Well, a couple of things really.

The first is the Abu Qatada business.   I just wonder how much it has cost the taxpayers of this country to keep this turbulent cleric and his family for all the years he has been here sponging off the state for all kinds of benefits and legal fees as he has used every legal loophole to avoid deportation back to his native Jordan where he is wanted on terrorist charges going back as far as the millennium `celebrations.`

I was hoping that Home Secretary Theresa May would have stood up in parliament today and told us that, as she spoke, Qatada was on a plane back to Jordan.   Instead - and I do understand the legalities involved here - we have the prospect of yet further delays as yet another appeal procedure opens up before him.   More frustration, more months or even years of delay, vastly more expense.   Now I understand too about Qatada`s `human rights` but do you know what?  I really don`t care about them or him and I think it`s high time he was shunted out of this country.  

But no, we seem determined to go down the laudably moral route of sticking diligently to the law not only of this country but also the European Court of Human Rights.  Instead, maybe just for once we should actually do something - stick him on a plane and live with the legal consequences - utilising the old hackneyed management phrase, "For God`s sake do something...even if you just say `goodbye.`".   

On the more serious issue of Afghanistan, I read with dismay the reports that the Taliban are stoking up the heat of battle again with their concentrated targeting of western embassies, government offices and military bases in and around Kabul, leaving Afghan President Karzai to complain - yes, complain - that western intelligence, especially NATO,  isn`t doing enough to stop this kind of thing happening.

In much the same way as Abu Quatada`s stay in this country must surely be unsustainable, the  mission in Afghanistan, despite the  US military assurances, will eventually prove  unsustainable in the long run.  The UK has so far lost 408 military personnel in this conflict and I can but imagine the feelings of their families and friends as they must surely wonder why their loved ones have been taken from them in what seems a fruitless adventure accompanied by no thanks whatsoever from the head of the country for which they gave their lives.