Gorgeous morality? I think not

It used to be that whenever George Galloway said something obnoxious, my blood pressure would shoot up and I would scramble off to my keyboard to bash out a denunciation, or dash over to Harry’s Place to feast on righteous indignation. Then I realized that life was too short, and getting shorter, to let every idiocy ...

608497_Galloway_15.jpg
608497_Galloway_15.jpg

It used to be that whenever George Galloway said something obnoxious, my blood pressure would shoot up and I would scramble off to my keyboard to bash out a denunciation, or dash over to Harry’s Place to feast on righteous indignation. Then I realized that life was too short, and getting shorter, to let every idiocy that comes out of the mouth of a man who cuddles Castro, saluted Saddam, and dances with Tariq Aziz bother me. But even by his own high--or should that be low?--standards, his recent pronouncement that “it would be morally justified” for a suicide bomber to kill Tony Blair is pretty disgusting.

It used to be that whenever George Galloway said something obnoxious, my blood pressure would shoot up and I would scramble off to my keyboard to bash out a denunciation, or dash over to Harry’s Place to feast on righteous indignation. Then I realized that life was too short, and getting shorter, to let every idiocy that comes out of the mouth of a man who cuddles Castro, saluted Saddam, and dances with Tariq Aziz bother me. But even by his own high–or should that be low?–standards, his recent pronouncement that “it would be morally justified” for a suicide bomber to kill Tony Blair is pretty disgusting.

I really don’t think it is worth giving Galloway the oxygen of

publicity that he so craves by getting all agitated about this. Considering that the man is prepared to imitate a pussy cat to get on national TV, I expect he probably said this to grab a headline or two. What it should remind us of, is how foolish it is to get into bed with Gorgeous George on the enemy-of-my-enemy-is-my-friend principle. But then again if James Wolcott could laud George Galloway as “A Hero For Our Time” despite knowing about his odious toadying to Saddam, his admiration for the Soviet Union, and his signature on the Cairo declaration, then even this recent furor is unlikely to make him realize the error of his ways.

James Forsyth is assistant editor at Foreign Policy.

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