Ha! I see the highly crucial question of this debate has been reached: just where did royalty sleep during the war and what did anyone's daddy do? Well, what else to expect from below-the-line peeps who cull what they fondly imagine is "news" via Fox and the Dirty Digger.

Growing up in a region renowned for sectarianism, I recall many tales post-WW2 of German (Jewish or not) émigré businesses - and indeed the synagogue - being vandalised and daubed with pig's blood. Dim people (who didn't even manage the Desmond achieved by their present-day führer) are conditioned to believe that the way to deal with anything "different" is to stamp on it. This is the sole reason why I don't think it was a good move for mainstream politicians (nor the high-profile black BM worker nor the homophobic and otherwise dodgy Asian life peer) to gang up on the odious nasty Nick on mainstream television. He is quite capable of displaying his neanderthal idiocy without fomentation of sympathy from the terminally stupid.

Straw senior at the outbreak of WW2 was a member of the Peace Pledge Union who took the view at that time that hostilities were merely a continuation of the imperialist WW1 and so got banged up. As he didn't stick around for long after Straw junior's birth I doubt if he had much influence on his son's decision to refuse to serve in his school's militaristic cadet force. When I first encountered Jack Straw as NUS president in the late 60s, his stance on peace was well-established. I don't recall if he ever wore the white peace poppy then but I wish he'd worn one instead of the war-glorying Haig "red flower" on QT.