Reblogged from Tendance Coatesy:

Anders Behring Breivik's conviction was greeted with quiet dignity in Norway.

The killings shook many of us to the very marrow.

How good people react to tragedy should be an example to us all. 

I merely note one of the many links we have with this wonderful country and its people:

The Trafalgar Square Christmas tree has been an annual gift to the people of London by the city of Oslo each year since 1947 as a token of gratitude for British support of Norway during the Second World War.

Short but good post from Andrew Coates about the Anders Breivik verdict. It has been very depressing to hear British commentators like Andrew Neil bemoaning the ‘soft’ sentence of an initial 21 years, as if the authoritarian right in the UK are in a position to offer any advice on penal policy when they have been setting the agenda for a generation here to such deleterious effect. I also think it’s excellent that Breivik wasn’t declared insane. Again, many on the right who know that his politics aren’t a million miles away from the likes of the EDL were desperate for him to be declared mad. That way, they could avoid some uncomfortable questions about the intellectual climate that the far and hard right creates. A climate where the delusional fantasies regarding ‘cultural Marxism’ and ‘multiculturalism’ are allowed to fester, eventually manifesting themselves in a lone gunman murdering dozens at a social democratic youth camp. The Norwegians are to be congratulated on their level-headed, rational response to this atrocity. We in the UK could take a few lessons from them.