War is too serious a matter to be left to mere military men

Another dead Iraqi child.

The great Sofa Warrior of Downing Street is clearly enjoying his little War – Anthony Charles Linton Blair takes Club Med holidays in Basra every so often, praising his troops for being better behaved than the americans. Or at least, encouraging them to continue keeping their bad behaviour better concealed.

In Tony B. Liar’s view, it was sheer cowardice and treachery for the top General of the british army to have dared to comment “The troops have had enough”. The cheek of the chap! Oh, the mortifying embarrassment of being gunned down by one of your own team.

The General’s been silenced - rest assured.

Beware though - the honourable General wasn’t talking about protecting the lives of Iraqi citizens, but only about preserving his demoralised soldiers. The fact that england’s most crucial foreign policy debate has to be kick-started by an honest military man then conducted in the media rather than Parliament is humiliating and shameful. The West is supposed to be modelling Democracy to the rest of the world, not making a mockery of it. This is especially the case when britain’s intelligence service doesn't even report to parliament, but directly to the prime minister instead.

(Aside: There is no such thing as Democracy - there are only Democracies. Democracy has many varying forms, faces and faeces ...see my earlier blog on the Thai version of democracy.

King Tony is getting an easy-chair ride through the rubble of Iraq. In fact, the weak british parliament is god’s own gift to Dictatorship. If I were an absolute dictator, I would get a parliament immediately. While british soldiers ram Democracy down others’ throats at the point of a gun, british MPs seem incapable of performing Democracy’s simplest ritual – challenging the Executive. It's the same story under the american constitution, too.

In the House of Commons last night, it was an eerie Silence of Lambs… King Charles I would have been proud. The timid british Parliament decided only to hold an Enquiry into the war after the troops had been withdrawn - whenever that was to be (...and certainly, you can bet your bottom AK-47, it will be after Blair is erased from the political map).

As they say, a Camel is merely a Horse designed by a committee. In the shimmering sands of Basra, that sick british camel has developed a worsening limp to the Right, making it wander in increasingly confused circles. For instance, Blair's mealy-mouthed pledge to "bring the troops home" is merely to replace them with mercenaries in the form of private Security Companies. Me wonders if, like Dick-less Cheney, he holds shares in the companies he selected...