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A Little Too Hollywood?

Eyewear isn't the only Quixote in town. David Davis has been mainly branded a Quixotic loser by the British press, since beginning his one man crusade against 42-day detention. What's curious is to see how such a principled stand is being played out in the UK. British papers often wax lyrical about "American style politics" - but when it emerges in their own backyard, they balk, puzzled, or disconcerted by the "loose canon" in their midst.

British social and political life is still often governed by rigid codes of decorum, and breaking ranks, even to voice something good or necessary, is tantamount to going "mad", or becoming "unreliable". No wonder it is so difficult to voice well-meaning opposition in the UK, without becoming quickly marginalised. One is meant to "work within the system" - even if, as Davis proposes, that system has failed everyone. It's sad to see a brave, decent man so quickly pilloried. The press might have championed him more.
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Matt Merritt said…
I've no problem with people breaking ranks to voice principled opposition, but I fail to see how Davis is doing that. Why draw the line at 42 days and start invoking Magna Carta? If he was really so deeply against this on principle, shouldn't he also have been taking a stand against 28 days detention, or 14 days?

Also, his concern for civil liberties doesn't extend to workers' rights. He had no qualms about serving as a whip while the Tories systematically crushed the unions, and I haven't heard him pushing for any of those draconian 80s anti-union laws to be reversed.

That's why I can't see him as a "brave, decent man" making a principled stand - far too much hypocrisy. I suspect a lot of the opposition to him is on exactly the same grounds.
Fri Jun 20, 04:28:00 pm 2008
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