BS: No One Is Above the Law?

Subject: RE: BS: No One Is Above the Law?
From: Iains
Date: 26 Sep 18 - 01:13 PM

But it is also a truism that ignorance of the law is no excuse so how do you square that circle?

You may argue Ignorantia Facti Excusat but not ignorantia legis neminem excusat

Subject: RE: BS: No One Is Above the Law?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 26 Sep 18 - 01:46 PM

The most obscene example of the law opposing justice was at the time of the Grenfell Tower fire when landlords invoked the law to prevent survivors from being temporarily housed in vacant buildings while homes were found for them - a sort of Blitz spirit in reverse
I was quite proud to be a SUPPORTER OF THIS HERO at the time
I think Iains may remember this !!!

A disturbing development in Dublin's hosing crisis a few weeks ago was when landlord's bailiffs (ex Paras) sent in to remove squatters from vacant property were accompanied by unidentified police in unmarked vehicles and wearing balaclavas
The law can a jackal rather than an ass when it is used by the wealthy and privileged to protect their wealth and privilege
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: No One Is Above the Law?
From: Iains
Date: 26 Sep 18 - 02:14 PM

Well we have been through this before. Requisitioning property has only been carried out in wartime in the UK. Any council trying it would be laughed out of court, very expensively. It might work in a socialist jackbooted society but not in the uk. Your socialist dreams are a thinking persons's nightmare. The EU would also eviscerate any council trying such a stunt. Your suggestion is totally nonsensical as you very well know. It would destroy property rights at a stroke. It ain't going to happen and the streets would be running with blood before it did.

Subject: RE: BS: No One Is Above the Law?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 26 Sep 18 - 03:06 PM

Thanks for confirming that you put property above human life Iains, though it wan't necessary
I din't doubt it for a minute
I prefer the humanity of teh feeling people, though I like to think that if people thought about things like this they might take a humanitarian approach to it rather than that of a Conservative economist

I think you demonstrate the fact that, as things are the law serves the haves rather than the have nots

Yur last sentence reads just like Charlton Heston's "Cold, dead hands" spech to the NRA - or even Enoch's "Rivers of Blood"
I can see where you're coming from
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: No One Is Above the Law?
From: Iains
Date: 26 Sep 18 - 03:16 PM

There is no fool like an old fool Jim. Keep spouting nonsense if it makes you feel better. Meanwhile back in the real world.....

Subject: RE: BS: No One Is Above the Law?
From: Thompson
Date: 26 Sep 18 - 06:31 PM

Jim, what about the Travellers robbing and terrorising farmers? What would you do about them?

Subject: RE: BS: No One Is Above the Law?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 26 Sep 18 - 07:30 PM

"im, what about the Travellers robbing and terrorising farmers?"
Hhat about the settled thugs breaking into people's homes,ot the muggers, or the rapists - what do you do about them
Why treat Traveller criminals any different tann settled criminals
Some of the worst crimes in society are committed by members of the indigenous settled community
I was brought up in one of the biggest 'problem' areas of Merseyside - do criminals suddenly become Scousers because that's heer they lived ?

Criminals are criminals Traveller criminals tend to commit different crimes than to settled criminals - bt they are equally both criminals
Murder islarhely a settled crime - it doesn't happen to much among Travellers
Pedophelia is overwhelmingly a 'setttled' crime, as is rape or organised prostitution or organised crime or mugging.....
We don't talk anout them i those terms
Why do we do so about Travellers?

By and large, travellers are 'criminals of want' - they don't steal to acquire (they are the least acquisitive people I have ever come across)
They steal to live from day to day
You can only discuss the flaws in Traveller Society when you level out the playing field

Tha vast majorty of Travellers in this country hav nowhere to stop legally, no running water, no sanitation, no electricity, no way of educating themselves or their children......
Try to work out how you would react to that situation
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: No One Is Above the Law?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 26 Sep 18 - 07:40 PM

"Meanwhile back in the real world....."
You always retreat behind that barrier when you have no intelligent respomnse to what is being put up
he real world is that far from the streets running with blood, the vast majority of people in Britain are humanist-minded individuals who reach out to people in trouble on an individual basis
Who would set the "streets running with blood" /
The people you represent are in the main incapable o replacing a fuse or changing a tap washer, or replacing a roof tile.... or any of the things that keep us warm and clean and fed ... they need to "call in a little man to do that"
Far from defending their property - like all wars and social disturbances - they have to conscript somebody else to do it for them
People who value property above people are entirely dependent on the people they exploit and despise
They'd have a "little man" to wipe their arses for them if convention would allow it
Jim Carroll
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: No One Is Above the Law?
From: Iains
Date: 27 Sep 18 - 02:56 AM

Jim there is no point in (Me)trying to argue with a fool (You)
Your arguments are crass dogma and make no sense.End of story!

Subject: RE: BS: No One Is Above the Law?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 27 Sep 18 - 03:59 AM

No there most certainly isn't
Anybody who puts ownership of property above human life is way beyond my pay range - it is simple inhuman greed as far as I'm concerned
It is everything that is wrong with society today and is what will destroy it eventually
It explains every wrong in society, from the homeless sleeping on the streets to the dead refugee children dragged from the sea
You have no arguments or explanations to offer and that is argument enough for me
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: No One Is Above the Law?
From: Iains
Date: 27 Sep 18 - 04:13 AM

I had an interesting conversation with a cabbage today!

Subject: RE: BS: No One Is Above the Law?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 27 Sep 18 - 05:34 AM

"I had an interesting conversation with a cabbage today!"
Hpe you didn't feel intimidated
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: No One Is Above the Law?
From: Iains
Date: 27 Sep 18 - 05:40 AM

I left kindergarten decades ago. II guess you could not find the way out.

Subject: RE: BS: No One Is Above the Law?
From: Thompson
Date: 27 Sep 18 - 05:53 AM

Interesting that Jim Carroll - someone whose thoughts interest me because they're based on his own lived experience and not on opinion - is being described as someone speaking from dogma.

Good points on the crimes, Jim - though it seems to me that very often when you see robbery with violence reported the names of the arrested are Connors and Ward and Maughan… Certainly there are many settled criminals, but particularly violent robberies now seems to be interwoven with Traveller culture in a way they never were before.

Subject: RE: BS: No One Is Above the Law?
From: KarenH
Date: 27 Sep 18 - 06:16 AM

I cannot say where the 'adage' comes from, though I'm thinking that discussions on the topic must go back to ancient Greece and Rome.

The saying uses the word 'above' not 'outside', suggesting to me a focus originally on higher-ranked people. So in Magna Carta one thing the Barons wanted to do was to make the king obey the rules as they saw them. The problem maybe comes up when some European rulers claimed the 'divine right of kings', to be accountable only to god, not to man-made laws. My understanding is that at least one US president has suggested that if the president does it it cannot be illegal.

Donuel wrote this: "The intent of the law was originally devised to hold the powerful and educated to bear more responsibility under the law because the well to do simply know better than the unwashed public." I'm not sure which society this refers to, but I doubt it would apply to all societies with written codes of law. How does trial by a jury of peers fit in with this idea?   

But it isn't just a matter of what the law says, it is a matter of who is able to enforce their rights through the law, which, as others have said, costs money. It's also a matter the purposes for which the law is cited, which may be to demonize a particular group, and of the strictness with which it is enforced.

Regarding travellers, there are, rightly in my view, obligations on English local councils to make provisions for sites, though my understanding is that these have been weakened, and that not all councils have fully complied.

Ians's raising of the topic of travellers in the context of Joe's thread looks racist to me, as well as, obviously, being designed to wind up Jim Carroll who, unfortunately, has taken the bait. Jim, we feel your passion, but in cases like this, maybe less is more?

Subject: RE: BS: No One Is Above the Law?
From: KarenH
Date: 27 Sep 18 - 06:20 AM

This might be out of date, but it gives the gist of the legal position at a relatively recent point in time.

https://www.eastcambs.gov.uk/sites/default/files/community/local_authorities_and_gypsies_travellers_a_gui_13895.pdf

Subject: RE: BS: No One Is Above the Law?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 27 Sep 18 - 08:33 AM

"but particularly violent robberies now seems to be interwoven with Traveller culture"
Whate does that come from
There are estimated to be around 63,000 Travellers on the roads of Britain
How may reports are there of Travellers committing violent crimes thay youi know of
The greatest rise in violent crimes in Britain today are urban based knife attacks
You seem to me honing in on the acts of a few criminals to present a adverse picture of an entire community
Were you to do this of, say, the Black community you would, justifiably in my opinion. lay yourself open to accusations of racism

Travellers in general, criminals or not, ater treated abominably in Britain - it is not unreasonable to expect a backlash from that

Ireland is is fact worse
While we have lived here, several times we've experienced going into town for a pint and finding all the bars closed
When Travellers are reported in teh ae the police make a point of visiting the bars and telling the publicans only to let in people they know
The publicans are told that if Travellers are let in and trouble breaks out the police will not respond to calls for assistance
Work that one out
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: No One Is Above the Law?
From: Thompson
Date: 27 Sep 18 - 12:07 PM

I'm talking about Ireland and not Britain.

I'd have sympathy with pubs that don't want Travellers, given the reports of fights with slash hooks and axes.

Subject: RE: BS: No One Is Above the Law?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 27 Sep 18 - 12:36 PM

"I'm talking about Ireland and not Britain. "
There are a few incidents of violent crime here, not that many, but basically the same applies - a minority of criminals
I really don't know where this is coming from
If a settled person commits a crime nobody associates it to the community as a whole
If a Traveller commits a crime it is identified as a Traveller crime andfd the press makes a meal of it

A couple of examples of how Travellers are treated - under the law, to keep it in context
In 2006 a farmer was tried and convicted of 'executing' a Traveller
The Traveller was trespassing on his farm, it was presumed, with the intention of burgling the home
The Farmer caught him standing in the yard, went for a shotgun, shot him and seriously wounded him
He then took a fence pole and beat him severely
Leaving him lying badly wounded on the ground, went in to his house, reloaded his shotgun, came out and administered the coupe-de-grace, killing him
The farmer was convicted of manslaughter, but the sentence was dismissed on appeal

As far as the law is concerned, there is no justice for Travellers

Your last sentence makes your own position quite clear and shows I am wasting my time
I have no intention of talking to deaf ears - bye
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: No One Is Above the Law?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 27 Sep 18 - 12:58 PM

PROBABLY WASTING MY TIME
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: No One Is Above the Law?
From: Iains
Date: 27 Sep 18 - 01:47 PM

Karen H
I suggest you read more carefully as to who raised the issue of travellers and then you can apologise!

Subject: RE: BS: No One Is Above the Law?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 27 Sep 18 - 03:34 PM

Raising people whio suffer worst by Britsih justice is a matter for apology
Must right that one down

You've never really been very good at this, have you?
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: No One Is Above the Law?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 27 Sep 18 - 03:45 PM

You really don't get the point of debating these issues, do you?
Il mappy to do so whenever the opportunity arises
On the one hand, I get a chance of expressing an opinion on a subject that's dear to me based on over thirty years of working and associating with Travellers
On the other hand, these discussions always draw out the rednecks and bigots who offer real-life examples of the bigotry and racism I describe and more or les help me make my case - sort of like an illustrated lecture

Win - win as far as I'm concerned
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: No One Is Above the Law?
From: Donuel
Date: 27 Sep 18 - 05:25 PM

besides poor Nomads

I am reminded of my cartoon about being above the law when I pictured George W Bush floating among the clouds suspended by lead balloons afixed with the Presidential Seal. Far below were monumental letters spelling out 'LAW'.

The meaning was transparent to me but to my surprise it was opaque to others. Now it seems our President is completely above the law.

Subject: RE: BS: No One Is Above the Law?
From: Charmion
Date: 28 Sep 18 - 10:07 AM

In "Le lys rouge", Anatole France commented for the ages on applying the law to the wealthy and the destitute alike:

La majestueuse égalité des lois, qui interdit au riche comme au pauvre de coucher sous les ponts, de mendier dans les rues et de voler du pain. C’est un des bienfaits de la Révolution.

[The law, in its majestic equality, forbids the rich as well as the poor to sleep under bridges, to beg in the streets, and to steal bread. That is one of the good effects of the Revolution.]

Subject: RE: BS: No One Is Above the Law?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 28 Sep 18 - 01:37 PM

"applying the law to the wealthy and the destitute alike:"
But he didn't include the penguins - (my favourite novel)
Jim

Subject: RE: BS: No One Is Above the Law?
From: Thompson
Date: 29 Sep 18 - 06:49 PM

Is this the farmer Jim's talking about?

Subject: RE: BS: No One Is Above the Law?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 29 Sep 18 - 06:56 PM

Yes
Jim

Subject: RE: BS: No One Is Above the Law?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 30 Sep 18 - 03:05 AM

Shouls have added that that wiki report was an almost straight lift from our tabloid press
Our President, Michael D Higgins summed up the situation with Travellers here in Irelandin one simple statement yesterday: we must never treat the refugees coming to Ireland the way we treat Travellers"
Jim Carroll