Saddam Hussein’s favourite MP has become a media darling. He was hardly off our screens last week. Many news broadcasters decided to put his Senate testimony at the top of their news bulletins last Tuesday – relegating the Queen’s Speech to item two. [Tony Blair’s programme for government was relegated to item three on the increasingly tabloid ITV news – behind Galloway and Kylie Minogue].
The reasons for Galloway’s celebrity status are many. First and foremost Mr Galloway undoubtedly provides good telly. He’s charismatic. He’s always got something to say. And, unlike much of the grey political establishment, he doesn’t mince his words. His anti-war stance also appeals to Britain’s old media and their obsessive determination to undermine British participation in the war on terror.
Michael Moore Conservatives, warped by their hatred for Tony Blair have even started to like George Galloway.
In America’s Weekly Standard, Christopher Hitchens provides some welcome reminders as to why no conservative could honestly sympathise with Mr Galloway. Putting aside all of the suggestions of dodgy financial deals, here are five killer facts about the socialist with a fancy villa in Portugal:
> Galloway once said that the worst day of his entire life was when the Soviet Union fell.
> He recently wrote that: “just as Stalin industrialised the Soviet Union, so on a different scale Saddam plotted Iraq's own Great Leap Forward.”
> On greeting Saddam, the mass murderer of Kurds, Mr Galloway fawned: "Sir, I salute your courage, your strength, your indefatigability."
> He was expelled from the Labour Party after encouraging the Iraqi insurgency to mount a jihad against British troops.
> The extreme Socialist Workers Party provided the grassroots activism that helped him win the Bethnal Green & Bow constituency from Labour’s Oona King.
Hitchens attacks Galloway for defending dictatorships abroad and for trading religious sectarianism at home and concludes:
”Within a month of his triumph in a British election, he has flown to Washington and spat full in the face of the Senate. A megaphone media in London, and a hysterical fan-club of fundamentalists and political thugs, saw to it that he returned as a conquering hero and all-round celeb. If only the supporters of regime change, and the friends of the Afghan and Iraqi and Kurdish peoples, could manifest anything like the same resolve and determination.”
Whilst it may be true to say "The extreme Socialist Workers Party (SWP) provided the grassroots activism that helped him win..." their continued support for Mr Galloway is far from clear.
Writing recently in Weekly Worker, Tina Becker says:
"The April 30 issue of Socialist Worker makes a feeble attempt to convince SWP members with a double-page spread that Respect’s success can be compared to Keir Hardie being elected to parliament in 1892: 'Now, with Respect standing in West Ham and neighbouring East Ham, the radical tradition of breaking new ground - seeking to represent those who don’t have a voice that can truly speak for them in parliament - lives on,' writes Tash Shifrin.
"Even she must have felt a tad cheeky when she wrote about the social unrest, increasing number of strikes and working class action that went on at the time - be it the protests over unemployment and home rule for Ireland or the 1888 strike by match girls at the Bryant and May factory in Bow. Quite clearly, these were struggles that symbolised the rebirth of the working class as a subjective force in British politics. What we are seeing today, however, is the political shift of a small section of the population that is defined first and foremost not by class, but by ethnic identity and religion.
"Clearly, these articles are attempts by those SWPers who are very keen on Respect to convince those in the SWP who are not so keen. The sect-culture in the SWP unfortunately prevents the membership from engaging in honest and open debate about the future of their organisation. Opposition or scepticism is ‘dealt with’ locally or regionally. Members have no opportunity to discuss their views in Socialist Worker or Socialist Review. Factions are only allowed three months before annual conference and limited to contributions in the very rare Pre-conference bulletin, which often only turn up on members’ doorsteps on the day of conference. We have written many times that without any internal democracy, effective opposition can only be expected at a leadership level."
Posted by: Cllr Graham Smith | 23 May 2005 at 06:13
Galloway and other such "creatures of the light" thrive in the spotlight of public attention, at whatever level of government they occupy. Please turn it off.
They are committed to the comfort of the niche they have established for themselves, and the outspoken, reckless language of minority opposition that will always attract just enough support to preserve it.
This is not the behaviour of public service.
Posted by: Robin M | 23 May 2005 at 08:33
Interesting comment. Let's try replacing the first word of your comment with another phrase and see whether it has a ring of truth about it?
"Michael Howard and the established Parliamentary Party are committed to the comfort of the niche they have established for themselves, and the outspoken, reckless language of minority opposition that will always attract just enough support to preserve it."
Hmm...Posted by: Cllr Graham Smith | 23 May 2005 at 09:18
First off, I believe you are wrong about Galloway in many "facts" you cite... Some of them are simply not true... Secondly, he came here to face the allegations that were brashly put before the world without a morsel of truth behind them... HE WAS DEFENDING HIMSELF!!... you guys just hate anything not republican huh?
Posted by: ck | 24 May 2005 at 03:16
"First off, I believe you are wrong about Galloway in many "facts" you cite..."
Care to offer any evidence for this assertion?
Posted by: James Hellyer | 24 May 2005 at 20:48
I believe that the Americans have more on Galloway, than the documents they produced. Why was Galloway so nervous as the questions were about to start. I watched the whole thing on Sky News. He moved about in his chair constantly, was almost in tears, and repeatedly drank from his water. I think they were testing him. At one point he actually slipped up and admitted that his Arab business freind had given him money. He suddenly went very quiet, and white in the face, as if he knew that he might have slipped up.
He says we shouldn't judge without the evidence. That is true. But the man protests too much, and something is very wrong about his dealings concerning Iraq. What is the bet that we see him before the Senate again?
Posted by: Eleanor Charnley | 26 May 2005 at 23:46
I am an expat in LA, but voted in the Bethnal Green and Bow seat for "Gorgeous George" for three reasons:
1) He had the best hope of unseating Blair's odious trained FemiNazi, Oooona King
2) The Tory candidate had as much hope as Frank Bruno when he fought Tyson
3) Galloway is pro-life
Clearly he is a buffoon and probably was on the take from Saddam Hussein, but what the heck, it was worth it to raise the spectre of the 1970's left wing to the British public and simultaneously embarrass Tony Blair
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