There’s quite a storm brewing. Did Raheem Kassam and about 100 other people walk out of the grassroots meeting because of George Galloway, or because they were afraid they’d miss the last bus home?
What do you think?
Has Farage scored a massive own goal by allowing George Galloway to spook a considerable number of potential “out’ campaign voters, or will the “Go” movement swallow their differences in the name of unity?
I did notice that many of the speakers seemed to be preparing the audience to accept that they’d have to work alongside people they disagreed with - and -yes, even people they didn’t like. But is this step too far?
I was just lamenting the fact that antisemitism has become something we are expected to overlook. “Suck it up” they say.
You have to ask, would they have co-opted Hitler if they thought it would boost the numbers?
Despite various glowing reports of Galloway’s “terrific speech” and the predictable standing ovation, I for one was not impressed. It was an average speech, full of the usual Galloway mannerisms that seem to impress people. He’s a great orator - to people who are unfamiliar with great orators. He’s the stupid person’s idea of a great orator in the Stephen Fry sense.
We were just discussing the appalling way that the increasingly overt antisemitism expressed by students, the man in the street, the Muslim community as well as in certain public figures, is overlooked these days.
Now it seems that the Out Campaign is another area which has been polluted.
I heard Kate McCann from the Telegraph being interviewed by a school-marmish Mishal Husain this morning. She said 200 people walked out of the meeting when Galloway was revealed as the mystery speaker, and some allegedly told her they left because they couldn’t tolerate his antisemitic views.
We’re used to Galloway behaving in a quite rational and even normal fashion on QT, or with Andrew Neil. But his duplicity is very well known.
Raheem Kassam, who had said of Galloway’s appearance at the meeting “It’s not a good look” has subsequently rowed back.
We can all change our minds, but I think he’s got a lot of explaining to do.
"He’s a great orator - to people who are unfamiliar with great orators. He’s the stupid person’s idea of a great orator in the Stephen Fry sense."
ReplyDeleteExcellent comment!
Galloway is a loudmouth whose sonorous pronouncements claim to be delivered from the moral high ground, but are in fact the echo of a voice trapped deep in the bowels of the earth where he keeps company with Arab dictators, Hamas's Jew-haters, crazed Ayatollahs, kleptomaniac modern-day Tsars and sinister Stalinists.