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Press The Hutton Button. By The Doktor.


The inevitable reaction of the British Establishment to potential embarrassment is to appoint a commission of enquiry. This has always worked in the past, and it has worked again. It has several effects: 1) it deflects immediate criticism, which can be forestalled by saying in a slightly pompous and wounded way that all comment on the matter is now inappropriate in view of the ongoing enquiry; 2) it prevents further independent investigation of the controversy; 3) the outcome of the investigation is postponed long enough for everyone to lose interest; 4) the immediate crisis is not only postponed to some later date but actually defused, as the topicality of the subject is removed; 5) when the final report is issued it inevitably entirely absolves anybody in authority from the least tincture of responsibility.

Even though I understand all this, and have understood it as a strategy ever since the enquiry was announced, I am nevertheless astonished by the solidity of this particular whitewash, by its depth and opacity and the clean unbroken, impenetrable surface it has created over the facts. I am astonished that although the foul-mouthed bully Alistair Campbell behaved so badly in the aftermath of Andrew Gilligan’s over-excited remarks that even he was forced to resign quietly for fear of the eventual fall-out, not a trace of criticism has been directed towards him.
That Hutton sounded like a piece of wood is explained by the fact that he also thinks and acts like one. He exonerates the Government for setting up a game of 20 questions which resulted in Dr. David Kelly being hounded to death. He exculpates Campbell and Blair from having any influence on the intelligence dossier cobbled together to prove the importance of invading Iraq.
The Government, weirdly, denies any necessity to investigate the total inaccuracy of the intelligence reports it acted on (once again citing the necessity of awaiting a report, this time from arms inspectors whose last boss just resigned saying that such weapons did not exist). No enquiry looks likely to be forthcoming into the damaging, indeed fatal incompetence of the British Security Services, (despite even George Dubbleya, to whom such claims matter a good deal less, announcing such an enquiry in the U.S.A.) which will no doubt continue to be referred to as ‘the best in the world’ by the smug, meretricious and ultimately victorious shits who rule the Nation through a web of cronyism and disinformation.

Hutton failed even to do the minimum expected of him by the Blair Government, that is, criticise Alistair Campbell. It is surely clear to one and all that this oaf was forced to resign after an attack on the B.B.C. of such ferocity that it made Normal Tebbit’s example seem reasonable by comparison for the sole and explicit reason that T. Blair could then point to the empty chair Campbell had once farted and sworn in when the Grim Reaper knocked on the door, or perhaps stood respectfully at the security gate. However, the Grim Reaper has found himself bound and gagged by Hutton and released in the B.B.C. instead, where he has taken the opportunity to decapitate the figureheads.

So here we are, and there it is. Even paid-up cynics and contemptible anarchists such as myself are left gasping in wonder at the sheer audacity of the operation to date. Next time crisis looms (for what else does it ever do?) the cry will ring out from the comfy battlements of British authority “Press the Hutton button”, whereupon we can all sink back into our comfortable stupor.

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© Winamop & The Doktor 2004

Read old page 94s here.

 

© Winamop 2004