In stiches about Kate and William
A souvenir kit featuring knitting patterns for 10 “characters” from William and Kate’s wedding bemused some commentators. “This will have to be a short article. With only 49 days to go until April 29, I have 1,000 hours of hard work ahead if I am going to get my souvenir finished in time,” said Cassandra Jardine in The Daily Telegraph. “Now that we know the secret of Prince William’s toothy smile — chain stitch — and the corgis’ alert ears — size 2.25 needles — there will be no stopping us ... It’s enough to make the hands shake.”
Anger flares over poppy fine
The £50 fine handed out on Monday to Emdadur Choudhury, a Muslim extremist who burnt two large plastic poppies during a two-minute silence on Remembrance Day, provoked debate about whether he had been treated too leniently.
“Seems a bit off, doesn’t it, a fine of just £50 for the outrage he caused by burning poppies and chanting during a two-minute silence that UK soldiers were murderers, rapists and terrorists,” wrote Martin Brunt on Sky’s Life of Crime blog.
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Charlotte Gore in The Guardian disagreed, arguing that we must tolerate such actions for the sake of freedom of speech. “We need to be less quick to add to the growing list of exceptions to freedom of expression and more wary of the consequences of pandering to populist sentiment,” she wrote.
The Daily Express’s Chris Roycroft-Davis was less forgiving. “I am filled with contempt for anyone who can say this: ‘I don’t have any respect for British soldiers and if they lose a limb or two in Afghanistan then they deserve it’,” he raged.