How the left views Ken Clarke

Slim Jim

The real issue is the 50% discount for pleading guilty early. It was amusing listening to Mrs. Balls on Sky yesterday. It's a shame Adam Boulton didn't remind her that it was her government that began the process of interfering (as opposed to improving) the criminal justice system. It would appear that the current mob are continuing the process. How much more can it be undermined?

Andre

The real crime here is Ken's underhand attempts to save money - by letting out criminals he feels society can justifiably tolerate. Follow the money.....

Steve

I usually object to almost everything KC says but find little wrong with what I believe to be the remarks that I he made on the radio yesterday.

Is anyone other than the most ridiculously militant femist really prepared to defend the view that a terrifyingly violent rape by a masked stranger in a dark alley is EXACTLY THE SAME CRIME as, for instance, spousal rape?

I don't think so, and anyone that claims they are the same thing is doing a serious disservice to any victim of the first crime. In my view, to say that they are not the same thing in no way diminishes the suffering of the latter whilst to say that they are the same greatly diminishes the suffering of the former.

I'm starting to understand why some admire KC for his so-called 'courage' in making unpopular statements.

Dominic

The low conviction rates for rape are always deemed to be a scandal, but nobody ever says what they should be. As David Cameron is the latest to trot out this line, perhaps he could enlighten us - should the conviction rate be 10%? 25%? 50%? 100%?
And on what basis could anyone decide which figure would be the correct one?

Joshua

"I usually object to almost everything KC says but find little wrong with what I believe to be the remarks that I he made on the radio yesterday."

I agree completely.

As a person who has seen the inside of a number of prisons and remand centres, I can assure you that prison does not work. Worse than that, it invariably makes a bad individual much worse. What does work? I'm really not certain.

Why doesn't prison work? I'm not sure about that either. My best guess is that if you treat a person like an animal, he will behave like one.

ButcombeMan

Since 6% is SUCH a low figure and it is reasonable to believe that given the sheer difficulty of carrying forward an allegation of rape (through the pressure on the victim) that many more allegations than that are genuine, the conviction rate IS inadequate, so Patterson is correct and Melanie has it wrong.

Of course the peculiar nature of rape allegations where victim and accused are well known to each other does lead to a situation of one word against another and real difficulty for juries.

With enhanced DNA techniques it is highly posible (though I do not have the facts) that "stranger rape" convictions are being made easier assuming an accused can be found.

Ken was howver broadly correct and the contrived anger from Red Ed just makes him look foolish.

Did Ken give "real offence"? If he did, surely only because the listeners refused to listen and jumped to conclusions about what they thought he was saying, that, or the anger was just contrived.

The line from the interviewer "rape is rape" was plain silly and we are entitled to expect better from the BBC.

There is nothing wrong in principle with the idea of giving a substantial discount for an EARLY GUILTY plea, which will reduce impact on victims thus spared the horror of re-enacting the circumstances in court and being accused of all manner of things by thuggish counsel for the defence.

If giving a substantial discount in suitable cases leads to sentences that are too low, the answer is to raise the indicative guidelines for sentence at the same time, this reinforcing the message to culprits.

That is the sort of discussion the BBC interviewer should have promoted. Once again the BBC failed.

mbarnes

He is a nice guy,too nice for the tories.The Sun says he must go,thats enough for Cameron,his policies come from Murdoch.He may drag his feet for a while but what Rupert says, goes.

aelle

If you start from a false premise you are sure to get lost, particularly in the moral maze.

Having listened to the Radio 5 phone-in it is simply inaccurate to say that Ken Clarke "appeared to denigrate the seriousness of rape."

He gave no such impresssion and, emphatically, said no such thing.

He spoke of "serious rape", instantly qualifying that as
"forcible rape" , "violence" and contrasting such crime with underage consensual sex and non-consensual intercourse in a voluntary social context, both of which may lead to conviction for rape. He observed that judges' sentencing for rape invariably reflected the context in which the rape occurred.

He repeated to a tearful and
emotional rape victim the self-evident truth that "rape is a serious crime".

The subsequent opportunistic and desperate attempts by the leader of Her Majesty's opposition and his cronies, abetted by a sensation-seeking media have meretriciously inverted his use of the words "serious rape" to suggest, quite without justification, that he somehow considers there to be such a thing as 'non-serious rape'.

There is a plain Anglo-Saxon word for such distortion of the truth : lies.

It is sad to find someone of Ms Phillips intellectual rigour failing to make this clear.

Nick Kaplan

I find it hard to think of a story that better exemplifies the almost complete inability of certain leftists to think coherently.

Many on the left would have us believe that we should be generous and sympathetic to almost all criminals; murders, thieves, muggers, drug addicts etc, that they should be ‘rehabilitated’ and allowed to vote and almost always given shorter sentences lest they be educated in the colleges of crime (prisons to those of us still able to speak English) and hence lost forever to a life of violence.

Yet when it comes to rape, which is somehow different from all other crimes (perhaps because it is the one crime other than ‘hate speech’ which it is un-PC to commit) even the suggestion (with which I disagree) that sentences should be made shorter is enough to make you an enemy of women and evil incarnate.

Unless of course you are a prominent member of the left-wing cultural elite a Roman Polanski or Dominic Straus-Khan say, in which case actually raping someone (even a child) is ok, because although it is ‘rape’ apparently its not ‘rape rape,' which somehow makes it all fine.

Nonetheless, while rape apparently is fine if you’re rich, famous and preferably European, you better not take out a super-injunction to prevent people knowing about your consensual sexual relationships; that apparently would be an abuse of your wealth and power. Which, you understand, is utterly and horribly immoral not because free-speech is valuable, but solely because such injunctions are expensive and hence unavaliable to all those (the poor and not famous) who would never need them.

Corin Keiler-Lloyd

The irony is that KC is going down for the one crime he did not commit - but that happens a lot in the justice system.

Daniel

Surely more convictions will require more evidence?

EDDIE

Surely all KC is really saying is that we just cannot afford to build enough prison to house all our criminals. Logically we therefore need to release them early or not to charge them unless they are actually seen knifing people in daylight. As our population increases exponentially this problem will get worse. KC is just being logical

Joshua

"Unless of course you are a prominent member of the left-wing cultural elite a ...Dominic Straus-Khan"

I have no idea whether he committed the crime. I do know that the trial by Daily Mail that is currently being carried on in article after article is one of the most unsavoury things I have ever seen in a British newspaper. I have always been a supporter of Melanie Phillips. I have backed her in forum after forum over the years. I have even sent her links from time to time which she has occasionally used. I am however bitterly disappointed that she continues to write for the Daily Mail. Surely there is a decent newspaper that could use her valuable services.

Simon

Is Miss Philips seriously suggesting that in the 94% of reported rapes that do not end in a conviction all the women involved are lying?

Kenny

Nick Kaplan.

Well said sir.

Despite the underlying seriousness of the issues here- and as with the Julian Assange case about which Miss Phillips has also written-the sight of left-liberals strung up by their own contradictions is a joy to behold.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1340101/MELANIE-PHILLIPS-Fancy-The-Left-war-Mr-WikiLeaks.html

Terry

Re Simon 7.34pm: see Inspector Gadget's blog for a reality check on the background to many reported rape accusations.

Kenny

Simon says:

"Is Miss Philips seriously suggesting that in the 94% of reported rapes that do not end in a conviction all the women involved are lying?"

And are you sir seriously suggesting that all those acquitted by a jury of their peers, no matter what the charge, are in fact guilty? Why bother with trials at all...

john bruce

Your views on womens rights leave a lot to be answered for Mel.

I heard your views on this subject on the BBC's Moral Maze the night before, where the question was also about rape.

Where you put forward your position that girls who dressed like sluts are basically tempting men and are asking for it.

You also were very patronising to the first female witness who defended women's right to dress how they like. We could already feel the contempt you had for that woman, it was dripping from everything you said. Was there any need to ask her "Do you know what hypothetical means?"

Do you honestly think that she didn't know what hypothetical meant? The BBC don't ask witnesses onto that program unless they have a basic understanding of the English language. She obviously knew what the word meant! Was arguing with her harder than patronising her?

Why demean a woman like that because she had a different viewpoint from you?

Nasty.

Dai of Edinburgh

KC has been misunderstood. His comment has typically been taken at face value without any scrutiny by shill feminists incapable of seeing the detail. Incidentally, what about that other 'real scandal' that men are often falsely accused of rape by spiteful women and largely with impunity. Such a false accusation effectively rapes the reputation of the man targetted by this spite.

Holly

This has come at a perfect time.
We should watch the shenanigans in America,where we have a case of rape,her word against his.
She will be dragged through the mud,accused of lying etc,ect.
He will be portrayed as a law abiding,upright pillar of the WORLD community,when reports are showing otherwise.
He will plead his innocence throughout.
If the evidence stacks up against him,should he plead guilty BEFORE the highly paid lawyers trash her,and take a plea bargain to save her the shit she is undoubtably going to go through?
Or,as I expect,will he continue to wreck her character and if found guilty get a longer jail term?

Raymond D

Labour's feminist coven , back in their comfort zone eh? Harriet Harman and her crew. They love it, just love it ! Doesn't matter about wrecking the economy. Doesn't matter about about the mass immigration. Doesn't matter about the mad, equality agenda which has done so much to wreck family life . Oh no, all that matters is beastly Tory men being sexist ! And don't get me started about all this "BLUE LABOUR" hypocrisy !

Fergus Pickering

If one is to believe Inspector Gadget's blog (read it) then it would appear that at least 80% of the women are indeed lyng. Or rather that 80% of the reports are lies, which is not quite the same thing. As I understand him, this 80% of reports comes from the same people week in, week out. As I said, read it and make your own decision. Maybe Gadget (a serving police officer) is the one lying in his teeth for some reason or other, but if he is not then the explanation for the 94% figure is there.

Mark 2

Isn't there a childishly simple way to end this argument once and for all. Potentially the sentence for rape is life. It must however be very rarely applied. All other sentences vary I imagine, according to the "severity" of the offence. So if anyone believes all rapes are equally bad logically they should argue for the maximum sentence - life. If they don't (and I can't believe many would) then are we not implicitly accepting that, as with other crimes, there are some that are bad and some that are worse. I suspect (and I am not a Tory) that that is what KC meant and realy can not see what else there is to argue about here.

Daniel

Simon
May 19th, 2011 7:34pm

"Is Miss Philips seriously suggesting that in the 94% of reported rapes that do not end in a conviction all the women involved are lying?"

The statistic indicates only that in 94% of reported rapes there is insufficient evidence to convict. No witnesses = no witnesses.

pterodactyl

There must be some similar conflicts of principles going on in the heads of the feminist Left who work for the BBC from the safety of Israel and then venture out into places like Gaza, and have to take extra precautions on these expeditions due to the way they treat women there. I would love for one of these feminists to interview an arab crowd and ask them about the way they force young girls to marry old men. I dare them to say 'rape is rape' to one of these crowds they seem to admire so much.
Such is the conflict of principles the Left have to go through. And then they return to Britain to condemn private education and the wealthy, even if they are very rich themselves and send their children to private schools. And they also will not hear a word said against the NHS, meanwhile using private health care themselves.

Nicholas

"Is Miss Philips seriously suggesting that in the 94% of reported rapes that do not end in a conviction all the women involved are lying?"

More likely that 94% are not proven beyond a reasonable doubt and that amongst that figure are an unknown number of malicious, false or "I changed my mind the next day after I had sobered up" complaints.

Frank P

You still banged up the Scrubs, Melanie? No copy yet on Obama's speech about 1967 borders and Bibi's reaction?

Cue Delia Smith geeing up her Norwich City supporters: "Let's be 'aving ya!"

TomTom

Kenneth Clarke was Chancellor. He knows Strauss-Kahn. Could anything be more crass than to go off on this track at this particular time ?

We have Strauss-Kahn doing the Perp Walk in NYC but know it would not even come to trial in France...or Britain....and moreover a Super Injunction would keep everything quiet.

We have domestic slaves getting compensation from The Met for failure to investigate....

Whatever else Clarke should show some political awareness of how events look when viewed in context

gerry

Everyone I've spoken to, male and female, agrees with Ken Clarke.

pterodactyl

gerry - in the Daily Mail poll 54% support Ken Clarke. (And 75% support Israel saying they should not return to '67 borders.)

In the future it will be interesting to see the impact of instant feedback on politics. On the one hand it will be harder to ignore the voters, but on the other hand politics will be dumbed down even more as the reaction to Ken Clarke shows.

I wonder if the 46% who say Clarke should stand down over his comments also think that all murder is the same, so the 30 mph motorist who kills the drunk pedestrian who runs in front of his car should receive the same treatment as the criminal who kidnaps a stranger's child and kills the child. After all 'murder is murder'

Augustus

I haven't the faintest idea what Ken Clarke said, but one thing you must never do is denigrate the seriousness of rape. Because women are obviously frail and vulnerable, and therefore always believable. In fact, nothing is easier for a woman to accuse a man of sexual misconduct. If you hate someone, or you think you might profit in some way, Bob's your uncle, you think of something and you have a case. The man can only try and defend himself, and 'I didn't do anything, truly I didn't', begins to sound a bit pathetic, because men are by definition guilty, because if they didn't do
anything, they at least secretly wanted to
and that's wrong too. C'est la vie!

John Holland

I suppose it would cloud the simple 'us 'n them' narrative beloved by the good folk on this site to acknowledge the fact that, with one exception, all the comments in the hated Guardian and Indy that I read were broadly in support of Ken, while the hysterical (and utterly opportunistic) screams for his resignation were in the beloved Mail and Sun.

JohNW

Clarke is a buffoon - but on this issue, he is absolutely right. There are degrees of rape - just as there are degrees of murder.

Of course, the militant sisterhood could never be expected to admit it, though. To them, all men are evil, but some are more evil than others.

JohNW

Dominic:

"...should the conviction rate be 10%? 25%? 50%? 100%?"

Sounds like we need a quota!

JohNW

John Holland:

"...the simple 'us 'n them' narrative beloved by the good folk on this site..."

Well, the Left does more than its own share of hurling abuse and categorising - evidenced by its universal loathing of the Sun and the Daily Mail readership.

John Holland

JohNW-

So your answer is merely to point out that "they" do it too.
Which simply illustrates my point.

And for all its many faults, I've never seen the Grauniad sink to the the level of rank hypocracy and cynisism of the Sun's sudden conversion to Andrea Dworkin-style femminism last week.