Savage Verdict

I liked Boris Johnson's opinion piece in the Telegraph today where he attacked Jaqui Smith's decision to list Michael Savage on a list of people 'banned' from entering the UK. Savage seems like a fairly nasty piece of work, but nobody seriously thinks that a visit from him would put anyone at risk, do they? As I said about Canada's exclusion of Galloway, this seems to be a case of using laws 'to send a message'. I think that's a bad idea. I think it makes people take the law less seriously.

Can you think of a case where law is sensibly used to 'send a message' rather than serving a directly practical purpose?