At a specially arranged press conference, a spokesman for the South Yorkshire Police issued a statement in response to former Sun Editor Kelvin MacKenzie's request to apologize for feeding him a lot of lies about the deaths of 96 Liverpool fans at Hillsborough in 1989.
"Although we admit we told a pack of lies to Mr MacKenzie about Liverpool fans' behaviour that Mr MacKenzie printed as "The Truth", it should be evident that not everything we say can be trusted to be accurate", said the spokesman, "because that would clearly limit our scope for telling porky pies in order to deflect attention from our own personnel's imcompetence. We need this latitude because sometimes the truth can hinder our ability to tell lies to the public so that they can trust us to tell the truth when it matters - usually years later and in secret"
"Besides which", continued the spokesman, "if we apologized to Mr MacKenzie now about us telling lies that he printed as the truth, how would he know we were sincerely telling him the truth that we were now genuinely apologetic?"
At this point the spokesman left, and the assembled reporters adjourned to the pub together to discuss whether the spokesman for the South Yorkshire police was telling the truth or not.
A few larger-than-usual filterless cigarettes were passed around, and as the cosmos revealed herself in all her glorious and terrible majesty, and the daisies in the fields turned all the colours of the rainbow and beyond, we agreed that truth and lies were somehow connected by the great wheels of karma tied to the axle of suffering.
Later several kebabs were eaten and body shots were drunk from the pierced navels of local fair maidens.
Life was good again. The Universe whirled around our heads as we headed home, safely protected by the noble South Yorkshire Police.
