Stop the War: Rally Permitted, More Cuts in Troops

Stop the War Coalition co-convenor Lindsey German told the Mirror that permission to assemble for today's protest was received just an hour before the off. Rt Hon Tony Benn had provided a supply of postcards, signed in his role as a Privy Counsellor, asking for all agents of the Crown to assist their bearers.

All involved will no doubt be chuffed, if not entirely sated, that Gordon has made a further troop cutting announcement, bringing numbers down in stages from 5,000 to just 2,500 from next Spring.

BBC News 24 had a bewilderingly badly thrown together "Breaking News" segment with interviews with a Mr Al-Chalabi who was formerly something in the British Iraqi community, and also a former SAS soldier. They ignored each others' points - the former saying GB's move should be reversed as Iraqi forces would be handing Southern Iraq over to Iran, while the latter was of a more respectable Troops Out ilk but claimed troops were going to the Iran border.

There is too much 24/7 news media straining for too little content. These were some of the worst calibre studio pundits in the worst round table discussion I've seen for a long time.

Meanwhile this Announcement in Parliament, as promised by Gordon Brown, did I think make the lie of the Tory Desert Storm over his making so-called new announcements on the hoof. He didn't do that. In fact he kept his own secret very well last week. the Tories wanted it both ways saying it was not an announcement and should have been not announced in parliament!

IMAGE: Nicked from Mirror.co.uk.