spiritual healer

Patrick “unseasonably mild” Wintour’s predictably friendly piece on Blair going before the Iraq inquiry is unintentionally disturbing:

No prime minister is indifferent to his or her legacy, and however much he feels stale controversies are being aired with little new public evidence, he knows tomorrow will be important for him, and his future public life as world statesman, Middle East envoy, spiritual healer and businessman.

Spiritual healer? As if the “world statesman” bit wasn’t hilarious enough, or the “businessman”, bit as opposed to “boardroom table ornament”. The whole piece is sourced to “friends”, British newspaper and especially Blairite code for “his PR people wanted to get this out”, so presumably he actually believes this or at least tolerates his media advisers saying it.

Meanwhile, in his defence, he argues that Iraq was already a regime that had used WMD, and therefore we can’t permit a regime like Iran from having them (around 10:11). The rest is here; if you care for a trip down memory lane. Alternatively, you could just vote Conservative.