On Fri, 4 Jun 2010 17:43:53 +0100, Ian Jelf
wrote:
In message , Recliner
writes
At least Boris was sober and sensible
when he made his verbal attack; Ken was filmed often enough making
drunken outbursts that were hard to support (eg, anti-semitic).

Interested to hear your definition of the term "often"?


Only once. But in a right winger's rant against a left-wing former
Mayor, it becomes pluralised.

I think the accusation arose because a certain journalist on the
London Evening Standard who was known to be virulently
anti-Livingstone persistently provoked Ken on successive days. Ken
asked why the journalist was hounding him on a daily basis - which the
journalist freely admitted he was - and the reply was that he was only
doing what he had been told to do by his bosses (Associated
Newspapers). Ken's response was something along the lines of "So you
are only following orders? The concentration camp guards used that
excuse".

The journalist happened to be of Jewish descent, and decided to
carefully spin Ken's remarks in order to accuse Ken of being
anti-Semitic. But there was not the slightest hint of anti-Semitism
in anything Ken had said.

The journalist was Oliver Finegold.

Having been wound up by Finegold, the Board of Deputies of British
Jews made a complaint. It went to the Adjudication Panel for England
(who the h... ?) and they grossly over-reacted, giving Ken a month's
suspension from his position as Mayor. It was such an over-reaction
that the Board of Deputies of British Jews were extremely embarrassed.
They had only wanted an apology. ;-)