Galloway on events in Iran

In the Daily Record on 15 June.

"Highlights" (though do read the whole thing):

You can count on the fact election was fair

I present two weekly shows for Iranian-owned Press TV.

This massive exercise took place without trouble of any kind [...]

The counting, too, was awesome.

[the disturbances] will soon fizzle out.

There's no other word for it. Galloway, who is still shilling for the Iranian regime even as it mounts a fascist coup against its own people, is scum.

Geroge Galloway and the Gaza convoy

- 'Call me Fidel.'
- 'Fuck off, fatboy.'

You may have heard about the convoy of vehicles driving from the UK to Gaza - they hope - in a blaze of self-publicity - they hope - carrying food and other aid for Gaza under the name Viva Palestine. It's a large convoy of vehicles, and an impressive undertaking.

Everyone's roughing it. Yvonne "Stockhausen Syndrome" Ridley* reports, at Socialist Unity -

This morning I expect many of us are bleary eyed as the convoy heads for Bordeaux - I know I am, after a sleepless night trying to find a comfortable position to sleep in a car seat...My eyes feel like sandpaper every time I blink...this 5000 mile trip from London to Gaza isn’t a jolly or five star vacation for any of us

Well...not everyone. Gorgeous George, obviously, isn't roughing it. The Independent reports:

You’ll find him at the head of the column, where the cameras can see him. Driving a Mercedes 4×4. This being George, he has a Winnebago motorhome in which to sleep while everyone else has to kip down in tents or in their cabs..."I do have to appear on television when we stop.”

And, inevitably -

He will actually fly back to London for three days a week, to host radio shows and his surgery as MP for Bethnal Green and Bow, while the others press on.

Nor is it all peace and love. Not that George would stir up already radicalised British Muslims. Oh no.

Most of those who are going with him are British Muslims. "If I had said to the youth, 'Right, break out the Kalashnikovs, we're heading for Palestine,' they would have been there. The people are boiling mad."....He goes further. "There is a kind of intifada among the youth. They are determined to act."

Lovely. Why do I suspect that if they were ever to really have their way - an event George no doubt fondly dreams of - 'the youth' would have him up against a wall sharp-ish?

H/T Harry's Place.

*Journalist > Taliban hostage > convert to Islam. Go figure.

Gallowayism of the week

A Friday quiz. George Galloway - pictured above relaxing with a wig-wearing Saddam Hussein in the good old days - has laid an early day motion bemoaning the lack of democratic rights in which Korean state:

a) that vast open air, starving gulag, North Korea; or

b) that successful modern democracy, South Korea?

In fact, I think you know the answer.

Galloway the thug

At today's press conference of hand-wringing 'slebs and politicos past their sell date called to 'demand' a cease-fire in Gaza, Gorgeous George declared:

"We will be very, very lucky if the explosions taking place in Gaza today don't blow up in our own face at some time in the future."

Am I paranoid in seeing that as a thinly-veiled threat made on behalf of his constituency of radicalised British Muslims?

Incidentally, the latest Respect leaflet on the matter, which includes a little homily from George, describes Hamas' actions (or 'resistance', natch) in firing rockets indiscriminately at Israeli civilians as 'entirely legitimate'. Just to run that past you again: a British MP considers that firing rockets targeted at Israeli civilians, with the aim of killing as many of them as possible, is 'entirely legitimate'. And that MP is considered to be 'left-wing'. Remind me, how did the British left get to this point?

Update: JMP's erudite readers will no doubt already be aware that Hamas' actions are not 'legitimate' under international law. Presumably, then, Respect believe that trying to kill Israeli civilians by rocket strikes is 'legitimate' according to some higher law. Perhaps they had in mind the Qu'ran's exhortations to kill Jews wherever they can be found?

A people's Woolies..for local people

That pus-filled spot on the face of the body politic, George Galloway, has come up with a slightly less objectionable idea than normal. Taking a break from shilling for the gay-killing Iranian regime, Gorgeous George suggests on the comrades' blog, Socialist Unity, that the Government should buy the stricken chain Woolworths. As economically sound as ever, he points out that it is a real bargain, as it's for sale for only a pound - "although", he bathetically if honestly points out, "there would be additional costs to keep it as a going concern". But then it does get a bit Royston Vasey:

"...the government could turn it into a people’s Woolies, employing local people, buying from local producers..."

Buying from local producers. Bless him. George trying the middle class language of localism and  sustainability - let's face it, it sounds like he wants Woolies to be a socialist farmers' market for hoodies - is like watching a dog riding a bicycle. It's eye-catching, though not done very well, but the miracle is that it is done at all.