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The search has been on, ever since the London bombings a year ago, for an elusive individual the police and intelligence agencies describe as "the fifth bomber". He is the mastermind behind 7/7, who presumably slipped out of the country just before the bombers struck. The search is now over. I have found him, still living in London, at 10 Downing Street - and his name is Blair.

As he is such an honourable man, it is only fitting that the Police Commissioner himself, namesake and equally-beleaguered Ian Blair, should make the arrest and bring him in for questioning. I am serious; I am not trying to be satirical or funny here. The London bombings last year - and the attempted follow-up a fortnight later - are directly linked to Blair's decision to commit British troops to Bush's mass-murderous imperial expedition to Iraq.

Pussyfooting by the media

All this week I have observed with some amusement, disbelief and despair at the mainstream media's pussyfooting over the issue of where the blame for 7/7 should lie. Instead of stating the obvious, that the most powerful man in the land was its architect, they have decided to go about things in a roundabout, plainly dishonest fashion - by calling once again for a public inquiry.

Everyone - apart from Blair and his toadies - is agreed that there should have been a public inquiry in the immediate aftermath of the London atrocities. But the naked mini-emperor at No 10 has steadfastly refused to institute one. Therefore, calls by the mass media for one on the anniversary of 7/7 are legitimate. However, it is a dereliction of journalistic responsibility for media organisations to fail - no, deliberately refuse - to honestly lay the blame where it should rightly be.

What they are actually doing is using the calls for a public inquiry as cover behind which to aim half-hearted pot-poodle.jpgshots at Blair. They interview survivors and members of the public calling for an inquiry. They commission survivors and security "experts" to write articles calling for inquiries. If dogs could speak, you can bet your bottom dollar that you would see them on the BBC calling for an inquiry! They even use the recently-released video by al-Qaeda of one of the London bombers, in which he says that Blair's foreign policy, in particular Iraq and Palestine, led him to become a jihadst.

I know this is a legitimate journalistic device used in reporting, to get others to mouth words which you cannot say yourself, in order to maintain your objectivity. However, when this device becomes the philosophical grounding of your 7/7 coverage, it becomes suspect. Why have op-ed pages and independent commentators? And newspapers have been known to kick "objectivity" into touch when the issues in question, such as paedophilia, rape and election coverage, are ones that people feel very strongly about.

Blair to blame

We don't need an inquiry to tell us that Blair, as much as Osama, has been instrumental in radicalising the people who bombed London - and their comrades who are planning even more atrocities as we speak. That is a given, it is incontrovertible fact. Wake up and smell the coffee!

It is possible that these media organisations want this inquiry in order to have a weapon they can use to deliver the fatal blow to Blair. But I don't think so. We have had all sorts of peripheral and tangential inquiries relating to Iraq, every one of which in their own way pointed the finger at Blair. That fatal blow could have been delivered ages ago if editors wanted to. There is after all something called campaigning journalism. But the one editor that tried it, the Daily Mirror's Piers Morgan, was sacked by the paper's men in suits on a flimsy pretext.

Maybe the mass media have bought into Blair's "respect agenda", in which people are to be forced to respect authority by law and not example; or they have realised that however imperfect the status quo might be, it is one in which their interests are best served.

They may decide to overlook Blair's role as recruiting sergeant for Bush in his headlong rush to the mass-murder of Iraqis, persuading, cajoling, coercing other national leaders into joining their "coalition for the killing", spearheading the push for a UN resolution for the slaughter, providing the bogus claim that we were only 45 minutes away from annihilation by Hussein's fictional weapons of mass destruction, and operating as a freelance, moonlighting dogsbody for Bush's necon, imperialist agenda.

Respect my foot

However the media decide to play the blame game, it is an open secret that Blair is as much to blame for 7/7 as any other person or organisation. When you compound this with the fact that the surviving victims of the London bombings have not been adequately compensated for their loss, it becomes very clear that not only did this man visit murder and destruction on his own people, but that he is so callous as to ignore the welfare of the victims his actions have so decimated.

victim.jpgThe government and its apologists, when attacked over the paltry sums that have been offered to victims, are quick to point out that victims' compensation claims are handled independently of Blair's office. This, if as an immigrant I am allowed to say, is very disingenuous. All that is required is a phonecall from Downing Street to put things right. The fact that victims - maimed for life, amputated, traumatised, destroyed - and dependants of the dead have got to struggle to rebuild their lives without adequate support from the state speaks volumes about the morality of this fifth bomber who goes by the name of Blair.

And, believe it or not, there has been no media outcry about the way the 7/7 victims have been treated by Blair's state. Square that, if you can, with the so-called outpouring of grief on this first anniversary of 7/7. You should see the powers-that-be lining up to make speeches, lay wreaths, shedding crocodile tears on this anniversary. This is crocodile grief - and it's sickening!

I am very passionate about this. I live in London. I use the tube. I live in an area of London served by the number 26 and number 30 buses. I could have been killed or maimed by those guys. They could target us again. Why? Because Blair decided to join Bush to kill some Arabs and Muslims. I love me - and I hate people who put me in danger, something which Blair has done. As his ally, new Home Secretary John Reid would say, Blair is "not fit for purpose".

There does need to be a public inquiry into 7/7 - but that is no excuse to excuse Blair from blame. He is culpable. He is also a mass murderer and war criminal to boot. That is fact. I agree I am partisan, but this is objective fact. He should go. Good riddance to the Great Reformer. Respect? Respect my foot. And you can quote me on that!

eBeefs

About the Author

A freelance writer who blogs at http://www.ebeefs.com