No Respect

The British Election result seems to have been fairly good: Labour had their majority cut. The Tories didn't get in. The BNP didn't win a seat.

On a more difficult note, George Galloway and his RESPECT party won the Bethnal Green & Bow seat, in an emabarrassing defeat for the government. Many on the left saw this as victory for those who opposed the war. Certainly it was the first time in years that a seat had been won by anything resembling a socialist party.

That night, Jeremy Paxman interviewed Galloway live on BBC TV, and asked him a series of fairly insupportable questions (most notably "Are you proud of ejecting one of the only black woman MPs in the country?"- to which Galloway threatened to walk off, which caused Paxman to shout at him - great TV!). But curiously, public support seems to lean on the side of Mr Galloway on this issue. I'm not sure when it changed, and I acknowledge that Paxman's questions were a little OTT, but since when was it that the journalist had to explain himself to the politician? It's my opinion that Galloway ought to be able to do more to explain himself and defend himself than simply repeating ad infinitum all his grievances about how no one likes him.

Anyway, I don't like the man. He's always struck me as something of a showoff. There's nothing wrong with enjoying the high drama of political intrigue, but Galloway does showboat rather. I just hope that he really works to serve the voters in England's poorest constituency who he will now represent. 'Cos if he's just in it for the photocalls and cat fights then he's let them down. I think it's up to him to prove that though, not Jeremy Paxman, the BBC or anyone else.