God Bless America - A Personal View

We can't let the Fourth of July pass without a comment. Just an aside though - I live in a prosperous community to the west of London, and we are accustomed to a storm of fireworks on what they call 7/4. Not a single bang has split the night. Odd, that.

I admire and respect the United States. As a student in the Sixties I took a lot of flak from my contemporaries for pointing out that the Vietnam war may have been the wrong war but it was fought for the right reasons, and for reminding my Marxist friends that the Soviet constitution wasn't too strong on 'life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness'. Especially happiness.

Can I just ask my American friends, whose legal system is evolved from the one that I play a small part in, to take a few moments in the still small hours of the night to wonder if there is anything that would benefit from a re-think? I have been abused and insulted in pub conversations, dinner parties, and other discussions for supporting the American ideal of justice according to law. America (just like my country) has every right to be proud of the way in which its legal system took on segregation and similar injustice. So can you understand how I feel about Camp Delta, and about the imminent quasi-legal abduction of three Brits in a clear abuse of natural justice?

I have always felt that my values are as one with those of the United States. Until now.

To misquote a great American:- "Say it ain't so, friends, say it ain't so!"