Galloway again

My previous post on Galloway hasn't convinced Gert, who comments:

Mr Galloway in December was awarded £150,000 in libel damages from the Daily Telegraph, for similar allegations of accepting money from the Baath regime. Doesn't that tell you something?

Not really, and since I believe there might be others with your same doubts, I'll tell you why:

First, the libel verdict won by Saddam-supporter George Galloway does not depend on the notion that Galloway's ties to Saddam were disproven. They haven't been. Nor was this case decided by a jury. The case was won because, in the judge's view, the Telegraph had not given Galloway sufficient time or space to respond to the charges.

Second, corroborated by the testimony of Tareq Aziz and other baathist officials and relevant bank statements, this is in short what the subcommittee has found:

1) Between 1999 and 2003, Galloway personally solicited and received eight oil "allocations" totaling 23 million barrels, which went either to him or to a politicized "charity" of his named the Mariam Appeal.

2) In connection with just one of these allocations, Galloway's wife, Amineh Abu-Zayyad, received about $150,000 directly.

3) A minimum of $446,000 was directed to the Mariam Appeal, which campaigned against the very sanctions from which it was secretly benefiting.

4) Through the connections established by the Galloway and "Mariam" allocations, the Saddam Hussein regime was enabled to reap $1,642,000 in kickbacks or "surcharge" payments.

Galloway should know that you can only sell snake oil in the same place for so much time, then you should change town.

Galloway, Oil for Food