George Galloway e a libertação da humanidade pela extrema esquerda

George Galloway has the most amazing ability to see the best in everyone - even homicidal dictators like Saddam

In his autobiography, I'm Not the Only One, George Galloway closes with a rousing quote from Nikolai Ostrovsky: "All my life and all my strength I have given/To the finest cause in the world;/ The liberation of humankind." Galloway introduces Ostrovsky simply as a "Russian writer". In fact, he was Ukrainian, but more importantly he was a Soviet propagandist, author of the socialist realist classic How the Steel Was Tempered, and a devoted Stalinist.###

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In the light of recent accusations, in which a US senate committee claimed that Galloway was engaged in oil trading with the Saddam regime, does such an arcane detail matter? Obviously if he was guilty of what Senator Norm Coleman suggests it would mean he had played a part in diverting funds to himself and the Saddam regime that were meant to alleviate Iraqi suffering. That is a very serious charge and one Galloway has repeatedly denied. So why hold the man to a literary quote about global liberty when his own liberty could conceivably hang in the balance?

The answer may be that it points to an aspect of Galloway's character that has enabled him to thrive in circumstances that would have undone far greater men, namely his enduring ability to believe in transparent fictions. He once told this newspaper, in a breathtaking demonstration of this gift, that Imagine, the anti-materialist song written by the multimillionaire property baron John Lennon, "is the socialist anthem. I believe every word of it".

Presumably that means he believes in the line about imagining "no possessions", not easy for a man with a taste for expensive cars and fine suits, not to mention a Portuguese holiday home. But possibly less problematic for a Catholic who has forged strong links with Islamic groups - "socialism and Islam are very close," he says - than imagining "no religion too".

"Imagine there's no heaven ... No hell below us," says Lennon. "If you believe, like me, that you will be judged one day," Galloway said earlier this year, "then you believe you'll be judged on everything." Where, one wonders, does he expect this judgment to take place, and what will be the sentence without heaven and hell? Or perhaps he envisaged a less celestial court, such as a US senate committee.

A while back, I pointed out Galloway's inconsistency with regard to religion (he rates the collapse of the Soviet Union, where countless numbers were imprisoned for 25 years for the crime of praying, as the "biggest catastrophe" of his life). He responded by accusing me of "grotesque intolerance". And say what you like about Galloway, he is a man of immense tolerance. Look, for example, at the exemplary tolerance he has displayed towards people who have sometimes been cold-shouldered by less generous spirits. One thinks, first, of Saddam Hussein. "I still meet families who are calling their new-born sons Saddam," he told the homicidal dictator. "I salute your courage, your strength, your indefatigability."