DavidGig wrote:How does Parliament work? Do MPs submit drafts of their questions ahead of time to the government, or was Hoon just improvising his response?
Hoon wouldn't have the brains to improvise a response. He was reading 5 or 6 sides of A4 paper verbatim, and even stuttering some of it. I can only conclude from that that he knew in advance the gist of what George was going to say, and had one of his more talented monkey-boys drum up a waffle-script for him.
(By the way, I'm as cynical as the next guy but I get the impression that Imran Khan is someone who perhaps really deserves the label "hero." Is his face pretty common on British media?)
heres the talk where galloway got the blair quote from
Press Conference with the Pakistani President
19 November 2006
(Snippet)
Tony Blair: "And I would like to pay tribute to his courage and his leadership in taking Pakistan on this journey of change and modernisation, but also in so doing symbolising I think the future for Moslem countries the world over and the interesting thing is that in this programme of enlightened moderation, over these past few years I think I am right in saying that the actual income per head of the population of Pakistan has around doubled which is a pretty significant achievement and there are many things now happening in health and in education with links with universities."
Read the whole thing at the link, if you can stomach it. And note the contrast with policy toward Iran, which has an elected President, no nuclear weapons and has always opposed the Taliban.
