of nationalised industries.

Another commenter said private companies now compete to provide us with these sorts of services. Well they don’t. I have one electricity line, one gas pipe, one telephone line coming into my house. In what sense are they competing to connect me to their services? It’s utter bilge.

And I’ve not noticed any benefit to the consumer on the bottom line. Quite the reverse. But that, of course was always the object.

The country is now run for the sole benefit of profiteers and exploiters. All that can be laid at the door of

Margaret Hilda Thatcher (née Roberts,) 13/10/1925-8/4/2013. So; it goes.

I don’t usually watch the ITN news but I caught the bulletin at 6.40 yesterday and was reminded why.

Their lead story was “Lockerbie Bomber Escapes Justice Again.”

Really?

Escapes justice?

Again?

Apparently the new Libyan regime will not extradite Abdelbaset Ali Mohmet Al Megrahi to the West.

And why should they?

ITN was peddling utter tosh. Twice over.

Even putting aside the fact that he is almost certainly innocent, Megrahi has not escaped justice. He was convicted, and served a term of imprisonment from which he was released on compassionate grounds under the terms of the justice system concerned.

So he did not “escape justice” even once: still less once more.

The BBC news earlier in the week wasn’t much better, though. A reporter knocked on his door in Tripoli and received no answer and on these grounds decided Megrahi had fled and had thereby broken the terms of his release.

Now, if you lived in Tripoli would you have answered your door this past week? And, if he has fled, wouldn’t you have in his place?

While he has survived way longer than we were led to expect he would, the man is still clearly ill. Given that he has already been duly processed, if under extraordinary provisions, it would be a crime to subject him to further detention.

And let’s have none of this “the victims want this to happen.” (That is to say the victims’ relatives.) They most certainly do not – or at least not all of them do.

That there is talk of US snatch squads apprehending him is an outrage. To do so would be a clear breach of international law and would put the perpetrators on an equal footing with any other law breaker.

Edited to add:-
It seems Megrahi is now at death’s door and has been found in his family home so perhaps we’ll hear an end of this.

So. It’s Russia.

Well done, comrades. (Or don’t you say that anymore?)

Fat lot of good having David Beckham, the Prince William and Mr Irresponsible presenting the England bid as part of the team did them.

But what an outpouring of bile we got from the commentariat on BBC news in the aftermath, saying that the process was flawed, not transparent enough and must be changed.

What? You lose the vote and that’s because of the system?

This display of sour grapes is profoundly unappealing. You were acting as if it were your divine right to have the tournament. I know God is supposed to be an Englishman but get a grip. No wonder you lost.

Where does this ridiculous sense of entitlement originate? You lucked out once and have been more or less mince ever since. You continually puff up your league as the best in the world. If it is – and that’s by no means a given – it would only be because it is stuffed full of foreign players who are more gifted technically, and more intelligent in the football sense, than your indigenous ones.

And before anyone points the finger, my poor little football country has no such delusions of grandeur. We cured ourselves of any vestige of that a long time ago.

It’s indicative of the desperation fans of England feel that they appear to think that only by hosting the World Cup will they ever win it again. (I would suggest that the way the England team is going now even being hosts wouldn’t guarantee that.)

Face it guys. Nobody likes you. You’re too arrogant.

I settled down last night at 9 pm to watch the second swatch of the latest BBC adaptation of John Wyndham’s The Day Of The Triffids only to find it wasn’t on. This was because Holby City had been bumped to an hour later by River City and so we in Scotland didn’t get to see The Day Of The Triffids until 10.20. I went and had a bath instead.

But… The main BBC news was on in Scotland at 10. The Day Of The Triffids lasted 1½ hours and so the news in the rest of the UK wasn’t till 10.30.

Was there a special news, for Scotland only, at 10? What did the (London) BBC news unit think of that? (The Scottish news opt out which normally follows the news – the “where you are” bit – came on as usual afterwards: it wasn’t a BBC Scotland main news.) Or did they just use the BBC 24 hour news feed for the fifteen minutes?

Anyway, The Day Of The Triffids adaptation itself was well done and, apart from some updating and an unnecessary emphasis on the hero, Bill Masen’s, family, (I blame Russell T Davies) reasonably true to the book as I remember it, with a fine performance by Eddie Izzard as the baddie, Torrence.

It was, however, – even the daylight scenes – filmed almost entirely in what I call Super Murk-O-Vision. This was probably to avoid too many shots with triffids in them as, no matter what you do, plants are not really that scary in appearance. Here, the book definitely scores over any possible visual version. The depiction of the triffid sting, showing it as a potent disabling weapon, was also much too late.

[Edited to add: the voice over was a mistake too.]

I doubt this version would have converted anyone that didn’t already have a penchant for it to SF, though.

For anyone who wants to see them, the iplayer reruns are here and here.