I for one am saddened at the news a truly great entrainer who over the years has provided much laughter and amusement, Agent Abbott you will be missed.

The good news is that Labour have a younger version in Dawn Butler so lets hope she can provide years of merriment to come.

One more point

It's really quite instructive that it's necessary to go into forensic detail to point out to some people what must be quite obvious to most. So here is where COULD came from. The article in the BBC (and many other outlets who took the clearly syndicated report on the autistic boy who suffered from toothache) contained this statement from the Judge:-

"The judge suggested that the head banging could have caused a severe injury and led to the boy's death." (the highlighting of could is mine).

ME then wrote:-

"You have to read right to the end of the article before finding out that the boy had died which is absolutely shocking jounalism" (again the highlighting is mine).

Get it now?

The boy didn't die! The Judge was merely pointing out that he might have done. ME attacked the BBC on a false claim.

For the avoidance of doubt any comments in response to a previous post are directed to its ideas and not at any, or all, posters personally.

In regards to the article, lets look at that sentence again pointing out the obvious problem.

'the head banging could have caused a severe injury and led to the boy's death.'

This can be read two ways and that is poor journalism but in true myopic WE style you only focus upon your interpretation and don't address any other.

You will notice...if you could be bothered, that I had also written, 'if this boy had died'.

ME originally attacked this piece for giving the impression that this boy had died and I agree with him it deserves criticism as I also had that impression.

What we can do is rescind any other form of criticism.

The offending sentence should have been clearly written, for example:

'the head banging could have caused a severe injury which then could have risked the boy's life'.

There are any number of ways of writing this better with more precision. These are meant to be high level journalists and the writing of English is their job.

Edited by Stirlingsays (24 Feb 2020 5.50pm)

'Who are you and how did you get in here? I'm a locksmith. And, I'm a locksmith.' (Leslie Nielsen)

I suppose that I'd have to give myself a yellow card if I called you a stupid oaf so I won't

I did not attack the BBC on the basis of a false claim but the shoddy journalism in the whole article as the whole thing was poorly written as a few others have agreed and I guess that if I had posted under a different name you wouldn't even have bothered anyway

It's no excuse if it was based on a press release as the editorial staff have a duty to present press releases sensibly

As you would love an excuse to give me a yellow card I will try to be polite. I have no idea if you are an oaf but what you are claiming is untrue. This is what you wrote:-

"You have to read right to the end of the article before finding out that the boy had died which is absolutely shocking jounalism".

There is just no way of seeking to pretend that your reason for claiming this was "shocking jounalism" was anything other than that "the boy had died".

You didn't criticise the piece for "giving the impression that this boy had died" as your fan boy has suggested. Nor did you criticise it because "the shoddy journalism in the whole article as the whole thing was poorly written" as you have yourself claimed.

You did it because you thought that as the boy had died that "fact" ought to have appeared earlier. A fact that wasn't actually a fact.

Whether, or not, the piece was "shocking journalism" was totally beside the point. We all make errors and misunderstanding what the phrase "could have caused a severe injury and led to the boy's death" meant was one and is nothing to be ashamed about. Others did too.

What is inexcusable is the pin dancing trying to pretend that what you wrote meant something else. It didn't.

For the avoidance of doubt any comments in response to a previous post are directed to its ideas and not at any, or all, posters personally.

We have a post where WE complains about someone pin dancing.

I think I've just about read it all now.

He seems to be blaming ME and others, me included for taking one of two interpretations from a poorly written sentence.

Nothing ME wrote was 'inexcusable', that's utter nonsense.
This article is worthy of criticism and for some reason this poster doesn't seem to want to move on.

'Who are you and how did you get in here? I'm a locksmith. And, I'm a locksmith.' (Leslie Nielsen)