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Just by way of another brief interlude in my self-imposed blog silence while I am upgrading software and design, I wanted to mention the wonderful speech I heard yesterday. One of the nice things about being one of the university's governors is that I can get to choose to go to pretty well any number of graduation ceremonies. I don't avail myself of the privilege terribly often, but I went yesterday evening to the graduation ceremony for most of our law students.

The honorary graduand was Clive Stafford Smith, the British born US based death-row lawyer and campaigner against the death penalty and torture and all things Guantanamo. As I understand it, he is, like many passionate campaigners, if not many lawyers, not terribly well remunerated, to put it mildly. His clients tend, almost by definition, to be amongst the poorest, often least educated in US society, and they have no legal right to representation once the sentence is handed down. There's not a lot of money in death penalty appeals or sticking up for the disappeared in America's network of secret GTMO-like prisons.

So he was appealing for these bright young starry eyed graduates to come and be exploited by his charity, Reprieve, for a few months, or more precisely, their parents to fund them while they are there. He promised an experience the like of which they are unlikely to find in a whole career at the Old Bailey or the corridors of corporate power. While they may dream of millionaire partnerships at Clifford Chance, he does it because it is fun! You cannot imagine the fantastic feeling you get, he says, when you "whip George Bush's ass in the Supreme Court" and defeat the world's only super-power in their own courts.

And when you think about it, how do we measure success? Is it the money? Or perhaps the satisfaction of a David victorious against Goliath.

...is at Her Majesty's Pleasure.

Was this the sort of democracy you envisaged when you talked about regime change:

Gays flee Iraq as Shia death squads find a new target. And apparently they're not having such an easy time being granted asylum because the Home Office doesn't want to give the impression that Iraq is not what you said it would be. Still, I suppose they could always try their luck in Zimbabwe, since that's now "safe".

History will be your judge. Oh yes. History. If anyone's still alive and free enough to write it.

No, not those "E's" that make you a little bit more chirpy and empathic when you're out at a club, but E grades at GCSE level...

Interesting that getting a grade E may double the relatively tiny risk, while smoking skunk may increase it by less than half that. I suppose it is distinctly possible that all the Grade E students are perpetually on spliffs.

Personally I think both this research and the cannabis research are more on the "urban myth" front than good science but I'll bet we don't get some lurid headlines in the Express or Mail these next few weeks about all those just about to receive their GCSE grades and how half of them are doubling their risk of evil psychosis. I note also the last paragraph of the BBC article:

[Hilary Caprani of mental health charity Rethink] added: "The good news is that many people who have psychosis recover and go on to have challenging careers."

We don't hear that much in the scaremongering about dope, do we?

Brian's family has confirmed the funeral arrangements:

2pm Friday 7 September, 2007.

Stonesfield Parish Church, near Witney, Oxford.
(buses are available from Oxford Bus or Rail Station - see attached PDF )

Donations in lieu of flowers to:

Adopt-A-Minefield
Kensington Charity Centre
4th Floor
Charles House
375 Kensington High Street
London, W14 8QH

telephone: 020.7471.5581
fax: 020.7471.5582
web: http://www.landmines.org.uk