It must have been a grim weekend for some.

First came the news that just 10 days after it came on line the £3.6bn Large Hadron Collider has fallen to bits and the experiment is officially over until such a time as they can make certain parts functional again.

Then the realisation came that Britain's response to last weeks economic crisis was nowhere near as crafty or clever as first thought.

In sport the UK was relegated out of tennis' world league and in golf Nick Faldo's team was soundly thumped by the Americans in the Ryder Cup.

This long roll call of the failure clearly caused the Brits to throw a bit of a sulk and they responded with a story about a father who killed his two young daughters before hanging himself. Although tragic, events like this happen on almost a monthly basis in 21st century Britain so I have to wonder why this particular one warranted such coverage.

From a metaphorical perspective it's quite clear and represents something of a mixed blessing because on a plus side it demonstrates that the state has finally accepted that the Bristol Abuse Case can never have a successful outcome and can only be discussed in a past tense where the participants will only suffer misery before dying

However on a negative note the use of a murder story rather then a justifiable homicide story only serves to demonstrate that the state has yet to understand why the Bristol Abuse Case was such a bad idea from the start. It also indicates that the state is once again going to allow a misguided notion of vengeance to stand in the way of real progress, something which does not bode well for the nation.