Well Galloway has just been offered another trip abroad, although he will have to hurry up if he wants the United Arab Emirates to pick up the bill for this one:
Committee chairman Norm Coleman….issued an invite to Mr Galloway, saying he would be pleased to have him appear at their May 17 hearing, entitled: Oil For Influence: How Saddam Used Oil to Reward Politicians and Terrorist Entities Under the United Nations Oil-for-Food Programme.
“The hearing will begin promptly at 9.30am and there will be a witness chair and microphone available for Mr Galloway’s use,” he said
I’m presuming Galloway will be attending as a politician rather than a Terrorist Entity.
The Amercians have also, in a Senate investigation sort of way, called Galloway a bullshitter.
All day Galloway has been bleating on about how the Senate chaps didn’t let him offer his side of the story. But a committee spokesman said “at no time” did he contact them by any means “including but not limited to telephone, fax, email, letter, Morse code or carrier pigeon”.
Perhaps our US readers will let us know whether the hearing will be broadcast live on C-Span for our entertainment?
Presuming, that is, that Galloway accepts the invitation.
Update: He’s accepted the invite.
“I’ll be there to there to give them both barrels – verbal guns, of course, not oil – assuming we get the visas. I welcome the opportunity to clear my name. My first words will be ‘Senator, it’s a pity that we are having this interview after you have found me guilty. Even in Kafka there was the semblance of a trial’.”
Galloway reiterated that he had never been asked to appear before the committee prior to it reaching its conclusion, or to provide even written testimony. “This is a right-wing committee with an agenda which reached its conclusion before even considering the facts,” he said. “Joseph McCarthy must be smiling admiringly in Hades.”
Actually I fear Galloway is going to rather enjoy this – it gives him a global platform for a rant against Bush in Washington and then he will take his microphone off and walk out refusing to recognise ‘a kangaroo court not fit for a banana republic’ or some such bollocks.
One thing puzzles me though. Why the talk about visas? UK citizens don’t need visas to travel to the US. There is no problem for Galloway is there? All he has to do is turn up and sign that form stating he has no links to terrorism………