Perhaps, then, we should have paid more attention to this puffed-up, fedora-sporting demagogue during our year exposure to him. Had we done so, we might have been better prepared for the arrival of a new generation of populist blowhards before they were able to cause so much chaos.
Coming to you daily during COP The NS team Sign up here. Green Times A weekly round-up of The New Statesman's climate, environment and sustainability content. How will life be different in ? As she tried to get away, they chased her and kept shouting. Nor can he be held directly responsible for the growing sense of violence and intimidation that has taken place.
Last Sunday, a group of Labour activists were pelted with eggs, then violently attacked. But you can say two things with clarity: That he came to Batley and Spen because he saw the potential for divisive politics.
And that he has acted to increase rather than alleviate it. This is the approach he has taken throughout his career: to ratchet up the fury, the debasement of opponents, the hatred in any political discussion. How are you going to explain that one? But in reality, Galloway is no friend of Muslims. Time and again he has dismissed, ignored, or actively spread disinformation about their death or mistreatment. In August , Ghouta — a suburban area around Damascus in Syria — was struck by chemical weapons, killing somewhere between and 1, people.
In , another chemical attack took place in the city of Douma, killing between 40 and 50 people. Now he stokes the same divisions he has always stoked. A recent leaflet he sent out in the constituency tries to cynically exploit the protests over the drawing of the prophet in Batley Grammar school.
They had the air of men and women who knew they were not going to be reprimanded by their employers, however rude they were to the successful candidate. They were convulsed with rage because Galloway said complimentary things to Saddam Hussein and Bashar al-Assad when he met them. Of course he had, as had every other visitor from Donald Rumsfeld to Tony Blair who had been to see these autocrats when they were in power.
Other criticism was of astonishing naivety. For instance, had not Galloway played ethnic politics by cultivating Muslim voters? Of course he had since they were numerous in the constituency, but then so had Labour to a far greater extent by selecting a Pakistani Muslim as its candidate.
These interviews, analyses and commentaries told one more about the cast of mind of inner circles of the British political class than it did about Galloway or the people of Bradford. Since few reporters appear to have gone to the city before or after the election, and commentators were quick to say the result did not matter, it was difficult even to establish basic facts about the poll, such as why people voted the way they did. All these are important issues, but even raising them invites allegations of demagoguery.
But what should be more relevant to current British politics than the Afghan war where British soldiers have been killed and a small British army of 9, is still fighting? It is a conflict in which men and women have died and are dying in vain: their intervention has achieved nothing; the Taliban are not being defeated and this should long have been self-evident.
On a small scale the atmosphere is closer to the First World War than the Second World War, with critics of official policy being caricatured as unpatriotic.
As a result, politicians and generals responsible for failures hold their jobs, ready to fail again. When Galloway so much as mentions it he is treated either as an eccentric, raising dead issues, or as a rogue, exploiting ancient feuds.
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