Going All The Galloway

On October 25th, the U.S. Senate's Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations released their report (PDF file) on George Galloway's testimony before them. Two days later, the United Nations' Independent Inquiry Committee into the United Nations Oil-for-Food Programme added relevant findings of their own (PDF). Among the shared accusations are that Galloway's wife received more than $120,000, and that Galloway received several million barrels of oil, with several million more allocated in his name. Blogger George at Seixon claims to have further evidence of his own, centering on Galloway's failure to register Fawaz Zureikat's donations for the Mariam Appeal and how his claim that the organization "publicly brandished [Zureikat's sponsorship] on all of our literature, along with the other donors to the campaign" appears demonstrably false.

These are not the only charges against international actors, but Galloway may be the most recognizable. He is almost certainly the loudest, apparently having become a minister of Parliament through browbeating rather than by legislative accomplishment. An English friend of mine suggests that by pursuing the MP, the U.N. and, particularly, the U.S. are playing with fire. I doubt it. For one thing, Galloway does not appear interested in becoming an American politician, and a teaching post at Berkeley seems more logical. Secondly, Galloway's Sir Oswald Mosley shtick plays well with the chattering class, but provides Lord Haw Haw-flavored entertainment for everyone else, such as this goofy attack on President Bush over Hurricane Katrina (the fisking of which I cheerfully purloin from Tim Blair)...

His is the America of Halliburton,

Curses to Bush for having a Vice President with ties to one of the world's most qualified businesses--one that has consistently served the U.S. government since World War II. We deserve less.

the M-16 rifle,

Made in Canada... (Bush is outsourcing the American War Machine!)

the cluster bomb,

Invented by Germany... And Great Britain still uses them, too.

the gated communities of the rich and of the billionaires he grew up with in Texas.

The gated communities of the rich and the billionaires Galloway knows in Syria are far more stylish.

There is another America.

I think I know this one: South America?

It is the land of the poor of Louisiana,

Oh. But as P.J. O'Rourke once noted, "Political scientist Robert Rector has worked up figures showing that when the official U.S. measure of poverty was developed in 1963, a poor American family had an income twenty-nine times greater than the average per capita income in the rest of the world. An individual American could make more money than 93 percent of the other people on the planet and still be considered poor." The poor of Louisiana are a lot richer than, say, the poor in African or Middle Eastern kleptocracies. I wonder why Galloway expresses more interest in discussing the poor of the U.S. than he did in freeing the needier people of, say, Saddam-era Iraq?

it is the land of the young men and women economically conscripted into the military.

Sure, the U.S. military is volunteer-only, but when made to choose between working at a grocery store, busing tables, or getting shot at, obviously people will rush to join the armed forces. The most damning evidence: The government offers additional financing and education to citizens in return for military service, and we even have career soldiers who "love" fighting for their country! Is any more proof of wickedness necessary?

It is the land of the glorious multiethnic mix that was New Orleans...

Complete with corruption and a murder rate nearly eight times the national average. Also, the hardest-hit section of the city, St. Bernard Parish, was 95% Caucasian. So not such a glorious multiethnic mix, really.

The oil-for-food charges are merely indicative of a more troubling problem: Galloway is a load of bull. Like too many of the "anti-war" crowd, he is not against a war on fascists; he is cheering for the other side. (Compare his appreciation for dictators to Condoleezza Rice, who literally tagged the president of Kazakhstan, brought him to a podium, and put in the position of answering questions from the press.) Galloway allegedly bruised the Senate in May; if so, it was because they failed to hold him to any rules of order: he freely dodged questions, interrupted senators, and gave a very clever performance of some very bizarre statements. (Comment at The Big Pharaoh: "US Senators are notorious gasbags who love to hear themselves talk. Apparently Galloway didn't realize that when a US Senator shuts up, he's giving you an opportunity to incriminate yourself.") It would be much more interesting to see whether Galloway could get away with his diversions in a hearing before a grand jury. Would a member of a foreign government stonewalling an American investigation, insulting American officials, demonstrating profound ignorance of American systems, and attempting to single-handedly boss the United States around impress many American citizens?

That brings us to the latest left-wing conspiracy, which is that Galloway and Bush are working together:

Where did this guy come from? Who invited him here? The answer: US Senate REPUBLICANS. As Cindy Sheehan was gathering public sympathy as the Gold Star mom against the killing in Iraq, the Republican party decided to import an easier target to pummel. So they brought over the "I-salute-your-courage, Saddam" religious fundamentalist crack-pot who can't tell us where the money went.

Maybe there is some truth to this paranoia. At the moment, few in the U.S. know or care about Galloway, but it might not be so smooth when the face of the anti-intervention movement becomes that of a man who engaged in duplicitous accounting; called the collapse of the Soviet Union "the biggest catastrophe" of his life; told Saddam Hussein, "Sir, I salute your courage, strength, and indefatigability;" cited Fidel Castro as his political hero; and in September of this year, in New York City, publicly suggested that America deserved the September 11, 2001 attacks.