How gorgeous is he?
I went to hear George Galloway earlier this evening. His media coverage gave me the vague feeling there was something slightly suspect about the guy - but I wanted to hear the man himself. I'm not sure I'd give him my own money, but who could resist free tickets?
There was a hint of the commercialism that infests the cultural world when we were warned at the start not to record him. Heaven forbid we infringe anyone's right to make money from what Mr Galloway described as a political meeting! Before I had time to worry that journalists might be reduced to shorthand, George walked on to rousing applause and the strains of Aretha Franklin's R-E-S-P-E-C-T.
My first surprise was what a friendly audience he had. Perhaps opponents of The War found him a kindred spirit. Maybe they just liked anyone who could get the better of a US Senate subcommittee. But they liked him.
Mr Galloway (Bethnal Green and Bow MP for the Respect Party) is an engaging and charismatic speaker. He has a slightly self-deprecating, gently humorous and occasionally bitingly sarcastic manner. He was obviously in his element as he worked the audience - as he should be, having done it over 1600 times since 9/11. He's worked years to become an overnight sensation he conceded, smiling.
He revelled in being to the left of New Labour. He made very telling points on a number of topics, and gave a good account of consistent and principled opposition to Saddam Hussein, his criticism of UK support for Saddam in his earlier years, his attacks on the suffering brought about by the sanctions programme which followed Saddam's defeated invasion of Kuwait, and his opposition to both the case for the war on Iraq, and the war itself.
He said that there were worse things than dictators - like obscurantist fundamentalist regimes - and not just the one in the USA. He criticised Saddam Hussein's record and that of other regimes the West supports, but he also mentioned the dangers of Islamic fundamentalism, which the West, he argues, is feeding. He argued that Western actions help form the swamp that breeds the mosquitoes of terrorism.
His main "swamps" were Israel's treatment of Palestinians, Western hypocricy in general, and the forces in Iraq. I didn't hear how a "drained" Israeli swamp would look (though he wants an end to support for Israel), but his solution for Iraq was for the coalition to leave. The killing might well continue, he said, but there was nothing we could do to stop it. The age, he said, of colonialism is over. It is not for us to intervene paternalistically, with lethal force. Or even with sanctions, presumably.
He deplored the rise of political spin, and the decline of Parliament from a watchdog which put country before party, to a group of people afraid to vote with their consciences on the National ID Card scheme. He has a point! At this point (sorry, pun) hecklers asked him why he wasn't in Parliament a bit more - he gave them short shrift.
Most questions were friendly, and gave him the chance to ramble entertainingly for a few minutes at a time. Some of the audience raised interesting issues, and he answered them well. I was impressed by the man.
Then a harder question was asked (I paraphrase a little, but like I said, recording was banned): Since military solutions were not the answer, and sanctions killed millions, what was his alternative approach to regimes or atrocities like North Korea, Burma, Rwanda or Zimbabwe? Hadn't action in Kosovo been a good thing, on balance?
At this point, in spite of his earlier complaints about spin and his comments about other politicians, he seemed to treat the question and the questioner with contempt. It was interesting, he digressed, that the questioner was concerned about the countries the Americans were concerned about. Why not the Congo? The questioner asked him to talk about the Congo, if he'd prefer. Once the microphone was safely retrieved from the troublesome upstart, George took the opportunity to complain that the West had removed a great statesman in the Congo and installed Mobutu, but completely failed to discuss the actual question. He admitted that Mugabe of Zimbabwe was a bad thing, but his only suggestion was that the West should not support people like the President of Pakistan.
I would have loved to hear his view on the Iranian President's wish to "blot Israel from the map". Or what badness he hadn't been up to with Oil for Food, and charity funding. Or even an answer to the problem of tyrants who were not anti-western enough for America to depose. But it was not to be.
Gorgeous George, as he's sometimes known, is a charismatic speaker with a great deal to say - some of it very important. But he's no less a politician than any of the people he criticises.
Another venerable gentleman of the left, Tony Benn, comes across in person as a man of strong principles and great integrity. George Galloway is a man with valid criticisms to make, but by the end of the evening there seemed to be too many questions, too few answers, and maybe not enough respect.
3 comments:
Hmmm. Very interesting. Wish I could have heard him. A "few" "brief" comments ;)
First - the warning not to record. Sensible I would take it, given the kind of flack he has had with govt and press. If I was in his shoes, I would be perfectly willing to face a live audience, but not willing to have bits recorded, which a trigger-happy government can use against me.
Second - the opponents of the war definitely find him a kindred spirit. I certainly did. Very few British politicians were sticking their necks out in terms of it. Galloway was thrown out and me thinks that here is a man who sticks his neck out for what he believes - a rare phenomenon one must admit.
Lets face it. Most of the British parliament "allowed" the B&B duo to go to war.
Moreover *anyone* who can get the better of the US senate SC's rather vacuous nonsense (probably goaded by the oil profiteers in the US) will get my vote. Seriously :D
"The age, he said, of colonialism is over. It is not for us to intervene paternalistically, with lethal force. Or even with sanctions, presumably". To this comment I would add a resounding AMEN. Let's look at it this way - would any country in the West take seriously the "judgements" of India, China, or Africa on their general behaviour and corruption. Many of the "interventions" do smack of Western superiority - of the attitude that believes themselves to be morally superior, something that is clearly untrue.
Obviously he is a politician and has a politicians style?! Does me detect a trace of "slight" cynical undercutting of the man? :D
Just a question? Do you not think that no one can have all the answers? And perhaps there indeed are "too many questions, too few answers" - that could well be the reality in today's complicated and messed up world. Just because one voices the fact that there is a colonialist and imperialist "interventionist" attitude, does not mean that one has the solution for the difficult conflicts of the world.
And another question "maybe not enough respect" for GG or from GG for the audience?
There is a lot in there - thanks for taking the time :)
> the warning not to record. Sensible
> I would take it, given the kind of
> flack he has had with govt and press
You can't (yet) stop the press from recording you in a public meeting - and rightly so - though the media industry is working on digital components to stop consumers doing just that - the press may be caught in the crossfire. A society where the press can't hold people to account for what they say in public meetings is heading in a dangerous direction.
> Galloway... is a man who sticks
> his neck out for what he believes
I have to respect that - even if I don't agree with those views.
> would any country in the West take
> seriously the "judgements" of
> India, China, or Africa on their
> general behaviour and corruption.
Funnily enough, the UN had the most unexpected countries chairing just such bodies. That sort of lunacy is a propaganda gift for opponents and critics of the UN.
> the attitude that believes themselves
> to be morally superior, something
> that is clearly untrue.
But we're still left with outrages like Rwanda and the Sudan, where genocide is being carried on by the nobly un-western regimes in power.
The question George Galloway was asked - and dismissively, contemptuously REFUSED to answer - was what should happen in cases like that.
I had been very impresed by Mr Galloway up to that point, and I still think he has made some useful contributions to the debate. But that cynical evasion, following as it did his denunciation of spin, and his complaints that parliament was failing as a watchdog, left a nasty taste.
George Galloway's lack of respect for the questioner and the serious point he was trying to make, and his use of spin and ad-hominem attack to evade the issue, caused me to lose a lot of the respect he had been building.
I'm sorry about that. I'd far rather have an opponent I can respect than a so-called ally I can't trust.
> Do you not think that no one can have
> all the answers? And perhaps there
> indeed are "too many questions,
> too few answers" - that could
> well be the reality in today's
> complicated and messed up world.
Exactly!
If he'd said "that's a hard question - it's complicated" - or even "I don't know the answer in some of those cases", I would have respected that.
If he'd said "you must never, ever, intervene, however bad it seems to us", like some sort of fundamentalist follower of the Star Trek Federation's relativistic Prime Directive, I would have disagreed - but I could have respected his honesty.
If he'd said (unlikely I know) we must always try to stop genocide, I would have been sceptical of the possibility, but I could have respected his sticking his neck out.
But to say, essentially, that the questioner seemed to be raising "american" concerns and to ignore the question was a travesty and a farce for one who advocates respect, and decries spin.
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