The man who said what others dare not say…
I reckon I must have been around 16 when the Roman Catholic faith and I went our separate ways.
There was no great fa'oot, just a growing realisation the Church of Rome was not for me. I still think having a faith is a good idea but I always duck out of belonging to any of the many religions, mainly because I detest being controlled and told what I should think and do.
So why have I suddenly found myself a fan of Cardinal Keith O'Brien, heid honcho for the Scottish RC community? In an interview on BBC Scotland last week, Cardinal Keith, jumped off the political fence and gave us his take on the Megrahi repatriation issue; and he did it in a way that covered many points long overdue for some sensible scrutiny.
For starters Cardinal O'Brien backs the Scottish Government decision to repatriate Mr Megrahi, wise when you consider he has a rather important guest in the not too distant future, when having McPuddock and his chums on side might be described as handy.
This backing arrived in the form of a few unequivocal remarks the political and media backbiters will struggle to turn to their nasty advantage. I quote: "The Scots politicians should not go crawling to the US like lapdogs"; "We shouldn't be crawling out to America or having them come here and questioning us on our own territory."
Perchance a reference to the nauseating display of grovelling from David Cameron during his visit to the US? Mr Cameron recently went to extraordinary lengths to convince the US people he had no part in sending Mr Megrahi home to die (sometime), in which case, surely, it was none of his business, and he should have devoted his media time to more important matters such as England's performance in the Football World Cup.
A point for which I have considerable sympathy is a reference by Cardinal O'Brien to the US culture of vengeance, a part of which is their use of the death penalty "which means the US keeps invidious company with regimes in Saudi Arabia and Iran."
Now that ain't going to go down a storm in the States but I suspect it was not intended to win friends across the pond. But the truth often hurts and after a prolonged session of US Brit-bashing, it is high time someone with a bit of clout socked it to them in the same way they have been sticking it to us.
So, dear citizens of the US, and I must state I cherish a few of them as good friends, it is time to stop using us as a whipping boy for things that go wrong. It is tempting to treat much of the recent abusive insolence from US politicians as the usual smoke screen from a failing government in the run-up to mid-term elections in the hope it will mask the so-far lacklustre performance of the Obama administration, and quieten the creeping suspicion that good ol' Barak has turned out to be a bit of a dud. Now all we need is for a few of our overpaid and over-indulged domestic politicians to put their head above the parapet and stand up for this nation which is what we pay them to do.
All this is important to us; we must never forget the Lockerbie disaster happened in the Borders, killing Borders people and wrecking the lives of many more. Lockerbie is a few minutes flying time from us, so what happened there could easily have been Selkirk.
The event will be picked over for years by the curious and sometime, maybe, the true story will come out. When it does I suspect over there in the States, it will suddenly go very, very quiet.
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I recently had the terrible misfortune to view a few minutes of the new BBC series called Sherlock.
My word, what a load of rubbish that was! Over the years various outfits have tried to bring us televised Holmes and Watson, not always with success, and I can tell you why. It is the written word that keeps my heroes alive, not bad acting and noisy sound effects, so turn off the box and dig out the book, you won't be disappointed.
I have a few bound editions of Strand Magazine dating to the 1890s in which the first ever Sherlock Holmes adventures were published.
They are beautifully illustrated, but the original text by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle is the real treasure. Surely this was also available to the scriptwriter of Sherlock, and although it might seem harsh, I can only suggest that same scriptwriter should be dropped down a well in the not too distant future.
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Weather for Selkirk
Friday 25 May 2012
Today
Sunny
Temperature: 9 C to 21 C
Wind Speed: 16 mph
Wind direction: East
Tomorrow
Sunny
Temperature: 7 C to 18 C
Wind Speed: 13 mph
Wind direction: North east
