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The Labour Party isn’t an Option Any More

London.

In two days the British people are going to vote-in a war criminal to be their prime minister for another five years. Not only that Blair is a war criminal who initiated an illegal war, following the British press, the picture is more than clear: the man is a compulsive liar who has surrounded himself with morally deteriorated advisers and obedient servants. Even his attorney general, Lord Goldsmith, the man who was supposed to uphold law within government, doesn’t exactly look squeaky clean when put under scrutiny.

But surely this is not a great novelty. Blair and his Junta didn’t invent a thing. Politicians are known to be pretty horrible people and if this is not enough, ordinary people do tend put their fate into the hands of nasty politicians. Seemingly, there must be something appealing about mass murderers. Stalin and Hitler were loved by their people for more than a while. But then, democracy was supposed to change it all, we were supposed to become morally guided peace loving creatures. Somehow, it didn’t happen. Not only did it not happen, we are now killing in the name of democracy.

Thinking of Britain in terms of a morally deteriorated democracy we may as well draw a lesson from the cases of America and Israel, no doubt, the two leading morally deteriorated democracies. The current Israeli prime minister is a convicted war criminal. And yet, it didn’t stop the Israeli people from electing him twice. Needless to say that Sharon, has never laid down his weapons, day by day he is engaged in killing Palestinian civilians and ethnically cleansing those who managed to survive. And yet he enjoys the support of the majority of the Israeli people. He is far more popular than any serving Israeli prime minister in recent years.

Not at all surprising, we would find that America is no different to Israel. In the last American election Bush’s success was more than just marginal, This time, he won the popular vote. The majority of the American people believe that the warmonger cowboy is the right man for the job. They must be happy with the American expansionist policy in the Middle East.

Thus we are allowed to deduce that it isn’t only the British people who crown a war criminal. People love to be lead by warmongers. But then, we should stop for a second and ask ourselves, is Britain as bad as Israel or America? Surely, we want to think that Britain is far better off.

In fact, it is the other way around, Britain is far worse. While in America and Israel it is the ‘right wing’, the so called ‘lower classes’ and the ‘uneducated’ who are voting-in war criminals, in Britain it is the ‘centre left’ who are doing the Job. In Britain, it is the ‘enlightened’, ‘well educated’ and well-informed broadsheet readers. In Britain it is those who read day after day about the PM’s lack of integrity. It is those people who read daily about the growing numbers of Iraqi civilian victims. True, they all admit in public that Mr. Blair is a dreadful choice and yet, they are going to vote labour. Furthermore, while in Israel and America the shift towards the right is usually blamed on the direct assault on the American and Israeli people. British people are yet to become victims of any direct terror. British people are voting Blair in spite of his crimes, in spite of the horror this man is liable for. This support of Labour cannot be morally justified.

Seemingly, Labour supporters developed a unique form of righteous blindness. They would say, yes we vote Labour in spite of Blair, we vote for health and education. As if the state of the NHS or schools is something to boast about. They would say, we vote for the economy, they obviously refer to Blair’s prosperous economy, a miraculous success maintained by masses of abused illegal immigrants who are working and living in inhuman conditions. And yet I am not intending to blame the British voter nor the Labour supporter, it isn’t their fault. In fact the Brits do not have much of a choice. They have to choose between the one who initiates the murder of thousands of Iraqi civilians and the one who supported this illegal war in the first place, They have to choose between Blair, the compulsive liar and Howard, the tactical liar, a man who declares a populist war against immigrants whilst praising the British people for letting his Jewish grandmother escape the Nazis.

Labour is a dead concept and yet, by no means am I suggesting here that Left philosophy is over. The idea of equality is as alive as ever, it is just those people who were supposed to transform that idea into practice. It is them who fooled us completely. It is the Labour party that should have replaced Blair way before this doomed election. It is the labour party, once a major European left institute, nowadays a morally bankrupt power-seeking society. True, a few Labour MP’s rebelled at the time; some even left behind their comfortable seats. But those who were not brave enough to stand up to Blair are the real bad guys in this saga. Together with Blair they betrayed the very notion of humanism. Being the ruling party, they betrayed the British people.

Clearly, it was the Labour party that was supposed to spit Blair out ages ago. They should have done it not only in order to protect world peace but as well, to help Labour regain its moral ground. But now it is too late, in two days, when Blair is re-elected, it won’t be just about Labour’s moral bankruptcy. In two days it will be the entire British society that will lose its innocence forever.

GILAD ATZMON was born in Israel and served in the Israeli military. He is the author of two novels: A Guide to the Perplexed and the recently released My One and Only Love. Atzmon is also one of the most accomplished jazz saxophonists in Europe. His recent CD, Exile, was named the year’s best jazz CD by the BBC. He now lives in London and can be reached at: atz@onetel.net.uk