Tuesday, August 23, 2011

Louise Mensch fibs while Libya burns

The people of Libya are at a crucial point in their history as the rest of the world looks on praying that the Gaddafi regime doesn't have a sting in the tail.

The rest of the world minus Louise Mensch of course. As the TNC rebels massed outside Tripoli and what's hopefully the endgame played itself out everyone's favourite chick-lit author turned A-List selected MP was busy tweeting like a political groupie and proclaiming it a "Genuine Triumph for David Cameron" whilst bizarrely inventing a paralell universe where Ed Miliband opposed the Libyan intervention. See here

This brought about the usual storm of twitter derision but it is very sad considering A: People are still fighting and dying for freedom in Libya and B: Ed made a strong speech supporting the NATO action from the off (As showed in the links below)

http://www.newstatesman.com/blogs/the-staggers/2011/03/labour-iraq-miliband-support

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/mar/14/libya-no-fly-zone-hague

Good to see the people at Political scrapbook ar taking her to task

http://politicalscrapbook.net/2011/08/louise-mensch-libya-smear/


Mensch’s “memory” of this incident appears to be a rather imaginative work of fiction. A quick search of Hansard reveals no such mockery in any of the seven occasions Miliband has mentioned the no fly zone. In fact, he could hardly have been more supportive of the idea:

28 February: “We welcome what the Prime Minister said about a possible no-fly zone.”

14 March: “when the Prime Minister first publicly floated the idea of a no-fly zone two weeks ago, that we welcomed the possibility. It is disappointing that Friday’s communiqué did not mention it … it seems to us that the priority must be to translate the no-fly zone phrase into a practical plan.”

28 March: “I welcome the fact that the military operation to enforce the no-fly zone and protect civilians is showing signs of success.”

I wonder if this shows a desperation amongst The Tories after recent travails. Regardless it is pretty grubby and we await a retraction.

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