SINCE Shami Chakrabarti was removed as shadow attorney-general last April, the public has largely been spared her pietistic pronouncements. Alas, the monotonous moraliser resurfaced on Wednesday as one of the BBC’s guests on Politics Live.
Chakrabarti complained that the governments of both May and Johnson had overly indulged President Trump. Conservative MP Tom Tugendhat, having sheepishly trotted out the usual defence that the UK must deal with whoever is in the White House, briefly stiffened his spine to retort: ‘It’s a bit rich from Shami to talk about cosying up when she only got her peerage because she cosied up and covered up anti-Semitism in the Labour Party.’
The Baroness Chakrabarti characteristically reacted with pained pomposity: ‘That is not true, that is a lie, it’s unworthy of you.’ Fancy anyone suggesting that sainted Shami’s sinecure as a Labour peer is only because of her exculpatory inquiry and report, the exonerative opening sentence of which read: ‘The Labour Party is not overrun by anti-Semitism, Islamophobia or other forms of racism.’
By contrast, four years later the Equality and Human Rights Commission found ‘a culture within the party which, at best, did not do enough to prevent anti-Semitism and, at worst, could be seen to accept it’.
Chakrabarti denies that her ennoblement was a quid pro quo. What we do know for sure, however, is that the blinkered Baroness willingly joined the shadow cabinet in 2016 and remained a Corbyn crony throughout a period when many prominent Labour MPs refused to serve under the discredited leader.
Her latest TV appearance confirmed that Shami retains her self-righteousness, the target of which was deplorable Donald whom she is ‘calling out’ for his ‘far-Right, dangerous, racist, misogynistic populism’. To this standard labelling by the Left, Chakrabarti added the F-word: ‘Donald Trump may have been the first fascist President in history . . . a President of a wholly different order . . . a menace to his own people and a menace to the planet.’
The puffed-up peer is no stranger to excitable exaggeration; for example in 2019, after a sacked adviser had been escorted from the premises by one of Downing Street’s armed police officers, Chakrabarti caricatured Johnson and Cummings as ‘people who will march young women out of Number 10 at gunpoint’.
‘Fascist’ is of course the Left’s insult of choice, meaning whatever a Leftist Humpty Numpty chooses it to mean. Collins Dictionary defines fascism as: ‘A set of Right-wing political beliefs that includes strong control of society and the economy by the state, a powerful role for the armed forces, and the stopping of political opposition.’
From the hysterical reaction to Trump’s speech on January 6 in Washington, Lefties (and their useful idiots amongst cod-conservatives) seemingly have expanded the scope of fascism to include urging one’s supporters to ‘peacefully and patriotically make your voices heard’.
Key to the aforementioned dictionary definition of fascism is ‘Right-wing’, which the Collins editors no doubt regard as a pejorative adjective. Yet their other touchstones might equally apply to the excesses of the intolerant and censorious Left.
Last year US Leftists downplayed as ‘largely peaceful’ the violent assaults on American history and civilisation by Antifa and Black Lives Matter; politicians and pundits sided with rioters, arsonists and looters against law enforcement. Yet in a shameless show of strength, for this week’s canonisation – sorry, inauguration – of Joe Biden, the hypocritical Left ludicrously deployed 25,000 troops on the streets of Washington: an excessively ‘powerful role for the armed forces’ and shameless show of strength intended to demonstrate that they are now the masters.
As for exercising ‘strong control of society’ and ‘stopping of political opposition’, throughout Trump’s presidency Big Tech and the illiberal Left colluded to narrow the parameters of acceptable opinion. For the hard men and women who now prop up Joe Biden, national ‘unity’ is to be achieved through compelled compliance.
On Politics Live, neither host Jo Coburn nor any other contributor questioned spiteful Shami’s hateful hyperbole. Tugendhat’s timid disapproval of Trump as ‘silly’ enabled Chakrabarti once more to denigrate The Donald: ‘Fascism isn’t “silly”. It’s evil and it’s wrong, including on Capitol Hill.’
But during the next four years, when America’s pitiless Left coerces conformity and demonises dissenters, do not expect a peep of protest from the baleful Baroness.
For those who can bear it, BBC’s Politics Live broadcast on Wednesday, January 20 can be viewed here.
The Baroness Chakrabarti of Kennington in the London Borough of Lambeth drops the F-word at 18:30.
