Britain's Devil's Advocates (Updated)

In the movie "Devil's Advocate," Satan returns to earth as a defense lawyer with the goal of destroying society by destroying respect for the law. Whoever wrote the script was incredibly insightful. Maintaining the rule of law is the foundational responsibility of government. If the government can't provide order, than society breaks down and individuals supply their own justice. A millenium ago, British society gave up, for the most part, trial by combat and private justice when the government instituted a fair system of laws and applied them with some balance. But what has taken the British a millenium to build up, the socialists are destroying at simply an amazing pace. Their new draft police guidelines could only have been drafted by an utter fool or a person bent on the destruction of British society. And what the socialists in Labour are doing to government and justice, the socialist occupying the position of Archbishop of Canterbury is doing to Christianity.
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This from the Daily Mail:

Guidelines ordering police to respond to emergency calls within three hours and to attend less urgent incidents such as burglaries within three days have been drawn up by the Home Office.

The astonishing proposals were designed as 'national standards for local policing' in England and Wales.

They laid down a three-hour target for officers to reach an incident which 'requires policing intervention'.

And they allowed police to wait a leisurely three days where 'there is less immediate need’ for their presence.

The leaked draft targets were to be included in the Government's long-awaited Green Paper on police reform.

But after a barrage of criticism from the Opposition yesterday – which accused the Government of being out of touch with the public – Home Office officials insisted the targets will not appear in the final version of the paper when it is published tomorrow.

The apparent disarray follows Home Secretary Jacqui Smith's startling U-turn over proposals to force knife-crime offenders to confront victims in hospitals. That plan was floated and ditched within 24 hours.

The proposals for response times – part of a ‘Police Pledge’ to the public – appear to be so modest that they would be of little value as performance targets.

. . . The suggestion that householders who have suffered a burglary should wait up to three days for a visit raises serious questions about the fate of any forensic evidence left at the scene.

. . . A major review of policing earlier this year by watchdog Sir Ronnie Flanagan warned that police were becoming increasingly ‘risk-averse’, and that ‘excess bureaucracy’ was encouraging them to ‘overrecord and under-deliver'.

Read the entire article. This all takes on even more sinister ramifications when one realizes that British law essentially has disarmed the populace and that anecdotal evidence suggests that self defense is likely to send you to jail quicker than committing an actual crime. [Update - That is no longer true. Britian's new law of self defense came into effect about ten hours after I wrote this post.]

And even if one is actually are apprehended for a crime, Britain is simply not enforcing its laws with realistic jail sentence. There is an insane leftist bent on emotional catharsis as providing both punishment and redemption instead of the true punishment of repaying a debt to society in a jail cell. You can see it Jacqui Smith's call for the perpetrators of knife crime to be made to "confront" their victims. When I was Britain in 2003, I can recall a plan being debated on the BBC to significantly adjust jail sentences downwards if the perpetrator would issue a formal apology to their victim. Britain's socialists suffer from the dual disabilities of, one, not trusting individuals to manage their own lives - including to be armed and to act in self defense when police are on their three hour meander over to the scene of a serious crime - and two, looking at law enforcement and justice from the standpoint that society is somehow the root cause of crime. This is a disaster in the making. Were the Devil's Advocate based on reality, one could well imagine Satan leaning back in his office next 10 Downing St. feeling quite confident that all was on schedule.

And then there is Rowan Williams, the Archbishop of Cantebury, doing to Christianity what Labour is doing to Britain. He is the man who prior to this day had praised Islam, damned America as an imperialist nation to a crowd of Muslims, blamed America for Muslim violence against Christians in the Middle East, refused to proselytize for Christianity among Muslims, and advocated implementing at least parts of Sharia law in Britain. The Archbishop's latest assault on the Christian faith has come in an apologia to Muslims for the violent history of Christianity and what seems an apology for one of the fundamental doctrines of the Christian faith - the Trinity. This from the Daily Mail:

Christian doctrine is offensive to Muslims, the Archbishop of Canterbury said yesterday.

Dr Rowan Williams also criticised Christianity's history for its violence, its use of harsh punishments and its betrayal of its peaceful principles.

His comments came in a highly conciliatory letter to Islamic leaders calling for an alliance between the two faiths for 'the common good'.

But it risked fresh controversy for the Archbishop in the wake of his pronouncement earlier this year that a place should be found for Islamic sharia law in the British legal system.

. . . The Archbishop's letter is a reply to feelers to Christians put out by Islamic leaders from 43 countries last autumn.

In it, Dr Williams said violence is incompatible with the beliefs of either faith and that, once that principle is accepted, both can work together against poverty and prejudice and to help the environment.

He also said the Christian belief in the Trinity - that God is Father, Son and Holy Ghost at the same time - 'is difficult, sometimes offensive, to Muslims'.

Trinitarian doctrine conflicts with the Islamic view that there is just one all-powerful God. . . .

Read the entire article. Its hard to know where to begin with idiocy of this magnitude coming from a man charged with defending the Anglican Christian faith.

Let's of over some basic facts for the Archbishop's benefit:

1. The use of force motivated by Christian beliefs is a part of the historical record. The use of force motivated by the desire to impose Islam is a matter of current events. The two are not morally equivalent.

2. Any original sin Christians suffer was wiped off by Christ's forgiveness on the cross. Any historical use of Christianity thereafter as a basis for violence was not done by anyone alive today. There is no need to apologize for it. There is an absolute need to demand that Islam break with violnece in the here and now.

3. A look at the historical record will show that, but for the Crusades, Christianity has been on the receiving end of Islamically motivated violence for approximately 1,300 years.

4. Even the Crusades were not an act of Christian aggression. They were a counterattack initiated after Christian lands had been steadily conquered by Islam for half a millenium and only after the Egyptian Caliph ordered the destruction of the most holy Church in Christendom, the Church of the Holy Sephulchre in Jerusalem.

5. Pretending that violence is not a part and parcel of how some of the sects of Islam interpret their religion today - including Salafi and Wahhabi sects - is suicidal and wholly out of touch with reality.

6. Apologizing for the Trinity is just beyond belief. If the good Archbishop has a firm belief in his convictions, then it would be impossible for him to apologize for his faith.

Archbishop Rowan Williams is every bit of a danger to Christianity as is Wahhabi Islam. Who will rid us of this troublesome priest, eh? That said, I am sure the Devil's advocate would want him to remain in place.