Hitchens VS Galloway? A Clash of the Apprentices

There was a minor stir in the blogosphere the other day at the prospect of a debating match between George Galloway and Christopher Hitchens in New York on Sept. 14th. It should be interesting - two reasonably intelligent men who are both, unfortunately, totally wrong and totally convinced of their own importance to life, the universe and everything.

However, George and Christopher are mere impertinent youngsters compared to the Masters - still at the "wax on, wax off" stage. If American audiences want to see live the kind of healthy democratic debate that goes on in the British parliament every day then someone should book a couple of the greats.

May I suggest to some enterprising Don King of debating the following candidates for the heavyweight championship:

The Conservative Party's resident loony Norman "Frankenstein" Tebbit - serially infamous for describing tory Lord Heseltine as a "serial Conservative assasin", for saying immigrants should learn cricket if they were to be regarded as truly British and for exorting the masses of unemployed his Mistress Thatcher created to "get on their bikes" in search of non-existant work. Here's another sample of his vitriol from 1997, attacking Lord Heseltine again:

As a Right-winger, Lord Tebbit blamed Mr Heseltine for Lady Thatcher's downfall. The Deputy Prime Minister, he wrote, was a man of "no great political insight but a shrewd political operator driven by ambition rather than idealism". He was undone by his failure to understand Lady Thatcher, whom Mr Heseltine also resented, Lord Tebbit said.

"At the roots of his hostility is a macho streak which sees only a subservient role for women, however talented, and a resentment that a woman achieved the supreme office which he coveted and which was denied him," he said. This attitude was exacerbated by the fact that Mr Heseltine was "like a laser-guided weapon" targeted on the office of Prime Minister.

Having chronicled Mr Heseltine's calculated rise, Lord Tebbit said of the biography: "Readers are left to reach their own conclusions on Michael Heseltine's personal values, his ethics and what, aside from personal ambition, has driven him forward. At times his conduct has been tasteless, tacky if not dishonourable, and self-centred beyond even the call of his profession."

Beautiful.

Tony "The Red" Benn - the only man ever to give up a hereditary peerage so that he could become a leftwing Labour MP. Now that's dedication for you. Here he is in the Gurdian today with an article entitled "Bush is the real threat":

Some influential Americans appear to be convinced that the US will attack Iran. Whether they are right or not, the build-up to a new war is taking exactly the same form as it did in 2002. First we are being told that Iran poses a military threat, because it may be developing nuclear weapons. We are assured that the President is hoping that diplomacy might succeed through the European negotiations which have been in progress for some months...

...That may be the position now, and I fear that if a US attack does take place, the prime minister will give it his full support. And one of his reasons for doing so will be the same as in Iraq: namely the fear that, if he alienates Bush, Britain's so-called independent deterrent might be taken away. For, as I also learned when I was energy secretary, Britain is entirely dependent on the US for the supply of our Trident warheads and associated technology. They cannot even be targeted unless the US switches on its global satellite system.

Therefore Britain could be assisting America to commit an act of aggression under the UN Charter, which could risk a major nuclear disaster, and doing so supposedly to prevent nuclear proliferation, with the real motive of making it possible for us to continue to break the NPT in alliance with America.

The irony is that we might be told that Britain must support Bush, yet again, because of the threat of weapons of mass destruction, thus allowing him to kill even more innocent civilians.

Come on, wouldn't you pay to see the clash of the titans?

Yes, both these examples are from outwith the House, but just tune to BBC America's coverage of Westminister to see that even worse is said and done in the mother of parliaments every day. To be honest, I think America loses something from the democratic process when its House and Senate are so sedate and mutually respectful face to face yet so nasty outwith the hall of debate. That's why the Hitchens/Galloway debate has stirred so much interest.