ANOTHER SPIN CYCLE - THE TWINS WANT MADDIE BACK

I haven't commented on the latest flurry of Madeleine stories, because to be honest, I was feeling a bit sorry for the main players.  Their world must be closing in on them, it's a bit like a car crash where you just don't want to look anymore.  Besides which, the stories are just more of the same thing we have been seeing on a regular basis for the past 9 years.  Madeleine is still missing and the McCanns are still looking and hoping and using their children as human shields.

I try not to pass judgment on other people's behaviour, but ffs, what is wrong with the very proactive family who surround the parents, that they are allowing those poor kids to be dragged into this mire of deceit?  Isn't there one among them with a sense of decency and conscience?  They are in it up to the necks, but the kids don't have to be.  If those kids have trust issues in their lives, the very proactive family will have only themselves to blame. 

Kate and Gerry know the public do not like them, so they are using the kids' names in the press releases to ward off criticism of themselves.  It is a cowardly thing to do, the twins are at an age where newspaper front pages can affect their lives, especially if they are mentioned by name.  

And using their children for sympathy is not new to them.  As soon as Kate and Gerry cottoned on how unpopular they were, they used Madeleine's name and face in earnest.  'It's about an innocent little girl' said the father, 'it's not about us' said the mother.  Now they are using the twins.  'They want their sister back' Kate tells us, because she knows the sad faces of herself and her husband are no longer tugging at our heart and purse strings.  

I probably wouldn't have commented, but I hate being manipulated, especially when it is so obvious.  It feels like an insult to my intelligence.  I felt like that in 2007 when Kate appeared at the Portimao police station with Cuddlecat strategically placed so that it peeked cutely out of the top of her rucksack as she went in for her interview.  Not to mention of course, her snazzy Madeleine badge - available at their newly opened online shop along with good quality wristbands.  

We are being manipulated again, the McCanns are keeping THEIR story on the front pages - they are probably building a defence and attempting to get the public back onside by using their children to gain sympathy.  Don't any of the adult family members want her back?  Those aware of all the facts and the implications of what they are saying? All those relatives who rushed out to join them at Warners' Resort?  

The latest news stories tell us that as this case draws to a close, the McCanns still have nothing from Operation Grange that clears them or suggests that Madeleine is still alive.  Kate believes Madeleine, is not a million miles from Portugal, not because the police have said so, but because it is where she feels closest to her.  We are led to believe that the parents are working with Operation Grange, and the McCanns have also told us that the investigation gave them hope.  Yet apart from the age progression picture when Operation Grange began, the police have given them nothing tangible to say in their defence.  And they have not been searching for a live child - there has never been any urgency to their investigations so the idea they have been looking for a live child is absurd.  Methinks the parents and the police are not reading from the same hymn sheet.

I don't think Operation Grange will end well for the McCanns.  Even if there are no arrests, the dark cloud will remain and the years ahead will be lined with civil actions.  They are eternal litigants, they can never walk away.  They also live with the risk that the pact can break at any time.  There are too many involved for this to remain a secret forever.  Relationships break down and change, consciences gnaw at the troubled in the wee small hours, driving them insane.  No-one can ever be certain what another might do.  Trust turns to hatred, dependence turns into a prison.  As long as they all have to rely on each other, their lives can't be anything other than a living hell. That they continue with it, is another 'unbelievable' to add to the ever growing list in this case.  Personally, I'd rather have cocktails with Fred and Rosemary West than that lot.