Tabloids elevate outrage level to red following Qatada compensation

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An artist's impression of the red mist that desdended over

Richard Littlejohn's eyes when he heard about Abu Qatada

Staff at the Daily Mail, the Daily Express, the Sun and several other UK newspapers are currently having apoplexy over the £2,500 award to a radical cleric for his incarceration by the government.

UK authorities are currently preparing to deport Muslim firebrand preacher Abu Qatada to Jordan, despite concerns that Saudi Arabia would do a much better job of torturing him. Qatada has been in prison or under house arrest since 2002, and the deportation ruling had pushed morale amongst firebrand right wing commentators to an all time high, and the outrage level to a record low.

However, the European Court of Human Rights stepped in and gave the cleric the cash because the long detention without trial had "breached his human rights." The outrage level was immediately pushed back up, and hit red by mid-morning.

Daily Mail editor Paul Dacre shat his pants when he heard the news and was forced to spend the rest of the day wearing a dress borrowed from his secretary. Sun political editor George Pascoe-Watson's head exploded and showered colleagues with pellets of spite, while his lifeless body attempted to throw itself out of the window.

Richard Littlejohn, usually the first to comment whenever anything happens that could be easily blamed on immigrants, was strangely silent for much of the morning. He was later found rocking back and forth in a London alley, repeating his trademark phrase "you couldn't make it up" over and over again as he stared up, shaking his fist at the sky.

Melanie Phillips was the most composed of Britain's outrage professionals. She immediately penned a story detailing how the legalisation of homosexuality in 1967 had directly led to the Abu Qatada case. However, she soon began foaming at the mouth and was led away by the men in white coats shortly afterwards.

Home Secretary Jacqui Smith said she was "very disappointed" by the Court's decision, but was pleased that it had distracted attention from the fact she is using tax payers money to buy scatter cushions.

"What we have here is a man who plotted to do something or other and sort of did some stuff and emailed some bloke in another country," she told reporters outside the Croydon branch of Ikea. "But the real issue is which of these cushions will match the sofa in my sister's house best? Are we talking the black and white stripes, or the purple swirl? I wish the bloody European Court would make a judgement on that. I've been dithering for hours."
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