Islamists step up campaign to stop Muslims voting
Not a smart move… what good does not voting do? You get to whinge about how you didn’t vote for the winner? But that’s not what caught my eye. It was the second paragraph here:
The extreme Islamist group accused of threatening George Galloway and hijacking a meeting of moderate Muslims is planning to step up its direct action campaign to stop fellow believers from participating in the election.
The Guardian can reveal that the gang of youths who stormed two election meetings this week are members of al-Ghuraaba, an offshoot of the now disbanded radical organisation al-Muhajiroun.
Emphasis mine. Can reveal? One must assume that before this radical organization was disbanded it was somehow preventing the Guardian from revealing anything about it? Perhaps all the Grauniad’s reporters were kidnapped by this now-defunct group and physically prevented from revealing anything about them?
Ok, I’ll admit that the can/may thing is a pet peeve of mine. But in this case, I’m not sure “may” is much better. Either way, I suspect that what they mean is: “we were too lily-livered to report on this until they went away".”
Yeah.. and I’m an American dissing Brits over improper use of English. Anyone have a problem with that?
Comment by Kathy K — 21 Apr, 2005 @ 22:59
Hmmm… I’ve always interpreted this “can reveal” phrasing to mean that they don’t actually know anything more about the subject but don’t want to admit their ignorance! I agree it’s a really awkward and annoying way to express anything. In fact, if I were the editor, I’d have chopped off the entire “the Guardian can reveal that” qualifier.
Comment by Carol Andrus — 22 Apr, 2005 @ 13:49
That phrasing has everything to do with UK law about disclosing information of anything involved with criminal prosecution; i.e., they may not publish much of anything about up-coming court actions until after the Crown Prosecution has completed the preliminary investigation, and then only to the extent of what is publicly known about the defendants.
The choice of wording has basically been crafted by The Lords sitting as the top appeals court.
Comment by MommaBear — 22 Apr, 2005 @ 15:21
Hhhmph. The Lords, then, should be ashamed of themselves for not knowing the difference between “may” (permission) and “can” (ability).
Comment by Kathy K — 22 Apr, 2005 @ 17:00