Right, I’m sure you have all had enough of me banging on about George Galloway everyday and I’m getting a little weary of it all myself.
I’ve made clear enough times what I think about Galloway and his supporters and put forward the questions I would like to ask the Respect MP – all of which still stand, so there is no point in continuing with long posts on the issue.
But I also know that there is a lot of interest in this topic from a good number of you so I think that perhaps the way to avoid the blog becoming a single issue campaign yet still be a source of useful info is if, when the occassion merits, I simply link to stories on the issue without the need for lengthy commentary.
So here are today’s (so far!):
Election threat to Galloway : George Galloway could face a challenge to his election victory in the East End over fears that hundreds of people may have voted twice.
The Evening Standard has learned that up to 300 duplicate names have been found on the electoral register for Bethnal Green and Bow.
……Any voter or candidate within a seat can challenge an election result as long as they lodge a formal complaint within 21 days.
The so-called election petition is then adjudicated by an election commissioner – a High Court judge with wideranging powers. If the commissioner finds evidence of impropriety he can order a contest to be re-run.
Galloway fund may face police inquiry: THE Charity Commission has warned that it may ask the police to investigate if it receives evidence from the United States Senate to suggest criminal activity in connection with the Mariam Appeal founded by George Galloway and the Jordanian businessman Fawaz Zureikat.
…..Mr Galloway arrived in London to a rapturous welcome from supporters and, with tears in his eyes, addressed a meeting last night. He also dismissed the threat of a fresh investigation: “It won’t take them long to establish what the Senate committee said about the Mariam Appeal was wrong.”
Mr Zureikat declined to comment on the allegations levelled in the Senate that he had traded in oil allocated to Mr Galloway by the Saddam.
He said he was aware of the accusations, but was too busy to answer them.
Update by David T: The Scotsman and Oliver Kamm ask why BBC Scotland decided to send along George Galloway’s long time friend, “political comrade” and “professional collaborator”, Bob Wylie, to report on Galloway’s hearing performance. Of course, Wylie ended up filing an encomium to his chum, describing him as “Braveheart”. Exactly why BBC Scotland needed to be separately representated on this story escapes the Scotsman, Kamm, and me. Galloway isn’t even a Scottish MP. I’m not a professional BBC basher, but the corporation really needs to be called to account on this one. They have evidently taken their eye off the ball.
Harry adds: Christopher Hitchens in a pay-per-view (as if we do) piece in the Independent:
But he looks so much like what he is: a thug and a demagogue, the type of working-class-wideboy-and-proud-of-it who is too used to the expenses account, the cars and the hotels all cigars and back-slapping. He is a very cheap character and a short-arse like a lot of them are, puffed up like a turkey. He has managed to fuse being a Baathist with being a Muslim sectarian and a carpet bagger in the East End as well as a front for a creepy sub-Leninist sect, the Socialist Workers’ Party. He’s got the venomous riff-raff at one end and your one-God fanatics on the other. Wonderful. Just what we need.
Full Hitchens interview posted at here, where you can also read the dismal and still not funny Mark Steel proving he is now Galloway’s court jester.