I don't think that's true. Galloway acts like a nasty piece of work who has aligned himself with corrupt leaders (Lutfur Rahman) and dictators whilst professing left wing politics.

If it was a simple as Galloway being left wing, then Dennis Skinner would have been routinely lambasted. That he was not, speaks volumes. I met Skinner whilst I was organising a strike 20+ years ago, super guy.

By way of comparison with Dennis Skinner, Galloway comes across as a charlatan who will do anything to stay in the public eye. He is a left wing Katie Holmes: as is Russell Brand.

The man is neither left nor right wing he is a fairly ruthless self publicist who will fly his flag from any mast as long as it guarantees the oxygen of publicity.

He has espoused left wing policies yet also supported some of the worse despotic regimes in the world.

The standing for London mayor is a bit like when he entered the Big Brother house, another cry for public attention.

Ignore him and he might finally go away.

And here I am hoping it was a dead thread.

That, unfortunately, has a historical pedigree among leftists in history (and of course something the right wing hasn't exactly covered itself in glory over).

Politics makes strange bedfellows, often involving threesomes of dictators, tyrants and leading UK politicians.

Of course the British left wing haven't actually made a habit of flogging oppressive regimes the equipment and means of maintaining oppression, tyranny and murder.

That they only offered personal opinions, say rather than flogging military 'defence' equipment to countries such as Saudi Arabia, Indonesia, South American Junta's (Pinochet), Iranian Theocracies (the USA) and so on and so forth.

Also, the left weren't entirely 'Stalin happy', just sadly some of them.