Friday, January 11, 2008

What is the Difference Between Tony Blair and a Mafia Boss?

One (a) portrays himself as a man of the people and guardian of the community, but extorts large amounts of money from businesses and individuals under the guise of protecting them against future perils whilst actually accumulating vast wealth for himself and his family, (b) is indirectly implicated in the deaths of many people to promote his interests although he is never present at the killings, and (c) assuages his conscience with a superficial adherence to the Catholic church.

The other is an Italian thug.

(sent to me by a reader)

23 comments:

Old BE said...

You thought he was on holiday in Tuscany all those times?

Anonymous said...

I think passing this on is a bit unworthy of you frankly. And I speak as a Tory who opposed most of the things that Blair did. The analogy, even as a joke, is totally off beam in almost every particular.

Anonymous said...

I'm finding it quite depressing that this man lied to parliament, was involved in war crimes, was party to the death David Kelly, selling peerages and more and is now able to profit from it all and there is not a system in place to bring him to trial. And yet if I were to be unable to pay my taxes etc I would be hauled before the courts. What is this country coming to?

Paul Linford said...

Well, he certainly left a few horses heads in Gordon's bed...

Anonymous said...

Omerta.

No memoirs.

But as Omerta is a code of "honour" Toady will publish. Could you imagine him keeping silent? if only we had never heard of him in the first place.

AloneMan said...

I like that, Iain; I think that's very funny.

Thank you for brightening my abject day.

Anonymous said...

Dr Kelly sleeps with the fishes.

Alex said...

Very drole. I saw the punchline coming, but I still had to wipe the coffee from my keyboard after I read it.

Anonymous said...

I agree with Londoner @ 1125. Very unworthy of you Mr D.

Man uses connections to take job earning pot loads of cash - he ain't the first and he certainly won't be the last, I seem to remember one Sir J Major quickly making it onto the board at Carlysle Group...

As for being indirectly responsible for killing, I'm categorically not a Lawyer, but that has my slander bells ringing!

Iain Dale said...

Well it made my laugh anyway. Sorry if others have had a sense of humour bypass.

Anonymous said...

Also to be aplied to Blair, & others of his ilk .....

What's the difference between a catfish and a lawyer?

One's a scum-sucking bottom feeder; the other's a catfish.

Anonymous said...

I am often sickened by some of the things said re politicians and by politicians - but joke or not that is the way many of us think about TB!

Very nice to swan off to USA leaving death and destruction behind you and a ruined country!

Anonymous said...

What a bunch of wussies @1:38 & 11:25. It is both achingly funny and painfully accurate:

(a) Let us not forget that Blair was the head of the Labour (yes the UK socialist party) until a few months ago. The credo of that party is to generally improve the lot of the poorer members of society to a great extent regardless of the broader impact on the economy (viz. the results of socialism whenever it has been tried). Now that he has stepped down from being PM he has gone to one of the names on Wall Street most synonymous with freewheeling capitalism during the last 100 years.

(b) I think the reference is to the Iraq War, not to Dr. Kelly. There is no doubt that there was no strong intelligence about WMD and Blair clearly took the country to war knowing that people would be killed on both sides. I have lost friends on both sides of the war and its aftermath (and no sign of any WMD). We may have got rid of Saddam, but you can't bring back lost friends.

(c) As a mainstream CofE christian I find Blair's behaviour appalling and quite contrary to Christian teaching (e.g. Matt 6:5 et seq.). I don't know of any christians who see a christian motive behind his actions.

anthonynorth said...

And don't forget he has Cherie's head in bed with him, too.

Anonymous said...

Well, the next time some NuLab MP starts whining during a media interview about City boys with big bonuses, I suggest Blair's name be flung back at them.

Anonymous said...

I don't know why Blair did one thing, and only one thing, right. It must have been in error. But going into Iraq was critical. Of course, he did it on a lie because he doesn't know any other way, but it was still the right thing to do.

I wonder how long that NYC bank will be enamoured with him, btw? I give it a year, max. And what happened to the job of Middle Eastern potentate? Did Condoleezza Rice sack him? I suspect she did.

Paddy Briggs said...

Iain

Nasty and unworthy. Have you ever been to Sicily? Please don't feel that you have to descend to the level of some of your contributors.

gadfly said...

To assuage your conscience, first of all, you must have one.

Tony Blair has probably embraced the Catholic faith in order to improve his CV in view of applying for the EU presidency job.

I do hope he's just a hypocrite - those leaders who genuinely believe they are divinely inspired, are the most dangerous.

Anonymous said...

Iain, you might have made this post easier to read by putting a colon after the first word of the answer 'One: (a)...'. Also, the comma before the 'and (c)' is superfluous.

At least, with declining education standards, bad grammar makes you sound young!

Anonymous said...

"There is no doubt that there was no strong intelligence about WMD"

There is rarely strong intelligence about anything. Every intelligence agency in the world believed Iraq had WMD. That would be the WMD that got moved to Syria while Blair farted around with the UN nonsense.

Anonymous said...

Anonymous said...
"Iain, you might have made this post easier to read by putting a colon after the first word of the answer .....bad grammar makes you sound young!"

Iain makes it clear that these are someone else's words (and punctuation).

Anonymous said...

A mafia boss called "Tony"? Whoever heard of such a thing.

Anonymous said...

So Blair is a banker?
http://neoclassics.blogspot.com/