Respect MP George Galloway was evicted from the house on Celebrity Big Brother last night by a good 64.7 percent of the public vote. The far-Left rabble-rouser opined earlier this month, after surviving an initial vote, that "it would be like losing an election. I'm not used to losing elections."
He's certainly not used to being concerned about his constituents whom he has chosen to thank for his local election victory over Labour incumbent Oona King in May 2005 by costing them thousands of pounds by failing to represent them in the House of Commons while he danced in a red Spandex body-suit, smoked cigars, ranted about Bush and Blair to anyone willing to listen (and no-one did), and pretended to be a cat during his twenty-two days in the Big Brother house. Voters were so appalled that they actually set up a website entitled "Get back to Work, George!"
Galloway said he signed up for the latest series of Celebrity Big Brother to get his anti-war message across to young people. Fortunately, Channel 4 - the British TV station airing the show - completely edited out his political machinations, focusing solely on his personal interactions with the housemates, which wavered between bitchy gossiping to outright bullying.
Just days ago, he mocked entertainer Michael Barrymore during a spat, "Poor me, poor me, pour me another drink!" Barrymore is a recovering alcoholic. He also opined that Barrymore was "the most selfish, arrogant and self-obsessed person" he'd ever met. Excuse me? Pot? It's the kettle - you're black. (Kudos to Barrymore, who replied, "No wonder Blair threw you out!")
Residents of the London township which elected Galloway were aghast. Here was their 51-year-old Member of Parliament trying to act thirty years younger and looking like a right twit in so doing. Galloway, champion of Muslims everywhere, was heavily criticized by the majority Muslim constituents of the Bethany Green and Bow district who were scandalized by his cavorting around on a show that, to their minds, is immorally deviant.
In addition to trying - and failing - to get his pinko manifesto across to the young audience tuning in, Galloway donated the money earned from his stay to the Miriam Appeal, a pro-Palestinian charity. Yes, he chose to donate money to these same Palestinians who just elected a terrorist organization to represent them. Doesn't your heart just melt? Well, it's certainly no surprise from Galloway, who has publicly embraced the likes of Saddam Hussein and Fidel Castro. I suppose it never crossed Galloway's mind to donate to a more local charity, perhaps one to tackle widespread poverty in East London where his constituency is located? No, instead it's Hamas all the way, baby!
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Article comments
1 - Valery
How ironic! On a Big Brother show Galloway's political remarks were edited out.
Did Galloway embrace the likes of Saddam Hussein before or after Rumsfeld and company supplied Saddam with the weaponry to kill Kurds and Iranians.
At least Galloway had the cojones to cavort in front of a television audience, unlike the loudest jeerers in Parliament who cavort behind closed doors, behind the backs of their spouses.
2 - Mark Edward Manning
It's really telling how the man can openly embrace Saddam and his even more psychotic son Uday, and yet he's beloved by your type, Valery, simply because he opposed the war.
Kinda tells you all you need to know about the morality of the anti-war movement.
3 - Valery
Why am I not surprised that you support UK and US warmongers and weapons pushers. With guys like you it's always profits before people.
4 - Mark Edward Manning
ah yes, Saddam was all about his people, eh (not that he was a Commie)? So was Stalin. So's Castro. And Mao Tse-Tung. Lovely people all of them. Let's just give them all Nobel Peace Prize awards, posthumous or not.
Capitalism and the Western way of life aren't perfect, far from it. But it's the only way I know that is the fairest way of letting people live their lives and giving them freedom of choice. It is a system where people control the elected, not where the "elected" - a.k.a. dictators - rule them.
Go to the Czech republic sometime, or the Baltic states, or Hungary or any of a number of other central/eastern/Balkan states that have actual experiences with Communism and have just shaken them off for good - and preach your love for Communism there, why don't you? Ah, I see, you'd be afraid of the possibly deadly reaction they'd have toward you. Understandable.
5 - Valery
I can see you're happier talking to yourself. Sorry for interrupting...carry on.
6 - sans-culotte
Galloway Vs O'Brien
http://brandoland.blogspot.com/2006/01/galloway-vs-obrien.html
M. O'BRIEN: This group you're providing money to has been, in some quarters, linked to terrorist organizations. What do you say about that?
GALLOWAY: Well, it's only linked with terrorist organizations by George W. Bush and the Zionist lobby on Capitol Hill, and nobody takes either of those very seriously over here, I can tell you.
M. O'BRIEN: So you don't feel as this group has goals linked to suicide bombings, for example?
GALLOWAY: Well that would be highly defamatory were you to broadcast that in Britain, because this is a registered charity in good standing with the British authorities and the British Charity Commission.
So you really ought to be more carefully without tossing allegations like that around.
M. O'BRIEN: OK.
M. O'BRIEN: Tell me, though, as you talk about this, how much credibility you think you have right now.
Let me share with our viewers a picture of you shaking Uday Hussein's hand, one of Saddam Hussein's sons --[ CNN would NEVER do this to Rumsfeld, by the way ]...who had his own private torture chamber, and there are allegations which sort of cropped up, as a matter of fact, while you were inside the "Big Brother" program location there, that you somehow profited from that infamous Oil-for-Food program marshaled through by the United Nations.
What do you say to all of that?
GALLOWAY: Well, I mean, I'd even shake hands with George W. Bush, and he has his own private torture chambers, too, in Guantanamo Bay and in the third countries to whom he is shipping price whom he has illegal captured so that they can be tortured in other countries.
GALLOWAY: He had one or two torture chambers in Abu Ghraib Prison, and the whole world saw the result, the evil, wicked result of that.
But I'd still shake hands with him, because I believe it's better to talk to people than to go to war with them, and that wars are easier to start than they are to finish.
And your viewers will be well familiar --
M. O'BRIEN: Do you think Iraq would be better off --
GALLOWAY: I was going to deal with the -- I was going to deal with the other point that you made first, if I may.
M. O'BRIEN: OK, go ahead.
GALLOWAY: Your viewers are well familiar with the false allegations against me about the Oil-for-Food program.
The newspapers which carried those claims have now paid out millions, almost three million pounds -- that's almost $6 million to me -- in damages and costs for the false allegations that they made against me.
So Saddam Hussein never gave me any money.
But the newspaper, including American newspapers which claimed he did, have given me plenty.
7 - sans-culotte
Just to keep a proper perspective...
The US gave Hussein the nod to invade Kuwait before GHW Bush, W's father, stabbed him in the back over it with gulf war I.
Transcript of Meeting Between Iraqi President, Saddam Hussein and U.S. Ambassador to Iraq, April Glaspie. - July 25, 1990 (Eight days before the August 2, 1990 Iraqi Invasion of Kuwait)...
http://www.thetip.org/art_April_Glaspie___US_Ambassador_to_Iraq______292_icle.html
Saddam was our ally until then.The crimes he currently faces trial for took place in the town of al-Dujail in 1982, Well before the now famous handshake deal when Rummy and hussein were chummy.
Shaking Hands with Saddam Hussein:The U.S. Tilts toward Iraq, 1980-1984 National Security Archive Video Clip: "Shaking Hands with Saddam Hussein,"
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB82/
8 - Mark Edward Manning
Sans-culotte: Stalin was our ally all throughout the Second World War. We were allied with the Soviets to fight on the European front. But, almost immediately after the Second World War came the Cold War. In a similar way, we propped up Saddam Hussein because he was fighting the Iranians who were our foe and main concern at the time. But then, as with Stalin, we soon began to realize that Saddam was no angel and was a problem we needed to deal with as well.
That's the nature of geopolitics. You make friends with people that you may well make enemies of and fight later. Changing times, changing circumstances. Happens all the time. You don't have to like it, but that's the way the game is played. Life ain't perfect, nor is it fair.
So, tell me the difference between allying ourselves with Stalin and the Red Army, which raped the women citizens of the German towns that they invaded in '45, and allying ourselves with Mr. Hussein throughout the '80s? Seems like a very similar situation.