Fox in a box

It’s been a while since I did any current affairs stuff, what with how crazy my life’s been recently, but my head was turned this week by the outcome of the Meredith Kercher trial in Italy. Does anyone else wish we’d had John Fashanu reporting on this case? Imagine how much more light hearted the whole thing could have been every time he said ‘Perugia’.

My, but it’s a tough one, isn’t it, readers. On the one hand, and I don’t want to perpetuate any tired national stereotypes here, but the Italians are bent as a nine bob note, aren’t they? You only need to look at their football team to know that! All that diving and praying to the referee for leniency, with their Alice bands and their long, shiny hair. They do have the best kit, though, according to Dan. He likes the three-quarter length sleeves, because it shows off their forearms.

I read a book about an Italian detective once and he had grappa for breakfast every day and had to bribe someone to get pretty much anything done, even to get a telephone line installed. It’s just how they operate out there. Whaddayagonnado?

On the other hand, the Americans are just so bloody sanctimonious. Foxy Knoxy’s parents are clearly in denial and they attribute her pre-interrogation cartwheels to youthful exuberance and energy. Now I’m not so old that I don’t remember having youthful exuberance and I tell you what: if I’d been about to be interrogated by Italian coppers who’d been on the grappa all day over the brutal murder of my flatmate, I’d have been bloody shitting it; innocent or not. In fact I’d probably have been shitting it worse if I was innocent, what with their reputation for corruption. You wouldn’t want to go down for something you didn’t do, right?

Not Knoxy, though. Cool as you like, upon learning that her flatmate’s throat had been slit in a macabre sex game, she throws a few shapes. Not exactly broken up about it, was she. How about a little respect, eh?

So her folks have described the judgement as shameful for the whole of Italy, which is a bit strong. Do they include the Pope in that? Or the Pizza? Silvio Berlusconi? (He’s been pretty quiet about the whole thing. He was probably the one spinning the bottle back at the flat!! Lol!!!) No, they’re way out of line. In fact, Knox’s parents are forgetting rule one of crime investigation: There’s no smoke without fire.

Fuck it, she’s guilty as sin; you can see it just by looking at her. It’s the eyes. But you wait and see: the Yanks are going to call in the big guns and, before too long, she’ll be free as a bird and signing a book deal about her ‘ordeal’ in a ‘backward European Jail’. She’ll probably get her own chat show, a fact that makes me sick. After all, old Teddy Kennedy, who passed away this year, was universally loved. Back in the day, though, he got pissed, drowned a young woman and then went home and didn’t tell anyone until the next day. Did he get chokey? Did he bollocks. They love posh killers out there.

The US is full of nice people but they don’t half throw their weight around on the international stage. And then we go and send them Gary McKinnon, the disabled hacker. Now, I don’t think he’s actually disabled, I just heard the newsreader on BBC radio describe him that way. I think he might have the Aspergers Syndrome, which is where you moan and hug strangers but you’re really good at counting, like Dustin Hoffman in Rain Man (fine, maybe he deserved the Oscar. For my money, though Tootsie was a much better film). Apparently Aspergers also makes your wee smell funny; the human body is a weird and wonderful thing, readers.

Or, in McKinnon’s case, rather than being good at counting, you’re good at sitting around in your pants all day smoking weed and playing on your computer. Harmless enough, of course, but Uncle Sam wants to throw the book at him, because Uncle Sam likes throwing books at people because no-motherfucker-fucks-with-the-goddam-USofA-don’t-you-eyeball-me-now-boy-are-you-eyeballing-me-mayo?-Mayonaaaaaaiiiise-sir-yes-sir-objection-your-honour-move-to-strike-objection-overrulled-you-want-the-truth?-you-can’t-handle-the-truth-oh-oh-say-can-you-see-by-the-dawn’s-early-light-watching-every-motion-in-this-foolish-lover’s-game-haunted-by-the-notion- somewhere-there's-a-love-in-flames-plead-the-fifth-from-my-cold-dead-hands-the-world’s-greatest-democracy-almost-forty-percent-of-Americans-are-clinically-obese-and-most-of-the-rest-are-plain-old-overweight-shoulder-to-shoulder-we-stand-you-guys-would-all-be-German-now-if-we-hadn’t-saved-your-limey-asses.

Thank God I had Super Mario Kart, that’s all I can say, otherwise maybe I’d be off to get water-boarded as well.

That’s the problem with the Septics. It’s one rule for us and another one for them. So I’m with the Blackshirts on this one (and you won’t hear me say that very often). They’ve got Knox bang to rights and she’s lucky she is in Italy and not back home in the US of A, otherwise she’d probably be on death row, waiting for her last taste of cherry pie like mom used to make.

‘Mom’, Jesus. ‘Mum’ is a perfectly good word. What do they need ‘Mom’ for?
Did you know that the tune for the American National Anthem was actually written by a church organist from Norwich? A nice, British tune, that.

Peace

ND