George Galloway hasn't disappeared

Pendennis in the Observer on Sunday, tells the story of George Galloway's visit to Vietnam as a young MP who met with various local dignitaries who recalled the comrades they'd lost during the war. Their stories prompted the young George (now 51) to say he admired his hosts because they, like him, had suffered in the struggle against American imperialism. "I was kicked by a police horse during a protest outside the US embassy in Grosvenor Square,"

According to the Scotsman today GG (now the MP for Bethnal Green and Bow) will be carrying his fight into the heartland of the enemy where he is "set for a money-spinning speaking tour of America's Ivy League colleges" at £5,000 a pop, including Harvard, Princeton and Yale.

He is sure of a welcome according to the South Asia Tribune, "The paper you can Trust" published in Washington, who claim - "He has straddled on the waves of greatness on the wings of causes that demand justice and fair play. What profound devotion and commitment his sincerity voluntarily evokes was writ large on every face of his multi-nation, multi-ethnic, multi-religious followers who had jam packed the Friends Hall at Euston Square, May 18, in their enthusiasm to welcome back their hero after he had singed the holy beards with the filth of their lies in the insulated Senatorial four walls of Capitol Hill in Washington."

BBC listeners and viewers in Scotland have of course benefited from the reporting of GG's Senate triumph ( GG described as "Braveheart" ?) by Bob Wylie.

His presence in Washington begs two questions: why in the current climate of cost cuts, did BBC Scotland send its own man when the BBC’s Washington correspondent, Clive Myrie, was already there .... and more than up to the job?

If BBC Scotland sent anyone, why Wylie? A friend of Galloway who received an acknowledgement in Galloway’s entertaining and "fully authorised" autobiography?(< left)

Full transcript and access to complete video of GG's Senate testimony at Bellaciao