Friday, September 23, 2005

An apology...

I'm very sorry. In the past I have suggested that George Galloway is that part of the female anatomy that rhymes with the kind of boat found on the river Cam. However I believe that Christopher Hitchens, my newest hero, is probably correct when he says:
Those of us who revere the vagina are committed to defend it against the very idea that it is a mouth or has teeth.

So apologies for likening the repulsive Galloway to that part of a woman. I can't guarantee that in the future I won't make the same accusation again though, as it is one of my most favouritist words.

Here are the full details of what Christopher Hitchens thinks of Galloway, or at least some of the details. Which came to me via last weeks, always excellent, The Friday Thing.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Well, despite the fact that I think that both of these guys, Mr. Hitchens and Mr. Galloway are blowhards of the most vacuous kind, I must say that of the two, in my opinion, Galloway is the smarter of the two.

I was not familiar with Mr. Galloway until he spoke in front of Congress this year, and I have to say that it was a breath of fresh air to hear him rail against the policies of our government. We don't get much of that here and it was quite welcome.

As for Hitchens, I never was bothered by his notorius "boozing" actually, and I used to appreciate to hear his rants a few years ago about our fucked up politicians, but since his unwaivering backing of GWBush's policies, he just fucking infuriates me.

I've seen the "debate" with him and Galloway, and just watched the two on Bill Maher this week and based on those two events alone (as well as the flyer that Hitchen's is hawking) I have to say that I agree more with Galloway these days.

Bear in mind that I am not all that familiar with either gentlemen other than the words I hear coming out of their mouths recently. But since I abhor pretty much everything our adminstration stands for, I must admit that the words I hear coming from Galloway ring truer to me than Hitchen's blathering support for our corrupt leaders' ambitions.

Go ahead, persuade my otherwise.

Unknown said...

I agree that at surface level Galloway's criticism of the current administration, both in the US and at home, and Hitchens' support for the war Iraq would tend to lead me to prefer Galloway. However, I can't really like Galloway as he is one of the Devil's incarnations here on Earth, or at least a pretty good approximation of what a Devil's incarnation would be like if such things were to exist.

I don't really understand why Hitchens has such unwavering support for the war in Iraq, but as far as I can tell his reasons are somewhat sound: Saddam was a fairly unpleasant individual and he did do a lot of murdering of innocents, particularly those Kurds that Hitchens has such an affinity for. In theory at least Iraq should be better off without Saddam. Of course, where I differ with Hitchens is in the opinion that what we have now, something between chaos and open civil war, and how we got here, an ill-judged and ill-executed military campaign, is any better than Saddam's tyranny. I also think he overstates the effect of the war in Iraq on other places, such as Lebanon and Libya. But then again maybe I under-emphasise the effect the war in Iraq had on these other places. As far as I can tell Hitchens like of Bush and Blair's war comes down mainly to his hatred of the Saddam regime, the enemy of my enemy and all that.

Galloway on the other-hand is a slimy hypocritical S.O.B. How he can claim to be pacifist and then go over and chat up the Syrian leaders and glorify those 'resistors' who "are writing the names of their cities and towns in the stars, with 145 military operations every day." Galloway is just a one trick pony, who offensively mouths off about the current governments in the west (I'm pretty sure it doesn't actually matter what they do, he'll just shout about it) and then goes an toadies up to the leaders of whichever oppressive regime he can find Soviet, Iraqi, Syrian, etc. Every now and again I find myself in agreement with him when he's complaining about our politicians and governments — not entirely surprising as his position never changes and there's that old saying about a stopped clock being right about twice a day — and when I do I come over feeling all unclean and sullied.

So in summary. Hitchens: fairly reasonable guy who happens to have an opinion I disagree with. Galloway: man without reason, or morals seemingly, who happens to express an some opinions that I agree with. Of the two I'd take Hitchens any day. But I must admit it is still kind of fun to set Galloway on some unsuspecting senate committee, or similar, and see the fireworks, he's just not the kind of man you'd ever want to actual have any personal contact with (just the thought makes me shudder).

Anonymous said...

Thanks, Ryan, for your well-reasoned response. I have been looking further into these guys and have to say that I see where you are coming from concerning your hatred for this Galloway fellow. Just another slimy politician.

I still think that Hitchens is a windbag, however.