Flannelled Fool – Hillsborough Smear Out Of Order

For many politicians in and around the city of Liverpool, working to right the injustices done to the memory of the 96 football supporters who lost their lives in the Hillsborough disaster is a lifetime’s hard work, a necessary obligation to their community. For some of the less principled, though, the campaign is an opportunity to indulge in point-scoring and smearing.

Hillsborough memorial at Anfield

One such unprincipled individual is the odious flannelled fool Henry Cole, tame gofer to the perpetually thirsty Paul Staines at the Guido Fawkes blog, who has decided for little reason, other than the thought that he may be a soft target, to use the occasion of the release of a single to raise money for the victims’ families’ legal costs to put the boot in on Liverpool Walton MP Steve Rotheram.

Smear lined up ...

Cole needed merely to observe Rotheram smiling for the camera to start his gratuitous smear: “Grinning just a little too much there Steve, you’re giving the game away” he sneered. And why should he not smile for the shot? “Maybe because [he] is seemingly using death of innocent people to further his career” was the flannelled fool’s snarky and just plain nasty conclusion.

... smear executed ...

And, just to show he really could sink that bit lower, Cole then latched on to a Twitter comment that one fan had actually carried his dead brother on the Hillsborough pitch (the single is He’s Not Heavy, He’s My Brother of Hollies’ fame), to double down “If so ... it makes the grin all the worse. Thanks for confirming my worst fears”. So the accusation he was levelling at the MP was crystal clear.

... smear doubled down

In the world of the flannelled fool, he sees a tireless campaigner to see justice for the Hillsborough families, someone born in the Anfield district of Liverpool (which, for the uninitiated in these matters, has some significance), and who opened the October 2011 debate in the Commons which contributed to the recent admissions of wrongdoing and apologies, as someone who is in it only for his own career.

I don't have to say sorry, cos I'm on telly!

And that totally misunderstands Steve Rotheram, who has majored on the Hillsborough campaign, but is a back-bencher and I suspect would not mind remaining one. Not for him the constant eyeing of the greasy pole like some on both sides of the Commons. Moreover, it has been no surprise to see Rotheram taking great exception to this vicious and premeditated smear.

It's not fair! I'm a victim!!

So how has Cole taken the news that Rotheram is considering action over the remarks (one can only imagine how angry he will be)? “They are ... going to court to silence me” he blubs, thus confirming Olbermann’s dictum that “The right exists in a perpetual state of victimhood”. It’s everyone else’s fault bar his. It’s only free speech. He’s only saying what everyone else is thinking – except of course they aren’t.

Cole is bang out of order. But shits like him don’t do apology unless forced into it.