THE MAN WHO WANTED TO BE PRIME MINISTER/DOUBLE STANDARDS AND DISTANT ECHOES
THE NASTY PARTY AND THE VACUITY THAT IS DAVID CAMERON
Baroness Warsi |
If you want to see just how nasty the Tory party can
get just read some of the reactions, a great many off the record, on the
resignation of Baroness Warsi.[1] The
nasty party barely covered it, as some senior Tories and their bag carriers
lined up to pour buckets of a metaphorical shit over the recently departed
peer.
Her resignation came at a bad time for David Cameron
and the Conservatives, her case against the government chiming with the
complaints raised by Ed Miliband. The reactions of George Osborne and the new
Foreign Secretary, Phillip Hammond, combined a patronising ‘more in sorrow than
in anger,’ tone, with facial expressions tinged with the kind of disdain that
only comes with years of unchallenged
superciliousness.
The Governments
position on the Israeli onslaught on the Palestinian enclave, slavishly
following the line set by Washington, could not have been more abject; whilst
its public support for Israel’s actions, whilst UN schools were targeted and
children slaughtered by the IDF, truly repugnant. True sights were more stomach
churning than the sight of the newly appointed Foreign Secretary, Phillip
Hammond, cosying up to the Israeli Prime Minister at the same time as Gaza was
being pounded.
“This crisis was triggered by Hamas raining hundreds of rockets on Israeli cities, indiscriminately targeting civilians in contravention of all humanitarian law and norms. In the last fortnight, Hamas has fired 1,850 rockets at Israeli cities. This unprecedented barrage continues to this moment, with Hamas rejecting all proposals for a ceasefire, including those put forward by the Egyptian government. I have been clear throughout this crisis that Israel has the right to defend itself.” David Cameron House of Commons 21st July.
From the Murdoch press and the appointment of Andy Coulson, to Gaza,
Cameron consistently demonstrates a lack of both judgement and a firm moral
compass. He is a man whose ambition was to be Prime Minister, period. Such men
always turn out to be vacuous at heart.
DISTANT ECHOES
The front page of this morning’s Guardian, [08.08.14], makes for grim
and depressing reading. From Gaza, to Iraq, Syria and Azerbaijan, from South
Sudan and the Ukraine the reports are of violence and crimes against humanity.
Whilst across Europe there has been a dramatic rise in anti-Semitic attacks.
Reading reports from Iraq respecting ISIS, now ‘re-branded’ as the Islamic
State, - Islamist SS would be a more accurate description, language begins to
falter, crumble, then collapse under the enormity of the suffering and inhumanity
inflicted.
“In recent days Yezidi women, men and children from the region of Sinjar have fled for their lives,” he said. “Thousands, perhaps tens of thousands are now hiding high up the mountain with little but the clothes on their backs, they are without food, they are without water. People are starving, children are dying of thirst. Meanwhile Isis forces below have called for the systematic destruction of the Yeziddi people, which would constitute genocide.” Guardian 8.8.14
The wrong faith? |
In East London someone has placed a black ISIS flag amongst rows of Palestinianflags and anti-Israel graffiti. Presumably whoever placed it there has been
outraged by the Israeli onslaught on Gaza, maybe even carried pictures of dead
Palestinian women and children?
Where are the massed demonstration against ISIS, or those against Assad? if
people are going to trade in pictures of dead children where are the dead
Syrian children murdered by Assad’s barrel bombs?* Of course as soon as you
start arguing in these nauseating terms you are already morally compromised.
What it is always essential is to keep at the forefront of your mind is that behind the
statistics of the dead in Iraq, Gaza, Syria, South Sudan, Ukraine, and the Caucasus,
are lives cut short, children who will never know the anguish of puberty or the
emotions of first love. Students frantically studying for exams they will never
take. Men with plans, ideas for improving the house, or meeting with a long
lost cousin. Women worrying about their children, about the rising cost of
food. Women living in fear for their children, their husbands and for
themselves. Those fears now sadly realised in an apartment block reduced to rumble,
on a scorching mountainside, or on the waste ground beside a church or mosque.
Like the SS ISIS likes to film its activities. |
The disgusting double standards that attend so much outrage and protest
are but distant echoes of the brutality, the mind set of those who destroy lives, kill and
maim and imprison for a cause, more often than not labelled faith.
*A barrel bomb is a type of improvised explosive device (IED). Sometimes
described as a "flying IED", they are typically made from a barrel
that has been filled with high explosives, with possibly shrapnel, oil or
chemicals, and then dropped from a helicopter or airplane.[1] Due to the large
amount of explosives that can be packed into a barrel, their poor accuracy and
indiscriminate use in populated civilian areas (including refugee camps), the
resulting detonations have been devastating.[2][3][4] Critics have
characterized them as weapons of terror and illegal under international
conventions.
[1]
Am a just a jaded old cynic in supposing that the timing of Boris Johnson’s declaration
that he will stand for parliament, in breach of his pre-election pledge not to,
was partly timed to knock Warsi off the front page?