BLOODY HELL
Tony Blair, Right Honourable Hypocrite
by Allan Uthman

I think we all know what they are trying to do. They are trying to use the slaughter of innocent people to cower us, to frighten us out of doing the things that we want to do, of trying to stop us going about our business as normal, as we are entitled to do, and they should not, and they must not, succeed...We will not allow violence to change our societies or our values.

- UK PM Tony Blair, on the London Bombings

Did you get that? This is Tony Blair, Tattoo on George Bush’s Fantasy Island, telling us that violence is not the answer. Blair doesn’t really compare to Bush when it comes to empty, infuriatingly banal statements, but here he very precisely, and unwittingly, makes an excellent case against the war in Iraq, indeed against invasions in general. Here he is, immediately after the bombings in London, making perhaps the most galling statement of his entire career. It’s a real humdinger, but, of course, nobody called him on it, because one of the lessons we all learned on 9/11 is that powerful hypocrites get a free pass after terrorist attacks.

Now, it goes without saying (or should) that blowing up subway cars and buses is not an appropriate way to seek change. But seeking to change a society through violence and death—isn’t that exactly what Blair and Bush are doing in Iraq?

The death toll in London has risen to 52 as I write this, and that is truly terrible. But the death toll in Iraq is well over 100,000. Were those all bad guys, you think? Or don’t their deaths matter, because they’re brown and they don’t speak English, at least not with those charming accents?

Think about it: a hundred thousand people. That’s more than you can fit in Ralph Wilson stadium. We killed them all. But their deaths are so irrelevant to us that even war protestors are more likely to quote the statistic of 1,700 or so American soldiers killed.

I saw a segment on the local news the other day, basically ridiculing the UN for not being able to come up with a working definition of terrorism in the last 4 years. What they failed to perceive, as they chuckled about that old bureaucratic dinosaur, is that the reason for this is that any accurate definition of terrorism would define nearly all the member states, especially the US, as having supported and engaged in it.

This is not to say that the victims in London somehow ‘deserved’ to be blown to bits. There’s no ‘little Eichmans’ theory here. But any leader who orders the carpet bombing of a city full of civilians knows he’s burning children to death. And to do so, to cause unspeakable harm to regular people, when there are clear diplomatic options yet available is despicable. That’s what Bush and Blair have done, and they deserve to be imprisoned for it. Luckily for them, The Hague doesn’t impose the death penalty. Of course, they’ll never have to answer for their crimes.

Tony Blair arguing that it is “barbaric” to use violence to cause change calls his incredible hypocrisy, and simple lack of self-awareness, into sharp focus. It’s about as reasonable as calling someone a faggot while you’re nailing him in the ass.

Unfortunately, Blair is not alone, or even in the minority. Here in America, hypocrisy is an individual right; it’s gauche in the extreme to remind people that they’re full of shit. This may explain why Bush and Blair both won reelection. But, when faced with the violent death of people we can actually identify with, we react, naturally, with disgust and hatred for those who perpetrated it, and righteous cravings for vengeance against them. How on earth can we expect a different reaction from others when we bomb them?