Friday, July 18, 2003

We have a great story breaking in the UK right now. On the 29th of May Andrew Gilligan, a political journalist, reported that No. 10 Downing Street staff had "sexed up" the intelligence presented in the now infamous "dodgy dossier" in BBC Radio 4's renowned Today programme. In a followup report in the Mail on Sunday, he stated that his source, a senior British official, blamed Alaistair Campbell, the PM's director of communications for inserting the claim that Iraq's WMD could be brought to bear in 45 minutes. On the 8th of July, after much bitter wrangling between the Government and the Beeb, the MoD announces that one of their officials - Dr. David Kelly - has stepped forward as having spoken to Andrew Gilligan. Gilligan later denies that Dr. Kelly was his main source, and does so in front of a commons select committee investigating the dossier. Yesterday, Dr. Kelly is reported missing. This morning, he turns up dead in the woods. Nobody thinks this is a conspiracy. Least of all anybody with a copy of Photoshop (that's Alaistair Campbell, btw).

No comments: