Day 2047: The Fluffiest Bunny in the Whole of Toytown (aka Up, Up, Up the Greasy Pole)

Friday


Isn't it interesting, the way that the same idea goes around?

In this case, the rise and rise of Dr John "not an attack dog" Reid.

I have been thinking of putting my woolly brain to work in order to write about him and suddenly there are a spate of other people getting in ahead of me!

I think this is because Dr John has made a big splash in recent days by SINGLE-HANDEDLY defeating terrorism and making the world a safe place for bunnykins. (Transport CHAOS and panicked responses to CLAUSTROPHOBIA and HAND CREAM notwithstanding!)

Mr Jonathan, Mr Charles and now even Mr Smithson of Political Stirring dot com (not to mention MY DADDY) have all already brought their keen views to bear.

There are several facts that are now WELL KNOWN about this KIND and GENTLE-HEARTED individual.

The first is that calling him an "attack dog" is not only a HORRIBLE CALUMNY but also a sure-fire way to get your throat ripped out a gentle dressing down.

(As everyone knows, a gimlet stare, a reputation for putting pressure on witnesses and the brutal enforcement of the party line is NORMALLY the sign of a political bruiser, but when combined with a GLASGOW ACCENT it is merely an indication of DEEP INNER PEACE.)

The second fact is that he was a member of the Communist Party of Great Britain between 1973 and 1975. Since then he has OF COURSE learned that putting the SECURITY of the STATE above individual freedoms is a sure sign of TOTALITARIANISM and therefore quite wrong. Anyone who thinks that he might have retained such a misguided Marxist philosophy should see fact one.

Of course, the full BANKRUPTCY of the Communist system would not be revealed until the Glasnost or Openness of Mr Gorbachev, but even by the 1970s it had become clear that people in Eastern Europe were so DELIGHTED with their lot under the soviets that their JOY had to be contained by columns of Russian TANKS rolling into Hungry (1956) or Czechoslovakia (1968).

Which, INCIDENTALLY, is where the term TANKIE for people who continued to support the communists after this time comes from.

Dr John has commonly put about the quote: "I used to be a Communist. I used to believe in Santa Claus". That reminds me – has anyone asked him if he STILL believe in Santa Claws?

The third fact that is becoming commonly reported is his three day stay at a luxury hotel as guest of his friend, the war criminal Radovan Karadžić. This was in 1993 at the height of the Balkan War when 70% of Bosnia was occupied by the Serbian Republican Army. Still, no doubt that gave them something to talk about.

Dr John has had an extensive ministerial carreer! He has had lots and lots of experience during his nine jobs in nine years. (Not like certain stick-in-the-mud stay-in-one-job people mentioning no names but he's Chancellor of the Exchequer) Here are all of the exciting things that Dr John has been up to:

• 2 May 1997: became Minister of State for Defence;

• 1998: became Minister for Transport;

• 17 May 1999: became Secretary of State, Scottish Office
  (replaced Mr Donald Dewar, who had resigned to go and be first First Minister);

• 24 Jan 2001: became Secretary of State, Northern Ireland Office
  (replaced Mr Peter Mandelson, who had just resigned over the Hinduja Passport Scandal);

• 24 Oct 2002: became Minister without Portfolio and Party Chair
  (replaced Safety Elephant Charles Clarke, who had to replace Estelle Morris who had just resigned);

• 4 Apr 2003: became Leader of the House of Commons and President of the Council aka. Lord Privy Seal, House of Commons
  (replaced saint Robin of Cook, who had just resigned over the Iraq War);

• 12 Jun 2003: became Secretary of State, Department of Health
  (replaced Mr Alan Milburn, who had just resigned to spend more time with his family);

• 11 May 2005: became Secretary of State, Ministry of Defence
  (replaced Mr Geoff "Buff" Hoon, who was fired for being rubbish);

• 8 May 2006: became Secretary of State, Home Office
  (replaced (again) Safety Elephant Charles Clarke, who was (again) fired for being rubbish);

• 13 July 2007, became Prime Minister
  (replaced Lord Blairimort, who had just resigned after being arrested for the accidental brutal murder of Mr Frown…)

The keen eye may discern a PATTERN emerging!

During one of his longer stints – as Northern Ireland Secretary – he was profiled (that's NOT racially profiled!) by two leading newspapers. All right, by the Independent and the Grauniad. Many of the funny stories about him can be found in these pages, including how none of his terrified colleagues would dare say a bad word about him!

A story that appears in BOTH papers – so no doubt it is one he is PARTICULARLY proud of – is the one about how he was in the bar at the Labour Conference in 1983 and when someone suggested that the party was split by the strife between the Marxists and the non-Marxists he quickly put them right:

"We are the Judean People's Party and the People's Party of Judea are SPLITTERS!" he said.

Such was the laughter that Mr Kinnock himself came down to the bar to appoint Dr John special advisor on the spot. The Labour never looked back and only fourteen short years later that decision PAID OFF!


Since being anointed appointed to the post of Home Secretary, or Minister of Justice, Dr John has made it his practice to protect and support all those working for him with his classic defences of: "it's nae ma fault", "blame the other fella", "let the Talons of Weng-Chiang shred your fleeeeaaaash!" and most famously "they're nae fit for purpose".

Who could ask for a more loving boss?


It is GOOD to know that our civil liberties – and maybe even the running of our country! – are in the hands of a man who would never BULLY or threaten; a man who would never employ NEPOTISM (no matter what the commissioner for standards might have thought); a man of whom it has been said:

"I have known John Reid as a Communist, as a member of the Scottish Labour Party and now as a general in the New Labour Army. His march across this ideological battlefield has been seamless with not a hint of embarrassment."

(that was said by Mr Gorgeous George Pussycat who knows a thing or two about living without a hint of embarrassment!)

Dr John is someone who truly knows the meaning of American statesman BENJAMIN FRANKLIN's words when he said:

"Those who would give up Essential Liberty to purchase a little Temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."



Oh, do not ask him to help out if you are POORLY, though – never mind what he said when being made Health Secretary, his Doctor-hood is in the 19th-century West African slave trade from a Marxist perspective, so he wouldn't know one end of an aspirin from the other.