Scurvy Gallowag
By See Dubya on Current Events
Patterico's Pontifications
The Norse Workhorse at Seixon.com continues methodically nailing down George Galloway’s lie before the Senate subcommittee the other day–as Ace would say, “Like a Viking”! But with all this talk over the weekend of George Galloway lying under oath before Sen. Coleman’s committee about his relationship with Oil-for-Food magnate Fawaz Zureikat, we need to keep a few things in mind:
First, Galloway’s organization, Mariam Appeal, was never a “charity”. It was a political organization. How do I know? Well, George Galloway said so, on the BBC in 2003:
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GEORGE GALLOWAY: Two mistakes there. First of all, it isn’t a charity. It’s a political campaign and always has been. Secondly, it isn’t mine. I founded it, but long ago gave up day-to-day control of it. Indeed the chairman of it for some considerable time has been Mr Fawaz Zureikat.
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It’s nice that he admits that. So let’s stop calling it his “charity” and refer to it as it was: a lobbying group for lifting the sanctions against Iraq, paid for by Iraq. It’s like an Iraq PAC. Except in the USA, PAC’s can’t suddenly start representing a foreign government for pay, without their staffers registering as lobbyists. Otherwise, you’re not a lobbyist, but a spy. Had Mariam Appeal operated under American law, Galloway would be in the same sinking boat as Susan Lindauer.
Second: Galloway looked the other way about where the money was coming from. He admitted as much in his testimony:
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SEN. COLEMAN: I’m asking you specifically, In 2001 were you aware he was doing oil deals with Iraq?
GALLOWAY: I was aware that he was doing extensive business with Iraq. I did not know the details of it. It was not my business.
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Later on he said “I took the view–I can be criticized for it, have been criticized for it–that I would fundraise from the kings of Arabia whose political systems I have opposed all my life in order to raise funds for what I thought was an emergency, facing a disaster.”
But back in 2003, with the memo just discovered and a fire newly lit under his nattily-tailored bottom, Fawaz’s doings were his business. Gorgeous George told the BBC he was busy searching for <the real killers> the truth about his oppressin’ buddy, Fawaz:
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JEREMY PAXMAN: Haven’t you asked him?
GEORGE GALLOWAY: Well, I’m trying to reach him to ask him if he’s ever been involved in oil deals because I don’t know the answer to that.
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Apparently Zureikat’s difficult to reach with the e-mail. Galloway had two years–from April 23rd 2003, the date of this BBC interview and shortly after the first allegations were made, and the date of his hearing, May 17 2005–to get an answer from Fawaz, and I guess he just never got around to it…
Either that, or Galloway’s role in this is either “willful ignorance” or “complicity up to his armpits”. Which brings me to
Third: Galloway was involved in a leadership role in a corrupt political organization and looked the other way while money from the Saddam regime–money that the Saddam regime was stealing from the Oil-for-Fraud program– poured in to the organization’s coffers. Money that should have gone in the first place to feed the very starving Iraqis that Galloway claimed to want to help. And he just didn’t care. Did he stop to worry that he was doing PR for a Kurd-gassing monster? Why, man, [he] did make love to this employment!
So my question for the Gorgeous George fans out there: Explain to me in the comments below why Enron is an exploitative abomination, but Mariam Appeal’s founder and front man ought to be nominated for sainthood. Please give a reason besides the fact that Galloway hates America.
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