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Continue reading →: Back to Warsaw for Shabbat
One of the Jewish members of our group evoked an embarrassed laugh this morning as we walked into the Jewish cemetery in Kielce. "Another perfect day; let's go visit some dead Jews", he said. It was dark humour to relieve the tension of an emotional week. At times, this tour has…
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Continue reading →: Kraków and Kielce
After all the death and despair we have reviewed this week it was good to be regular tourists this morning. We visited the Wawel, seat of Polish kings. We toured the Royal Cathedral, of which John Paul II was formerly the bishop. We enjoyed the largest and, in my opinion…
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Continue reading →: An icon of genocide
Auschwitz is the German name for Oświęcim in Poland. To the majority of its inhabitants before the Second World War, it was known by its Yiddish name, Oshpitzin. Because of the notorious concentration camp, Oświęcim's main industry is now – as the unpleasant jargon has it – "necrotourism". The number of visitors on…
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Continue reading →: To Krakow, via beauty and horror
Museum-Memorial Site in Bełżec. We started our day in Zamość, visiting the synagogue there restored by the Foundation organising my tour. The Polish state has handed back such sites in the 1,200 places where there were Jewish communities in Poland before the Holocaust. There are now 10 places where Jews live…
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Continue reading →: The road of life
This is not a jolly tour by its nature, though the people on it are mostly happy sorts. When we visit a site (like the Yeshiva at Lublin, pictured) we are glad it survives but sad the people it once served are gone. When we visit a death camp like…
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Continue reading →: On the Polish road without Speranza
Tributes to the fallen of the Warsaw Uprising on the streets after the recent anniversary I couldn't spare the time to drive on this trip to I am reduced to planes and coaches. I am touring Poland for the next nine days with an organisation called The Foundation for the…
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Continue reading →: Travelling broadens the mind again
Speranza took me last week to another place I have never been before. Cornwall. I know my home islands quite poorly, having spent twenty years abroad. If I had thought of Cornwall before, it was because of Rick Stein or Poldark or the dim notion that there was another set…
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Continue reading →: En voyage
If you get out of this blogging habit, it's hard to get back in. Time was, I would have meticulously taken a photo at the start of this trip and then logged each stop. I am more relaxed these days. Sorry. I am on one of my favourite runs –…
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Continue reading →: A libertarian says “think of the children” in calling for less law
Discussions of "sexting" in the media and on websites advising young people and their parents, focus on the risks to teenagers of being coerced, blackmailed or subjected to "revenge porn". There is another, perhaps worse, risk from the criminal justice system. Firstly, the law on this subject is very badly…
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Continue reading →: Of Cowardice in the face of unreason
Our cowardice helped to allow this attack | The Times. I am coming out of retirement as a political blogger for one day to say, firstly, that je suis Charlie. I want to add my small voice to the condemnation of the murders in Paris yesterday. I want to…
THE LAST DITCH
Your blogger
Tom is a retired international lawyer. He was a partner in a City of London law firm and spent almost twenty years abroad serving clients from all over the world.
Returning to London on retirement in 2011, he was dismayed to discover how much liberty had been lost in the UK while he was away.
He’s a classical liberal (libertarian, if you must) who, like his illustrious namesake, considers that
“…government even in its best state is but a necessary evil; in its worst state an intolerable one.”
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The Last Ditch by Tom Paine 
I’m sure there are a few fire and brimstone types they could have had instead of a woke woman. Putting…