Losing v Not Winning

The McCanns will not lose in the damages trial in Lisbon. In fact, they cannot lose it.

Please read on – it's not what you are thinking.

Before you think we have turned our coats on the issue, we haven’t. Please read again what we have written.

Those words do not state a personal opinion. We’re stating a fact: the McCanns cannot lose as much as Mr Amaral cannot win.

The outcome for the McCann, as they are the plaintiffs, is only one of two: they either win or they don’t win.

The outcome for Mr Amaral, as he’s the defendant, is only one of the two: he either loses or he doesn’t lose.

For the McCanns there’s no losing, for Mr Amaral, no winning. For the first, the worst case scenario is them not winning, for the latter, the best case one is not to lose.

The action of a person swinging a hockey stick at another with the intent to cause damage has only one of two possible outcomes: the hockey stick makes physical contact or it doesn’t.

But each of either outcome represents different things to each of the participants: the one who swings, either hits the other or he doesn’t, and the other either gets hit or he doesn’t.

A miss, one of the 2 possible outcomes of the described action, means to one not hitting and to the other not getting hit.

The difference being that the hitter never runs the risk of getting hurt. Only the other person will or not feel the pain caused by that hockey stick. Only he runs the risk of getting hurt.

In the damages trial, the McCanns are the ones swinging the stick at GA. He is trying not to get hit with it. If he gets hit then the McCanns have won the process. If he doesn’t they have simply not won.  For Mr Amaral it’s only a question of losing, getting hit with the stick, or not losing, if the McCanns are unable to hit him with it.

It may seem only a question of being semantically precise but in this case it isn’t.

We have, like everyone else, made the mistake of frequently associating “to lose” with a possible outcome for the McCanns. For example, we have said that Team McCann has done all it can to assure that the McCanns to lose in Lisbon. We shouldn’t have said that but that they did all that was possible to do and all was done to assure that they didn’t win and that Mr Amaral didn’t lose.

This difference can be noted when saying “the McCanns are doing all they can to mitigate the damages from not winning their case in the trial in Lisbon” instead of “the McCanns are doing all they can to mitigate the damages from not winning their case in the trial in Lisbon”.

To mitigate damages from losing is logical while doing so for not winning sounds like pampering egos of spoiled children.

To heal a bruise from a hockey stick makes sense, to heal the ego of the one who strikes for having missed, doesn’t.

Those saying that the 01SEPT14 Sky News Report (SKR) is nothing but the McCanns in a Damage Control Process are stating they’re mitigating possible damages for not winning, for not having had their way, in the trial in Lisbon.

Let’s only look at this Damage Control Process under the assumption that it is what the McCanns are doing.

In this Damage Control Process the McCanns have apparently been able to muster at their convenience Sky News, The Telegraph, The Sun, a Pulitzer Prize Finalist, Anthony Bruce Summers, author of eight best-selling non-fiction books along with his working partner for more than twenty years, the author, investigative reporter and researcher Robbyn Swan and a former head of CEOP (Child Exploitation & Online Protection) Mr Jim Gamble, all to say that there was an overall British incompetency that significantly hampered Maddie’s Portuguese investigation.

A pretty serious accusation.

To convey this message the McCanns have simply gone and slandered – by involving them in this alleged incompetence – the UK Prime Minister, the Home Office, the Foreign & Commonwealth Office, the Metropolitan Police, Leiscestershire Police, SOCA (Serious Organised Crime Agency), CEOP, the NPIA (National Policing Improving Agency), ACPO (Association of Chief Police Officers) and Crimestoppers.

And it appears that all of the above, by their silence, seem to have acquiesced to having been incompetent. Not saying by not commenting on an unpublished report always leaves a cloak of suspicion as whenever one is wrongly accused of something one tends to react defensively. In this case, all opted for silence. We call it concurrence by silence.

So, according to the Damage Control Process defenders all of the above seem to have accepted being publicly humiliated simply to minimise possible damages that a Brit couple may suffer because they won’t have their way.

Please read again the relevance in society of those listed and ask yourself if it makes sense.

Plus, do remember that we’re speaking of possible damages. We have explained why we think there’s a possibility for the McCanns to win in the first instance court. Those assuming there’s no way Mr Amaral will lose – we hope sincerely they are right – should avoid counting chicks before the chicken has hatched the eggs.

If the McCanns win the case, what was the purpose of this slandering exercise? Shouldn’t they have waited for the unfavourable outcome first, and then put this up while they were appealing the decision?

But what are the damages exactly that are allegedly being mitigated by the McCanns in this Damage Control Process?

All those arising from the not being able to prove that Mr Amaral was responsible, directly or indirectly, for damages they claim they suffered from him.

Have we missed something? We welcome any correction.

If the decision says there wasn’t any damage caused to the couple then the mistake was to have taken the action in the first place and that means Mr Amaral has as much to do with this result as we do.

If the decision says that there was damage but Mr Amaral is not the one responsible for it, it’s all about the right of Mr Amaral expressing his opinion. A right already granted to him with the lifting of the banning of the book.

Will disgrace befall on the McCanns just because they took a swing at Mr Amaral and missed? It proves nothing against them and only proves that Mr Amaral is entitled to express his opinion and, like all opinions, it doesn’t necessarily represent truth. It may or it may not. It’s just an opinion. His opinion.

And the court will be simply saying he can voice it, independent of being ridiculous or not. It will be saying this and only this. Nothing else.

Any other reading about the court’s decision will be the sole responsibility of the subjective interpretation of each but, we repeat, is not that of the court.

However, whatever reading one makes of that decision one has to agree that to control the damages referred to, the mustering of the “forces” listed above is quite disproportional for the threat it represents. Like using WMD to kill a mouse in the pantry.

We remind readers that in case they don’t win, it won’t be the first time that has happened.

They have asked for the book to stop being commercialised and it is still on the stands. They did not win then. They won on 1st instance but later that victory would be taken away from them by the overturning of the decision by the Appeal Court.

So, as a relevant side note, whatever damage there may result, it can be nullified completely by the McCanns appealing. Mr Amaral did that against them, they can now do it against him. In case they don’t win, that is. The Damage Control Process can simply be an appeal with no need to slander British institutions and organisations.

This would conveniently delay any decision. Any decision from the Appeal Court would be somewhere late in 2015. And if it continues unfavourably for the McCanns they still have the Supreme Justice Court to use – which they did with the unfavourable decision regarding the book. So, all in all, without any slandering circus the McCanns are able to push the definite decision up until 2016 or later simply by following transparent legal procedures.

The fact is that the McCanns didn’t win the banning GA’s book brought evident damages to them. There was this physical object, available to all, stating that Maddie was dead and that her parents were active participants in the concealment of her body. That is pretty damaging for the McCanns.

In January 2010, there were UK headlines very damning for the McCanns. The 12JAN10 Telegraph said “Madeleine McCann's death 'covered up by parents who faked kidnap', court hears” and 13JAN10 Express wasn’t any kinder “Maddie 'died' in apartment, court hears”

Very damning headlines in a process that culminated in a very hurtful decision for the McCanns.

It seems to us that the damages suffered by the McCanns were far greater then than any they are to suffer now.

Then it was about an opinion, now it’s only about if the right given to voice it is superseded by the suffering to the parents it causes.

Then it was about a book that said their daughter was dead and they hid her body, now it’s only about realising that Mr Amaral is not the only person responsible for their pain.

They survived 2010. Confronted with very damning accusations, the damage control they did then was effective. Why not apply now the same formula to damages of a lesser degree? Plus, we don’t remember then any slandering campaign against UK institutions and organisations to distract and mitigate.

Then they simply used a very friendly media.

Not many, even among the case dwellers, remember the final decision about the banning of the book came in 2011. Most people think the Appeals Court’s decision late 2010 was the final one but it wasn’t. The final one came from the Supreme Justice Court to which the McCanns appealed after the unfavourable decision from the Appeal Court. The Supreme Justice Court upheld the lower court’s decision in allowing the book to be sold.

Why don’t people know this? Because both unfavourable decisions weren’t news. At least not in UK. The McCanns had the media fully on their side and they used it.

The UK MSM practically ignored the Appeal Court decision. The Supreme Justice Court’s decision was simply not reported at all in UK.

When Mr Amaral was told he could no longer sell his book it was headlines in UK but when the McCanns were told that this was no longer so, the same media simply ignored this.

And in the modern world, damages are only damages if the media says they are damages. Unreported damages aren’t damages at all.

So it would be sufficient as damage control for the UK MSM to ignore an unfavourable decision against the McCanns. It would be shameless but it would be something they have already done.

And if they must report it, then the couple shouldn’t have anything to worry about from a friendly media.

They would put headlines like:

COURT ALLOWS BLUNDERING COP TO SLANDER McCANNS

HAVEN’T THEY HAD ENOUGH? COURT SAYS COP CAN CONTINUE TO LIE

PILING NEEDLESS PAIN ON THE McCANNS

COPPER’S OPINION WORTH MORE THAN PARENTS’ PAIN SAYS COURT

“I JUST CANNOT UNDERSTAND!” CRIES KATE

Want more possibilities? Nothing we haven’t read in these past 7 years. Not so much so for the past year and a half. But we will get to that later.

Another argument to demonstrate that it makes no sense to say the SKR is not the McCanns in damage control is the fact they always had the possibility to stop things at any moment in time.

Once the book ban was lifted, logic indicated that it emptied out all arguments in which damage to the McCanns by Mr Amaral should be punished even if he was the only person responsible for their suffering. If the system allowed Mr Amaral to freely express his opinion, the same system can’t punish the consequences of that opinion being expressed. Simple straightforward logic.

It makes no sense for a justice system to allow an opinion and then punish one for having it.

Once the book ban was lifted, the McCanns lost their damages claim. Team McCann has brilliant lawyers on their payroll but there’s only so much that a brilliant lawyer can do. Even brilliant lawyer Pinto de Abreu advised the McCanns to come clean because he knew it was the only way out of this.

We are convinced Team McCann realised the moment the Supreme Justice Court confirmed the Appeal Court’s decision that they were fighting a battle they couldn’t possibly win. Yet they continued. We have explained our opinion about this and that is that of May 2011 the McCanns are being agonisingly slowly being taken like lambs to slaughter.

In January 2013, Team McCann offered Mr Amaral an agreement. Mr Amaral refused. That moment would have been the appropriate one to drop the case, if they really wanted to really do any damage control. To do it by anticipation.

A friendly MSM would spin things favourably for the McCanns. And yet they continued. Apparently not afraid of damage even faced with the possibility for success would be little or nil.

Let’s recap what we have said up to now:

- The McCanns will only not win process, not lose it.

- We can’t see any relevant damages coming from an unfavourable decision.

- If they do face an unfavourable decision they have legal procedures to “empty out” damages of said decision

- They have already overcome a much more serious “not winning” situation against the same opponent and about the same issue.

- A friendly media assures no damage to the McCanns even if there is any.

- They had the opportunity to drop the case or not even have started it.

Based on this one has to ask if there really is a need to do any damage control at the moment and the answer is clearly that there isn’t.

But even if the answer was they do, then one must ask if the damage at stake are such that it requires involving – in a very negative way – the UK Prime Minister, the Home Office, the Foreign & Commonwealth Office, the Metropolitan Police, Leiscestershire Police, SOCA, CEOP (and Jim Gamble), NPIA, ACPO, Crimestoppers, Anthony Bruce Summers and Robbyn Swan to control them.

The answer seems very clear to us, unless one thinks it’s appropriate to swat a fly with an aircraft carrier, the damage to be expected isn’t.

But the beauty of all this is that by saying that the SKR is the McCanns on a Damage Control Process it only helps to prove our point: the McCanns are weak.

To resort to the SKR as damage control is because they fear damage. Something they apparently didn’t when the situation was much more adverse than it is now. If one reads all of the above the McCanns should feel more than comfortable with a negative decision by the court but even to those defending SKR to be a McCann manoeuvre it’s evident they are far from feeling that way.

Even those who think this is a McCann initiative have to recognise that the McCanns have never been this fragile.

Why? What has happened that has changed the McCanns from the almighty ones of 2010 to the 2014 fearful ones?

Where is the friendly press on which the McCanns could always rely on? We have a certainty and that is Sky News and The Times have defected.

Why is everyone so sure that the McCanns have anything to fear from the court’s decision? Back in 2010, the McCanns confirmed all their above-the-law status they had gained back in 2007/2008 after surviving incomprehensibly the arguido status.

Where are the 2010 McCanns now in 2014?

Some say that they know they are going down and are trying to drag as many as they can with them. The question that has to be asked is why are they going down? Where and when did the tide turn against them? Because things just don’t happen because they happen. They happen for a reason.

We will be waiting for someone to tell us when and what made the Establishment turn against the couple to the point of them feeling the need to come up with something like the SKR.

If they are doing damage control it is because they fear damage.

We say the SKR was a finger pointed in the direction of the powerless McCanns showing them with absolute clarity that things have taken a turn for the worse for them, we think we have explained ourselves quite adequately with our post “Sky News – The Clarifying Report”.

To those thinking that SKR is part of a whitewashing then one must ask Anthony Summers to return the cheque because it seems he has paid a very poor service to that cause with his book.

About Summers & Swan latest piece of literature - which we won't buy - it seems to confirm our suspicions: a Streisand effect move, only in this case intentional. Not on the part of Summers obviously but by whoever commissioned this piece of...

The literary treasure on Maddie

However, we must say that this piece of... is proving to be much more useful than we ever antecipated.