Flannelled Fool Carswell Fail

There were a number of anti-austerity protests in London on Wednesday. At one point, UKIP MP Douglas “Kamikaze” Carswell found himself the target of one group, who shouted abuse and jostled him. The Metropolitan Police escorted him to one of their vans to ensure his safety. Carswell asserted that the experience had left him somewhat shaken. Then the whole business was suitably amplified by one of his “friends”.

Behold the rictus grin of the buffoon Cole

One uses the quote marks advisedly, as the one doing the amplifying was the odious flannelled fool Henry Cole, tame gofer to the perpetually thirsty Paul Staines at the Guido Fawkes blog, who, rather than merely reporting what happened, decided to turn the incident into a slice of lefty-bashing and righteous moralising, with a post titled “Cross-Party Support For Carswell”, and highlighting his presence at the scene.

Yes, Master Cole can be seen in the background, pretending to be cool by wearing shades, and ostentatiously brandishing his gold iPhone, in perhaps unconscious tribute to one of Harry Enfield’s least appealing creations. The post ends with the line “Silence from the left, so far”, as if to suggest that there is some kind of presence out there called “the left”, which encompasses all of those rotten lefties he so dislikes.

Spot the poseur (Photo (c) AFP/Getty)

And it was at that point that the bullshit detector began to sound. If Cole thinks that any one part of the political spectrum has a monopoly on aggressive and intimidating behaviour, he is not, as they are wont to say on Merseyside, dealing from a full deck. Where was his condemnation when Jim Murphy got roughed up? How about when Mil The Younger got the same treatment, or when he had missiles thrown at him?

Moreover, Master Cole is no stranger to deploying intimidatory tactics on others, and at this point I would remind him that I still have that threatening email, thanks, together with the records of the shouty phone call that preceded it. And, as Zelo Street readers will know, he has recently, via his lawyers, issued a legal threat against me. The odious Cole has no room to bleat about intimidation from others.

On top of that, he and his pal Staines are no strangers to dishing out the physical rough stuff themselves, as Adam Bienkov discovered - and captured on video - when the pair barged into a Ken Livingstone photocall outside London Bridge station, which led to a camerawoman being knocked to the ground, and Staines engaging in a Derek and Clive tribute act when he got blocked by one of Livingstone’s team.

Zelo Street deplores intimidatory behaviour, whatever form it takes, and whoever engages in it, whatever their status or political stripe. This blog also deplores hypocrisy, pretentiousness, dishonesty, bullying, boorishness, misinformation, and the deliberate spreading of prejudice and ignorance. So it will surprise no-one to see adverse comment being passed on “pretend journalists” like the odious Cole.

He has no room to call thuggishness and intimidation on anyone else. End of story.