George Galloway's imaginary reflection on his television programme

Following the first episode of George Galloway's new television programme, we imagined him reflecting on how it went.*

Al-Salamu Aleykom.

Al-hamdullilah today we have completed the first episode of my new show at Al-Mayadeen television channel, for which I will be receiving £3000 per episode. The money will go towards buying more houses that I can name after important moments in the history of the Palestinian struggle inshallah. Perhaps a villa on the French Riviera. There’s so much more that I can do for Palestine, like I keep reminding Syrians.

When the producers of the show first contacted me, I was a bit anxious. ‘Would I have to wear a tight-fitting bodysuit and pretend to be a cat?’ Somebody had told me that was haram. Also, that it made it look like I would do anything for money. They reassured me that wouldn’t be the case, I would just have to be myself. Well, not exactly myself, I decided Arabs would like me more if I pretended to be Eli Wallach playing an Arab in a spaghetti western. But for some reason, they didn’t like it when I came in dressed as Lawrence of Arabia. The headdress had to go and the camel had to wait outside.

I decided to run the discussion with the audience according to my time-tested method of ‘you speak, then I speak and tell you not to speak over me, then I speak some more.’ It’s very irritating when people don’t idolise me and agree with everything I say. Especially after I bothered putting on my fake Arab accent for their benefit. And I alone speak haq. I’m not quite sure what haq really means because I don’t speak Arabic, but I find that it has an intimidating effect.

Some criticised me for lamenting the lack of jihad in certain countries while denouncing jihadists in Syria. They said that it was a logical contradiction. But what do they know of logic? Like Saddam used to say to me, consistency is a trait of the weak. The strong don’t bother with logic and rely on a well-modulated voice and a well-groomed luxuriant moustache. Valuable advice.

Some faulted me for saying that Syrians should start a revolution in Saudi Arabia first instead of joining the Zionist-Salafist-American-Saudi-Qatari conspiracy against their own country. They said people should start with their own countries. But look at me, I have never done anything for Scotland or my constituents in Britain. How glamorous it is to deal with people complaining about jobs and the such when I could be jetting from place to place denouncing global conspiracies? That is haq.

Al-hamdullilah I also had a chance to explain my position about dictators, which has caused many controversies in the past. The late Kim Jong-il had taught me about an important traditional Korean concept, the ung-ma. It’s a rhetorical device that’s useful for confusing your audience. I said I am not with dictators, but is it my fault that their enemies are worse than them? They leave me no option but to hang out with those dictators over a nice Cuban cigar.

I have now quit smoking cigars, along with alcohol which I have never drank before in my life. One must make some sacrifices in order to maintain the support of Arabs and Muslims who are by nature puritanical and averse to worldly evils and easily convinced with gestures like that. Although I never understood how could ‘alcohol’ be an Arabic word. Somebody even told me that there is a rich tradition of Arabic poetry about drinking, but that does not fit with my oversimplified view of Arabs.

It’s like I said once “I have more faith in the Arabs than the Arabs do!” They are too drunk with the fumes of crude oil to see what’s best for them. It’s this alone that explains the reluctance among some of them to follow me unquestioningly. What could be a more natural expression of Arabs’ faith in themselves than blindly following a Scottish politician that reinvents himself every few years?

But with the help of Allah, I now have this valuable television programme which will allow me to reach a wider audience. Perhaps we might discuss sexual politics next time, my views will no doubt be received very well by Arabs.

*Because we know that George is very litigious, (can he sue me for saying that?),  we would like to emphasise that this is an imaginary article. But it still could have been written by George himself.

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