In the Lords, he became a fixture of the bar, always the centre of a disparate group of fellow peers, from right and left.
In 1970, Fitt was one of a disparate group of leaders of the Catholic community, including John Hume, Austin Currie, Paddy Devlin and the Protestant Ivan Cooper, who came together to form the Social Democratic and Labour party (SDLP).
Bin Laden and his senior associates have long struggled to make sure the disparate elements of the group and its various affiliated networks only attack targets they consider as legitimate.
We all benefit if the system is just; directly if we are involved with the civil or criminal courts, and indirectly if our disparate society has confidence that a fair deal is possible through law.
He now leads an opposition coalition, the People's Alliance, comprised of three disparate political parties - his own People's Justice party, the Islamic party PAS and the secular, largely Chinese-based Democratic Action party – which won a record number of parliamentary seats and five of the state governments in the March 2008 polls.
As things stand in the evil empire, these two very disparate rebel factions – Wolves are bankrolled by Volkwagen whereas Gladbach have followed Dortmund's blueprint to grow organically, by sheer virtue of employing a superb coach in Lucien Favre and very good players – are both only four points adrift.
It seems pretty inconceivable that this disparate band of parties could be part of a workable alliance, making the Labour-SNP option or a second election a surer bet.
And is the future a group of disparate networks working on common standards rather than the big systems we associate with a more monolithic national health service?
"We caveat this data – we have been for decades, cautioning individuals and organizations from drawing conclusions from it, because we recognize it is incomplete data, it is disparate data that leaves too many holes and gaps," Morris said.
She said this undermined the claim of media commentators that voters no longer wanted to be governed by the main parties and would prefer a more disparate system.
In the interim, the charismatic leader stitched together the disparate opposition and worked feverishly to tempt coalition members across the floor of the house with the ultimate aim of bringing down the government.
