The Phoenix-like rise of Red Ed

In July 2011, I wrote a article called “Ed Miliband’s Biggest Mistake” which argued that the “Red Ed” nick name was a blessing, not a curse. My main point was that only through gaining the attention of the media can you then get your message across. Miliband had rejected the image that the journalists tried to construct for him. As a result he made himself a boring subject to write about, so they didn’t write about him.

Although the article was prominent and caused some conversation, Miliband soon asserted that he wanted to occupy the middle ground and be seen to do so. “Red Ed” was the last thing he needed to win a general election. Or so he thought.

What would a jury make of Assad?

Sarin is invisible, odourless and deadly in tiny amounts. The best way to detect it in your surroundings is to note that you’ve have just shit and pissed yourself, and are now choking to death as your own throat muscles contract.

If a terrorist group decided to crop dust London, they might consider that in agriculture, a crop duster would cover an area of about 1.5 square miles per day. Since London is 700 square miles, that would require 467 crop dusters. This is not such a brilliant terrorist plot since the planes could easily be shot down.

However, since Sarin is heavier than air, it naturally falls to ground level, so the terrorists could fly far higher and rely on gravity to take the poison to the quarry. Therefore we could crop dust London using jumbo jets to deliver nerve agent in industrial quantities, and wipe out 8 million people. This may be possible with as few as a dozen aircraft covering the capital in a vector grid.