Oona King

[RogueTrooper]

I, for one, was glad when I heard that scumbag George Galloway would no longer be representing a Scottish constituency. Shame he has turned up in East London...

snip...

Labour MP Oona King claims Muslim voters are being told not to vote for her because she is Jewish.

Ms King, who is in a bitter battle with anti-war candidate George Galloway for her Bethnal Green and Bow constituency, was speaking after being pelted with eggs as she joined mourners at a memorial to the Jewish war dead in the East End.

One of the eggs hit a war veteran in the chest, while an onion hit a bugler sounding the Last Post at the ceremony.

http://www.thisislondon.com/news/articles/17843145?source=Evening%20Standar

RespectWatch has some more.

http://respectwatch.blogspot.com/

[Englander]

1. You do realise that Oona is going to lose?

The only people who are going to benefit from
this contest are their respective lawyers;

"The contest between the pair in the once safe Labour seat has become deeply personal. Ms King, 37, last month paid Mr Galloway's legal costs and made a £1,000 donation to charity over allegations she made in a press release about sexual impropriety."

Guardian Politics

Edited to correct link.

[RogueTrooper]

2. You need to edit your link

it has a double http:// in the title.

What makes you think Oona is going to loose?

[Englander]

3. Thanks,I cleaned it up.

Well,she deserves to if the Labour campaign managers think
that a bitter libelous attack on an opponent is a wise way
to win an election.

On a lot of issues I'd have thought I'd agree with Oona,
& it's a shame that Iraq & her support for the war negates that.
Looking at this MP's voting record shows that she is,in fact,a very loyal Blarite.

The Public Whip

[T_i_B]

18. Bethnal Green & Bow

The constituency in question is one of the safest Labour seats going. (which is partly why Oona King was parachuted into it in 1997). It would be hard to think of a more deprived constituency then Bethnal Green, which is partly why it came to be a safe Labour seat and also part of the attraction for a hard left party such as RESPECT as it should be fertile ground for their policies.

It's no suprise that this should be the spot for George Galloway's carpetbagging but he really does have an uphill task to unseat Oona King.

[muriel_volestrangler]

19. RESPECT says they came top in the constituency votes in the Euro elections

The figures show that in the EU ballot Respect topped the poll with 30.2 percent of the vote, New Labour were second on 24.5 percent, the Lib Dems were third on 23.9 percent and the Tories trailed in nine points behind Respect on 21.3 percent of the vote.

http://www.activistnetwork.org.uk/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=125

which is why, I think, Galloway chose it as his new constituency, rather than trying to contest a Glasgow seat. It's interesting that in the European elections, 4 parties got a credible amount of the vote.

[Vladimir]

4. That scumbag George Galloway?

you mean the same one that won his libel case? Its funny how none of these people who attack George can ever back up their attacks in a court of law, or indeed explain what they were doing during the 80s when he was one of a very few people who knew, let alone cared, about the crimes of Saddam Hussein comitted largely with WMDs supplied by the West.

This thread has a decent enough discussion on George and the Iraqi regime, as well as other things about RESPECT:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=191&topic_id=1626&mesg_id=1626

And that respectwatch site is pretty funny when it says RESPECT is focusing all of its energies on Bethnel Green and Bow. We had 40 activists in Slough both days last weekend canvassing and leafletting in the constituency and we will have the same every weekend and some weekdays until the election. Meanwhile, the local Labour party was paying 15 year old kids to do its leafletting. Similar work is being done in each constituency we are standing in. For an 'independant' website, they certainly have a funny agenda...

[RogueTrooper]

5. Aye, that scumbag

Having spent my formative political years in Scottish politics I have no illusions regarding Mr. Galloway. Or his effectivness as a politician. I think the hit job the avataring Telegraph tried on him was pretty scummy but that still does not make me a fan of old Mr. Galloway.

RESPECT - The SWP front end? Well I have seen the SWP use anti-semitism before in campaign leaflets. I am sure it makes them popular with their new found friends the Islamic extreemists.

[Vladimir]

6. If you can find one piece of RESPECT material

which is anti-semitic, I would love to see it. Otherwise, please don't make accusations which would be laughable if they weren't so serious.

[Michael_UK]

7. We know that there are links between RESPECT and muslim extremists

http://www.whataretheysaying.org/archives/000972.html

[Vladimir]

9. Links? How about credible proof that RESPECT has

one single policy against gays or women? And in fact we of course don't, indeed quite the opposite.

I would direct you to:

http://www.respectcoalition.org/pdf/041103_resolutions.pdf

in particular Motion 57: Gay Pride.

Motion 57: Gay Pride – Tyneside
This conference welcomes the production of a Respect leaflet for London Pride.

It supports the policies outlined in that leaflet i.e.

· An end to discrimination against lesbians, gay men, bisexuals and
transgender people

· For Equal partnership and pension rights

· For strong policies to tackle homophobia in all public bodies

· For an increase in public services that meet the needs of lesbians, gay men bisexuals and transgendered people, rather than money wasted on war.

Conference instructs the incoming National Committee to produce similar material for all Pride events next year and urges local groups to make sure the material is distributed at events in their area.

[Englander]

12. Do you think that MAB is an "extremist" organisation?

So,why are they involved in Operation Black Vote,along
with the National Black Police Association,& the Society of Black Lawyers?

Why are they mentioned in a news article on the BBC,with a link to the MAB web-site?


BBC Article;

" Muslims' liberties 'being eroded'

The civil liberties of Muslims have been eroded since the war on terror began, a Scottish spokesman has said.

Osama Saeed, of the Muslim Association of Great Britain, said hundreds of Muslims had been arrested under terror laws only to be released soon after.

He said threats such as Hogmanay bombings in Edinburgh had been "bogus".

His comments came after a House of Commons report recommended involving the Muslim community in the next stage of tackling terrorism in the UK. "

More at;
BBC News


A Guardian article;

"We need race minister to fight inequality, say campaigners

Special report: election countdown | Special report: home affairs


We need race minister to fight inequality, say campaigners

Tania Branigan and Ali Hussain
Friday April 1, 2005
The Guardian

Campaigners yesterday called for the introduction of a race minister as they launched a manifesto demanding equality for black and ethnic minority communities.

The initiative, organised by Operation Black Vote (OBV), is designed to push race-related issues higher up the agenda in the run-up to the election.

The manifesto calls for high-achieving schools, colleges and universities to have legally binding intake quotas for low-income black and ethnic minority children.

>snip

The coalition - which includes organisations such as the National Black Police Association, the Muslim Association of Britain and the Society of Black Lawyers - hopes voters will use its manifesto and pledge card to press candidates on race issues."

More at;
Guardian Unlimited

[Michael_UK]

13. I'm sure they have extremist elements

The point is that those on the far-left, in their opposition to the war have got themselves tied up with some pretty nasty characters, who oppose almost everything people on the left should stand for

[Englander]

15. What,like CND,& the NBPA?

How do you know MAB has "extremist elements"? Why would CND,& the Beeb,&tc,
have anything to do with a group that has "extremist elements"?

btw,the Exit Zero blog you posted as "evidence" links to Little Green Footballs,
Mark Steyn,& Protest Warrior amongst others.They really do hate the left.

Apologies for all the acronymns:-)

[RogueTrooper]

8. I said I have seen the SWP use anti-semetic material

in the past. As RESPECT is nothing but a front for the SWP I fully expect the same mentality to be there. I never said RESPECT have produced anti-semetic material.

Others have, however.

[Vladimir]

10. If she can prove any of this, I would be quite amazed

I take the issue of anti-semitism very seriously indeed, Sir, not least because my great-grandmother died in a Nazi concentration camp. So you appreciate that I will not stand for this kind of slander if I do not see proof of it - and calling us an SWP front-end and talking about what you have 'seen' ain't gonna cut it.

[RogueTrooper]

11. Then you should look a little more closely

at who your friends are then. Of course RESPECT are a front for the SWP. They work out of the same offices for goodness sake. Here are the results of a Google search based upon the inputs RESPECT SWP

http://www.google.ie/search?q=RESPECT+SWP&sourceid=mozilla-search&start=0&start=0&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&client=firefox-a&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official

Here is a nice article from those comrades at the Weekly Worker about the whole thing.

www.cpgb.org.uk/worker/551/respect%20-%20const.htm

Having been in organisations that have had fight back entryism from the the hard left in general and the SWP in particular I find the whole thing very believable.

[Vladimir]

14. I note that there is still no proof of anti-semitism anywhere

as for the SWP thing - yeah sure, the SWP is a large part of RESPECT. But you might note that out of the 48 national council members, only 9 are SWP members - hardly some sort of controlling majority. In my branch, we have ex-CPB, ex-Labour, people like me who previously had no political affiliation etc., and believe it or not we do not recieve our orders by dictat from the SWP. The fact that certain left groups like the CPGB (presumably the same hard-left you 'fought back') have a problem with RESPECT is hardly an earth-shattering revelation, but these people were standing outside the national conference before it ever began slagging RESPECT off to the public and calling it undemoratic. If that's an attempt to engage, I am a horse's arse.

I can entirely understand that you might not support RESPECT, for whatever reason. But if you are going to call people scumbags and anti-semites, I would suggest you raise your standard of proof a little bit, for the sake of credibility if nothing else.

[RogueTrooper]

16. I did not call RESPECT anti-semites

I said that, in the past, I had witnessed the SWP using anti-semitism in their campaign litrature. That was a long time before RESPECT came into being. I also said that I had not seen any anti-semitic litrature produced by RESPECT. I said that others have accused RESPECT of seeking electoral gain from anti-semitism. These allegations have been reported by the UK's commercial media. As far as I am aware this has not been refuted by RESPECT. You asked for proof of anti-semitism: This is the proof that I cite.

As for calling people scumbags; I assume you meant RESPECT member? I did not call RESPECT members scumbags I called George Galloway a scumbag.

[T_i_B]

21. CPGB?

At the time of the anti-way protests in 2003 they were still part of the Socialist Alliance (albeit a part that spent most of its time bitching about the SWP.) Have they buggered off since then? It is noticable how fond the far left parties are of bashing each other.

And have the Socialist Party (aka the old Militant tendency) left RESPECT? I never know if they are in or out of it.

Socialist solidarity is something of a joke in my experience I have to say I'm afraid.

[RogueTrooper]

22. The far left are never happy than when fighting over

the placement of a comma. Too much student politics for maturity to intrude I am afraid.

[T_i_B]

17. Oona King is hardly cleaner then clean herself!

Any guesses as to what Oona King will do with these postal votes? Mind you, we always knew that it was going to get dirty in Bethnal Green & Bow didn't we?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/vote_2005/england/4438529.stm

Bethnal Green and Bow Labour candidate Oona King has defended her use of a postal vote mailshot her Respect party rival George Galloway says is illegal.

Ms King says the postal vote application form with a hand-written note asking for it to be sent back to her office is within guidelines.

Mr Galloway had called it "dangerous to the operation of local democracy". He argued the forms should be sent to the local returning officer instead, at a Respect press conference in Bishopsgate, east London.

Mr Galloway called the campaign "a desperate New Labour machine resorting to smear, resorting to tactics on postal voting that must be close to illegal, if not illegal". He said Respect was taking legal advice. The other prospective parliamentary candidates support Mr Galloway's views.

[Guy_Montag]

20. She was successfully sued by GG

for claiming he sexually harrassed her.

edited: because html doesn't work in the title

[SweetLeftFoot]

23. Warmongering

Blair babe deserves everything she gets. Rather it wasn't from Galloway but there you go.

BTW - she happily accuses him (falsely) of sexual harrassment and then cries anti-semitism at the first opportunity.

I didn't even know (or care) that she was Jewish until she brought it up.

[T_i_B]

24. VERY interesing article about this

by Johnathan Freedland of the Guardian

http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,3604,1461183,00.html

Among the dignitaries at the service was the local MP, Oona King. When she spoke, she attacked the "ignorance" of the assailants and insisted that their real target was her. Later she repeated the claim to newspapers, suggesting the attack was part of an increasingly vicious contest between herself and George Galloway, who is seeking to win Bethnal Green and Bow for his anti-war Respect party.

Indeed, the episode became part of a new escalation in hostilities between the two candidates which would later include King's charge -emphatically denied - that Respect activists were seeking to whip up Muslim antagonism against her by highlighting her Jewish background.

I was there and I must confess it did not look like an attack on Oona King to me. She was not especially visible, and no slogans were chanted or words uttered - as surely they would have been if this was merely a stance against King's support of the Iraq war.

Most of those there thought it much more straightforward. They believed this was an attack by Muslims on Jews. After all, the men wore skullcaps, the prayers were in Hebrew. There was no doubt who they were.

[Sto]

25. Hi

I'd disagree with Myleftfoot.
I think that Oona King was saying that he had been accused of sexually harassing women, which he had, not harassing her personally.
Also, I think that she claimed that she had been told by people that operatives of RESPECT had told them not to vote for her because she's Jewish, something not beyond the realms of possibility given some of his supporters.
I think it is a very difficult call wanting to punish the government over the war and other things, which i very much want to do, when Oona King is largely loyal to the government and on the payrioll vote as a PPS.
However, voting for George Galloway is more difficult. Why on earth did he call for Tariq Aziz to be released witout charge last week and laud him as a great diplomat and thinker etc? Mr Aziz was up to his neck in the far-reaching blood-drenched crimes of the Hussein regime and could have defected at any time. I've got much respect for those who opposed the war for various reasons but actually attempted to put forward some kind of alternative method of curtailing the behaviour of such an evil regime. Does anyone seriously believe that George Galloway has ever put forward any ideas on this score? He claims to have always been opposed to the regime, but what has he done to oppose it? How could he sit there scoffing Quality Streets with the man who ran torture chambers for his own amusement? Don't the victims of Saddam Husein deserve more of a mention here? Mr Galloway has allowed his visceral detestation of America (part of which i agree with, being on the left) to warp his mind to such an extent that he despises the Americans more than psychopaths like Saddam Hussein. I'm afraid to say that in my view he is an appeaser of Stalinist regimes, pure and simple. I hope that Oona King- who has a long record of opposing dictators and the kind of genocide of which Saddam Hussein was guilty- defeats him comprehensively.

[Englander]

26. First off,welcome to DU....

:hi:

--I'd disagree with Myleftfoot.

The name of the poster is "SweetLeftFoot".

--when Oona King is largely loyal to the government and on the payrioll vote as a PPS.

No,I'd say Ms King is completely loyal,since she's on the payroll as a PPS to Patricia Hewitt. Loyalty=Government job.

As for the fiery rhetoric,all very entertaining,
but nothing more than that,& it's all your opinion,
not claims based on actual history.

http://www.iraqbodycount.net/