Last Straw

A huge con­tro­versy has blown up in the UK after a couple of comedi­ans made a lewd phone call and it was broad­cast on BBC radio. The broad­cast received two single com­plaints on the day but after The Mail on Sunday lead with the story a week later that even­tu­ally bal­looned into the tens of thousands.

As of tonight one of the comedi­ans has resigned, one is sus­pen­ded for twelve weeks and a senior BBC man­ager has also resigned.

The pub­lic out­rage has more to do, prob­ably, with their obscene pay pack­ets than the any­thing else but what I find so repuls­ive about all this is the con­trast between the account­ab­il­ity of people involved in a petty prank and the account­ab­il­ity of people involved in the unspeak­ably more hor­rendous mat­ter of the inva­sion of Iraq.

Here we have a silly but ulti­mately harm­less prank gone wrong. A few com­plain and people are apo­lo­gising and resign­ing left right and centre.

Tony Blair, Gor­don Brown and mob launch a war of aggres­sion, the “supreme war crime,” on a pack of lies, res­ult­ing in the destruc­tion of a coun­try and untold people’s lives des­troyed or ended. The largest protest in human his­tory ensues and not only have these people never apo­lo­gised, resigned or been brought to justice but a plur­al­ity of Brit­ish voters re-elected them.