Great men of our times
George Galloway ("Gorgeous")
Gorgeous has run foul of the permanent subcommittee of investigations of the US Senate.
Their conclusion is non-equivocal: -
Despite Galloway’s denials, the evidence obtained by the Subcommittee, including
Hussein-era documents from the Ministry of Oil and testimony from senior Hussein officials,
shows that Iraq granted George Galloway allocations for millions of barrels of oil under the Oil
for Food Program. Moreover, some evidence indicates that Galloway appeared to use a charity
for children’s leukemia to conceal payments associated with at least one such allocation. Lastly,
according to senior Hussein officials, the oil allocations were granted by Iraq because of
Galloway’s support for the Hussein regime and his opposition to U.N. sanctions.
The full report is available here.
You will recall that Gorgeous listed beating the Telegraph (a UK paper) in a libel trial as one of his great achievements of the year. (See this article) Anyway, it seems that even that 'achievement' is a lie. The Telegraph recently won the right to appeal against that verdict, and, as they say, it ain't over till the fat lady sings. Incidentally, if you hadn't guessed, the alleged libel perpetrated on gorgeous by the Telegraph had something to do with Saddam and oil vouchers...
David Blunkett (aka The Bonkster) with his Bonkee
Blunkett is presumably a follower of the school of thought which holds that all women are beautiful in the dark. Yes, he's back in government. Never gave up his free house, and now (blind) Mr Blunkett will take charge of pushing through reforms of Incapacity Benefit - an issue which has provoked backbench Labour rebellions in the past. Not that he himself is particularly worried about incapacity benefit or pensions...
Beverley Hughes
The headlines when she resigned in April 2004 ran: -
Immigration Minister Beverley Hughes has resigned after admitting she "unwittingly" misled people about a suspected visa scam.
She's also described as a "close friend" of the bonkster.... Whooo Hooo!
Anyway, she's back. Her kindest critics last time said that she was just overworked, not telling porkies, so now she's going to look after all your children. Kind of a new nanny for the bonkster?
Shaun (sic) Woodward. MAN OF THE PEOPLE
Yup, a man for all seasons and all political parties. If the TBCs won't make you a minister, try ZNL. He quit the TBCs in December 1999 saying "New millenium, New Party, New Labour!" (OK, so I made that up, but he should have.) Now he's a junior minister in Northern Ireland reporting to Peter Hain. Great!
Peter Hain, leader of the Stop the Seventy Tour
In 2001, secret government documents published under the 30-Year Rule revealed that Peter Hain had been under surveillance in 1970.
Harold Wilson's government had even considered charging him with seditious conspiracy for threatening to disrupt the proposed cricket tour.
Hain now denies he ever dug up cricket pitches, he says he just sat on them, but that's not my memory...
[In fairness it should be pointed out that the famous incident when the Headingley pitch was dug up in the middle of the test match against Australia back in 1975 was nothing to do with apartheid protests, or Mr. Hain. It was, in fact, a "Free George Davis" protest and one Peter Chappell got 18 months for it. A year later Davis was in fact freed, but two years after that got 15 years for robbing a bank (again).]
Anyway, he's now going to sit in Stormont and meet lots of people who have been, or are, under surveilance. He should feel right at home.
Lord Drayson. Smallpox baron
This guy's an expert on procurement, and no, I don't mean for immoral acts. He got the smallpox vaccine contract from HMG (£32,000,000 thank you very much) even though he was just a middleman acting for the Dutch manufacturers. That one cost him a 50 grand bung to ZNL. Then he became a peer. That one seems to have cost him a cool half mil. Now he's a junior minister in the ministry of defense. If it were up to me I'd put him in charge of procurement.
Stop press. According to the Ministry of Defence website he is "Under Secretary of State and Minister for Defence Procurement, and Government Spokesman for Defence to the House of Lords". My old boss always used to say that when your title is longer than your name it's time to worry.
And no, since you ask, he ain't ever been elected by no-one.
All these have been specially selected by Toni who expects them, somewhat egomaniacally, to propel ZNL into a 100 years of power.
Lord help us.
What's next
OK, a little pretentious, I guess, but it's likely the next election will be held close to 5 years from now, than four. My guess would be the end of 09. And 'no' before you ask. You will not get a daily blog for the next 4 1/2 years. But, from time to time....
Michael Howard faced a chorus of criticism over his decision to quit just when the TBCs were doing so well.
Fact is, they weren't.
His reason for going, "I'll be too old", may be personally true, but is certainly electorally true. It's this second part which other members of his party would have realised soon enough, and, being ambitious, would have acted on. So we have a scenario whereby a leadership battle was inevitable within the next few years. This will be divisive, will put off the voters, and will be ruthlessly exploited by ZNL. Now ask yourself the question. Should the TBC's expose themselves to this a year or two before the election, or should they get it over with ASAP? And should they seek to make it as smooth a process as possible to minimise the damage? Looked at like that there's only one decision to make. Clean up the TBC internal voting system, and do it as soon as possible. The only motive for staying would be for MH to have some fun at Prime Minister's Question Time. No question he would have done that, he's really quite good at it. But it's of little interest to the voters, the only people who get much out of it are MH and his supporters. So, he's sacrificed that and gone. Principled, intelligent and right. We'll see who we get now.
