Foie Gras is no more or less evil than any other farming method, and it's bloody lovely! (twice a year, couldn't eat it frequently)

I suspect that many who consider the production of foie gras to be atrocious still eat eggs, say, that are battery produced.

My early vote for this as the Most Bizarre Claim 2014, and the Biggest Thread Drift 2014 simultaneously. (Unless they stuff the goose somewhere I don't know about).

It wasn't Standee who brought the conversation around to fine dining and, then, to foie gras.

And I'd make him right: anyone who imagines that gavage on, say, a really decent farm, is somehow worse than battery and factory farming – with the millions of animals that go through that process – is bonkers.

He said "than ANY OTHER FARMING METHOD". And you say he's right.

Wanna read it again?

Anyway, back to the plot. Is it right that DLT should face retrial after the last multi-charge fiasco? Or is it fair enough that he gets another session of gavage?

There are times when I can see the argument that there should be a retrial but this surely isn't one of them; a jury has had to sit through weeks of all the details and has acquitted on nearly all charges, and not found sufficient evidence to convict either absolutely or by majority on the remaining two. Given his acquittal on the large majority of charges, which should never have been brought, his age, and the huge impact the charges of which he was innocent have already caused on his life, I don't see the justice in letting the CPS have a second crack. Surely he's been punished enough already, even while not found guilty of any wrongdoing?

Okay – it's probably slightly more cruel than growing mung beans – although those beans have feelings too: you can hear them scream if you listen carefully as they're ripped from the ground.

Meh. I was the first and only person ever to point out on these very boards that these so called vegetarians are nothing more than sizeist. They are in fact happy to murder billions of life-forms by boiling their veg, (ripped from the ground, as you rightly point out, without anaesthetic) just as long as the lifeforms are microscopic and can't be seen. If bacteria were the size of hamsters, would they do it? No they wouldn't. Bleedin' 'ypocrites, the lot on 'em.

Its all becoming a bit of joke - Seems to me that the CPS are determined to get one of their very ropey cases to actually stick, so to stop people from questioning whether all these cases are worth the taxpayer's expense.

What I'm most intrigued to see, is what actual sentence DLT will get if found guilty for what is, basically, feeling a woman's boob without consent - If common sense is applied, it will be a small fine. Anything more will just be a knee jerk reaction to all the media circus that has been created with all these cases.

With that in mind, is all this expense really worth such a minor offence??

This is very true, two minor assault charges that would no doubt result in a Magistrates case, a fine, a disciplinary case at his place of work and possibly dismissal if it wasn't the first time.

Its obvious that the CPS have dug a very deep hole for themselves now, if these two charges do not stick then questions need to be asked of the director's recent statement to the effect that historical sex abuse allegations will be persued and prosecuted to a different level of proof than that of, say, a robbery with no witness or physical or forensic evidence.