what I was trying to say and obviously not expressing myself very well- is that I don't think any amount of shrill sloganeering and finger pointing is really much to the point at all. Professional politicians are really the last people you can look to for any perspective. all their insights are based on whatever is expeditious - I would advise anyone to be as suspicious of Galloway as you are of Blair.

I was a teacher for quite a while. i can remember little kids of eleven or twelve telling me they wanted to kill Salman rushdie at the time of the fatwa's announcement - and I remember thinking even then, there was going to be stormy weather ahead when they'd had a few more years of the guidance they were obviously getting.

It was something which wasn't present in the kids I'd taught in the 1970's. Maybe the negative things said about Islam at the time of the Iranian revolution sparked off the reaction.

Remember we were a much more racist society in those days, and we can all take some blame for that. And perhaps a little credit for improving ourselves.

Either way, all this was in the air long before 9/11, long before Aghanistan and Iraq. Anybody who says otherwise has either very little insight, lives a long way from civilisation, probably needs to score of some political rival and/or just enjoys the confrontation and bickering of politics.