Tony Jones, Tariq Ramadan, and questions, so many questions ...

(Above: Tariq Ramadan, Contemporary Islamic Studies, Oxford University, on the ABC's Lateline).

Well having taken the vow of holiday silence, what else to do but break it when confronted by the riches on view in Tony Jones' interview with Tariq Ramadan on Lateline, with the transcript now available under the header Changing Osama stories 'bizarre': Ramadan.

What was bizarre was the interview, because Jones had questions, and so did Ramadan. All he had was questions. Everybody was asking questions:

And look at what is happening now in the Muslim majority countries, is that all the people are asking questions.

There were questions about 9/11, there were questions about Osama, there were questions about Obama, there were questions about the killing, there were questions upon questions. There were even questions about the questions, questioning the questions:

TARIQ RAMADAN: ... I don't have a - you know, between the conspiracy theory on one side and everything it should be clear on the other side, in between still there are lots of questions. There was no independent, you know, inquiry about what happened, and still now there are questions to be raised. And the first questions that we have is about what happened two days ago. So I think that ...

Naturally Jones asked questions about the questions:

TONY JONES: No, can I just interrupt you there. We'll just stick with September 11 for the moment because are you saying there are still questions about what happened there? Because you were quite equivocal about this 10 years ago when you were first asked about it. You said, "Perhaps bin Laden is a useful bugbear, like Saddam Hussein." What did you mean by that?

And all he got was questions to the questions:

TARIQ RAMADAN: No, the first reaction that you are talking about is the week after, when we, for example, heard that with all what happened, we find two passports almost completely clean and with nothing, and I think, "OK, what's that?" I had questions, yes, with silly people leaving a car in a car park with things in Arabic when we all know that the pilots are reading things in English.

A whole interview and nary an answer to all the many and sundry questions, though it's fair to say that there were plenty of obfuscations and insinuations.

I don't think, while packing, that I've come across a better example of the question as answer technique that now runs rife through daily discourse. It's exceptionally handy in every situation. I'm not saying the earth is flat, but surely there should be questions and a debate or a discussion. I'm not saying that creationism is valid, but surely we should be asking how people can manage to speak two languages without the help of god. And it's essential in climate change. I'm not saying that the Arctic ice isn't melting, but what does it all mean.

As a result, the desire to talk back to the interviewer and the interviewee at various moments became overwhelming, but the pair of wretches gave no indication that they'd heard the pond's incisive and witty interjections.

Naturally they were in the form of questions:

Did Osama spend well over a decade taunting the USA over his mass murders, by way of video and sound recording and interviews?

Did Obama, like various US presidents before him, vow to take him out, dead or alive, come what may?

Well there's only one kind of answer to questions like that, and if we may borrow from another part of Professor Ramadan's interview, when he's talking about Afghanistan, it runs like this:

TARIQ RAMADAN: We don't know. Who knows about that? Who knows about that? Who knows about that?

TONY JONES: You don't know about that; is that what you're saying?

Oh okay, it's naughty to apply a quote to another area, but surely the point is that no none can know anything when it comes to the crunch. After all, the key point is to question:

TARIQ RAMADAN: And how can you explain yourself today that he was not so far from Islamabad for five years and the Americans and the Pakistani people not knowing about it. These are questions - we are legitimate to ask these questions and to say, "Look, at the end of the day, ..."

TONY JONES: They are certainly - they are certainly legitimate questions.

Yes, indeed, they're legitimate questions, just don't look at an ABC interview expecting any answers.

Yep, as we wait for Qantas to ready the plane - it's not the airline it once was - it suddenly seemed to us that the ABC isn't the broadcaster it once was.

Why is that? Well we'll just have to leave that question dangling in the ether ...

(Below: is that Tony Jones below? Well it's certainly a legitimate question).