The Lord Levy saga...

The Herald:

"Lord Levy last night claimed he was the victim of a smear campaign by unnamed figures who wanted him to be the fall-guy of Scotland Yard's cash-for-honours inquiry.

Tony Blair's chief fundraiser delivered an angry riposte to claims he had encouraged another suspect in the police investigation to change her evidence. As the 61-year-old peer was thrust yet again into the spotlight, he complained of being the victim of a "media-style trial".

The latest twist in what one MP dubbed "a soap opera of an investigation" came after the Guardian successfully defeated an attempt by the Attorney General Lord Goldsmith to halt a story in which it said detectives were investigating whether Lord Levy urged Ruth Turner, the Prime Minister's gatekeeper, to "shape the evidence" she gave to the police..."

No doubt about it there is a faction somewhere that sees Levy in particular as a deeply sinister and corrupting figure, and we must take a seriously grave view of someone who has been so intimately tied to Blair, who has been funding this vile party to create these wars, create this crushing police state, but I think we have to be realistic about this too.

You've got a whole range of characters in and associated with the Labour party who are nasty dangerous sick people: pro-war of agression, pro-Orewllian police state, pro-'big lie', pro-deconstruction of society, pro-seizing private assets through a kind of Fabian incrementalism and I'm not sure it is clear that they are all under the thumb of Lord Levy as is sometimes being implied with this scandal.

Look I've really laid into this character and he deserves anything he gets, but my take on this right now, right at this moment, is that Levy, important as he may be, may have been made expendable, possibly he's just not that important anymore and despite whatever trouble he could genuinely be facing, he may be being wielded within that by the regime and its supporters, as a kind of relase valve for the far more serious and multi-layered crisis going on in the UK and a way of keeping the crap game going. On the other hand it is a direct attempt to dismantle Blair and his vile government as well, so we'll see how this plays out....

Lord Levy cash-for-peerages New Labour Blair