I wrote this appreciation of Michael Foot last year. The media ridicule of this good man was a key waymark in this nation’s journey to despising integrity and honesty in politicians, and instead worshipping only slick media presentation.
https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2009/05/michael_foot.html
If Larry from St.Louis,or eddie,who constantly complain this blog is full of nutters they should check out Guido Fawkes’ blog on the death of Michael Foot and the comments thereafter.
Most of the comments are deeply disturbing and extremely cruel.
By contrast Craig’s blog is a delicate joy.
I’ve seen the comments on Guido’s blog.
Most of his followers seem to be fascists of one sort or another.
They’re certainly not nice people, of any description but at least they’re unburdened by complexity.
Modern media has done a wonderful job.
Michael Foot is my hero, sadly missed.
He knew my father, both born in Plymouth and both supporting Plymouth Argyle Football Club.
Michael opposed the Iraq war, telling the Independent on Sunday: ‘The pre-emptive strike is a terrible, terrible idea. The dangers of this idea spreading are just appalling.’
Michael Foot loved and appreciated – PBUH
i just looked at Guido’s blog. what a bunch of ignorant fools they are, won’t be bothering looking there again for any sense or reason.
Larry,
Intelligence rules here – inane comments are ignored. (Tip) The dialectics of ignorance are sometimes useful.
Here is another form of ‘intelligence’
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I’m not going to look over at that other blog, but I imagine the comments do not include the level of crazy one regularly reads here, like, for instance, 911 being an inside job. You people are batshit crazy.
The comments over there are basically nasty sneering and cackling at an old man who died recently.
I don’t know much about Michael Foot but Craig Murray’s assessment of him seems fair.
But no, the commenters there aren’t conspiraloons just yobs. They don’t make weird meaningless statements like this:
“Intelligence rules here – inane comments are ignored. (Tip) The dialectics of ignorance are sometimes useful.”
or rattle the collection tin for other conspiraloons.
Euan Ferguson wrote – ‘An intensely kind, often brilliant man; and, if history has any principles, it will one day bathe him too in a kind and a brilliant light.’
http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2001/mar/04/labour.labour1997to99
Well said Craig.
Michael Foot was not a war criminal and was not a hypocrite like the psychopaths Bliar and Brown.
Michael Foot’s crime was to be a human being and be too foolish to hide it.
Foot was too good for us British. We would never have allowed ourselves the intelligent, inclusive, benevolent leadership he wanted to provide.
“Foot was too good for us British. We would never have allowed ourselves the intelligent, inclusive, benevolent leadership he wanted to provide.”
Yes, I vote for Ghengis Khan or Idi Amin!
It’s what we deserve!
I take it back. There are some loons over there too with their “Where we went wrong was in fighting the Nazis” and “The KGB still control the British government AT THE HIGHEST LEVELS!” Although I don’t think too many people here will have earned the right to smirk at that nonsense.
QUOTING CRAIG:
The irony is that it was Foot’s innocence of the dark arts we now deplore in politicians, that led to his extreme unpopularity.
…
The media ridicule of this good man was a key waymark in this nation’s journey to despising integrity and honesty in politicians, and instead worshipping only slick media presentation.
>>>>Sums it up, Craig. The UK is now so debauched and corrupted that it hates and fears goodness, innocence, honesty and integrity.
I don’t think this is hyperbole – rather it’s fact. Indeed, one needs look no further than your comments sections which appear to have been hijacked by some of those who have nothing good, honest, innocent to add, but prefer to attack others for their opinions instead of fairly and rationally debating.
Mr Foot must have gone to his grave already spinning at the state of Britain. I do hope this kind, gentle and honest intellectual giant can find some peace where he is now.
Larry : ‘You people are batshit crazy.’
So why do you turn up here with such tedious regularity?
Yep. Foot was real. He towered above anyone around today. It is our loss that we ignored people like Michael Foot. Salut, Michael. Bon voyage.
Foot’s crime?
He was a human being who cared, not a celebrity icon in a sad shallow world.
Life matters to all. Not just the few.
angrysoba snided: “Yes, I vote for Ghengis Khan or Idi Amin!” … no you silly bugger, we voted for Thatcher. And we got what we deserved for being almost as miserably misinformed and willfully ignorant as our American counterparts. You got Reagan. Now while it might justifiably be argued the Yanks deserved that miserable bastard, the rest of the world – central America in particular – did not.
KingofWelshNoir: You asked why these clowns show up all the time. Good question. They scoff and splutter at the notion their job is to do so. They don’t have any respect for the posters here, and they don’t think much of the host. Such sustained effort does make you wonder if they’re being entirely straight with us. (At least one of them has the partial excuse of trying to generate some small spin-off traffic to his own blog.)
Damn, I’ve been feeding trolls again. And what happens when you feed them? They breed! Just ask Lt. Gov. Andre Bauer : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jpb4nwfiaPY
“no you silly bugger, we voted for Thatcher…You got Reagan.”
You silly sausage!
In what sense did I “get Reagan”?
Anyway, Michael Foot was one of the authors of this book:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guilty_Men
Good on him!
A man in a million, whom I was privileged to talk with. Really, too good to be a politician. He was a courageous, intellectual giant, compared against the new Corporate International Business boot-licking MPs of the Bliar ilk.
Something which I haven’t seen mentioned in any of the obits is when Foot was backing war, not peace.
His pamphlet “These Guilty Men” in 1940 was probably as influential in rallying the British to fight Germany after Dunkirk as were Churchill’s speeches.
“In what sense did I “get Reagan”?”
–angrysoba
You will forever be associated with Larry in our hearts, dear, the same Larry who has yet again managed to post “911 being an inside job” on the current/top thread. But one does notice that your expressions can be very American at times, not to mention your spelling of diarrhoea. But I digress! I need more coffee.
In our idiocracy people like Michael Foot have no chance of winning an election. Principles and honesty are seen as mere impediments to power amongst today’s political chameleons, who auction their souls at the first opportunity. New “Labour” is a mockery of everything he believed in, and to see Brown eulogising him in front of No.10, (looking to gain some reflection from Foot’s aura of integrity), was typical New “Labour” hypocrisy.
Regarding those bad pennies that keep turning up here; the Chinese call them fifty centers…..
I also had a soft spot for Michael Foot, partly because he reminded me of a friend of mines dad, also a very principled person, but mostly because he was obviously sincere.
It’s hard to see how anyone can be 100% sincere within the party system (and survive). Toeing the party line, voting with the party, speaking only within the party stance on any issue. Needing the support of the machine in elections, etc.
And then there’s Craig’s situation in Norwich North, where the lack of a party machine hampered his chances, and there was no party to apply pressure to ensure he was covered by the media, or to ensure it by the party’s very existence. I do not know what the answer is.
“I do not know what the answer is.”
I think (as I’ve said before) that it could be sortition.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sortition
It does sound very democratic, Vronsky. I’m assuming people would be obliged to serve, as they are when it comes to jury duty.
“The most common argument against pure sortition (that is, with no prior selection of an eligible group) is that it does not discriminate those selected and takes no account of particular skills or experience that might be needed to effectively discharge the particular offices filled.”
The various Minsters we have in Ireland at the moment had/have no particular skills or experience relevant to their offices. And the guy who was a barrister (technically – don’t think he practised – Defence Minister Willie O’Dea) just resigned for having sworn a false affidavit to the High Court.
Willie O’Dea has always been a particularly useless little shit.
Good riddance, and perhaps now we won’t have to listen to any more of the little prick’s lies.
Vronsky, that was beautifully out. How right you are.
Veering back to Mr. Foot – in a different conversation elsewhere, someone’s reminded me of that business over the Falklands, when he demanded to know what action Maggiemaggiemaggie was going to take … unfortunate, that, for a pacifist.
But conversely, as a wild-eyed scruffy loony from way back, I really minded the duffelcoat / donkeyjacket Cenotaph business. A kind of final warning, all is officially lost, tabloid headlines rule.