Tag: news

The police have raised the death-toll to ‘at least 50’.

I think London will cope pretty well with this – we’ve been brought up with terrorism, on a smaller scale, from the IRA, and ever since 911, Bali and particularly Madrid, it was pretty clear that sooner or later it would happen here as well. That doesn’t make it any better for those directly affected, but it does mean that the population as a whole was psychologically prepared for it. I think we have to treat it like a big train-crash: try to make sure that all possible precautions are in place to prevent it, and emergency plans are in place to respond to it; and when it does happen we hold an enquiry to see if anything could have been done better. But what we mustn’t do is let it change anything important. Shit happens. Life goes on.

Well, the death-toll is 38, for the moment. It’s a sombre reflection that, after 9-11, Bali, Madrid and Beslan, to have only 38 deaths – more than any IRA attack ever killed – feels like a relief. And it’s a great deal better to be living in London than, say, northern Uganda.

I was planning to do lots of enthusiastic Olympic-related blogging today, but then this happened. At the moment, at least it looks like the casualties aren’t on the scale of Madrid or Bali, but we still don’t have much information.

Three things which I found pleasing today: the UK had the least road deaths last year since records began in 1926; Canada and Spain have legalised gay marriage; Venus Williams beat Maria Sharapova to get into the Wimbledon final.

Wel, the weather may be rotten, but it’s hard to be completely gloomy when the people of Carlisle are doing so much to cheer me up (there’s a picture of the Stone here). And hurrah for the Melton Mowbray pork pie.

Article in the NY Times.

Aaargh.