Ken Livingstone's clash of civilisations

It's not enough for our Mayor to attempt to run a city, he also feels the need to run his own foreign policy department. I'm not sure how the war on terror relates to getting the trains to run on time (except that it might stop terrorists getting on our trains in the first place), but it's great publicity for Ken Livingstone which is more to the point.

I'm pleased to see that his propaganda efforts have not been quite the success he hoped for. At his highly publicised debate, A World Civilisation or a Clash of Civilisations? his opponents Oliver Kamm and Daniel Pipes gave him a good run for his money. And apparently, they had support from about half the audience.

There is more coverage here by Adloyada.

But the best comment of the day is from Harry's Place relating to the prayer rooms provided by the conference:

Publicly funded child care was apparently available at the event, along with other necessary facilities - two gender-segregated "prayer rooms":

Male Prayer Room – Shelley Room (4th Floor)
Female Prayer Room – Wordsworth Room (4th Floor)

I'm sure that Shelley, who was famously expelled from Oxford for writing a pamplet entitled The Necessity of Atheism, would have been amused.