A Country Walk

The Chairman and Hayley are having a country walk down a local lane which is liberally sprayed with horse muck:

Chairman: "Why the hell can't horse riders be made pick up their bloody horse muck, like dog owners have to?"

Hay: "Horse muck isn't dangerous to human health."

Chairman: "It damned well is if you slip on the stuff. Added to which, if I were to dump a load of it in the middle of a street I'd be prosecuted; if a horse does it it's fine."

Apparently a poll (aka what the baying mob says) shows that more than 50% of people in the UK believe Marine A (the Marine who illegally shot dead a Taliban insurgent) should receive leniency. Why does that not surprise me?

There's a story in the Sunday Telegraph today about the "fiasco" of a Sudanese paedophile who is due compensation for his human rights being violated. The problem with these populist stories aimed at the mob is that they risk destroying legislation that is designed to protect the vulnerable, just because of a very, very few inevitable mistakes, like the one recounted in the news story. The problem is not the human rights legislation, but mistakes made by civil servants that allow human rights legislation to come into play.

If the mob had its way, we'd have a return to arbitrary justice and gruesome public executions in town centres.