Fitted Up?

You see, my problem with these attempts to rehabilitate Andrew Mitchell in the wake of the revelation that a member of the public who apparently witnessed his altercation with police officers in Downing Street is actually another police officer, is that he doesn't actually deny swearing at the officers when they had the audacity not to let him cycle through the main gates.  The only argument is whether he called them 'plebs' or not.  Frankly, I think swearing at anyone, let alone public servants just trying to do their jobs, is pretty much unacceptable.  Of course, even without this 'witness', the actual police log of the incident still stands and hasn't been called into question.  So how, exactly, has this very unpleasant ex-Chief Bastard, sorry, Whip, been wronged?  He lost his temper and swore at someone who had the audacity not to allow him to do simply as he pleased, tried to brazen it out, was (quite rightly) publicly vilified and forced to resign.  Tough shit.  As a purely personal observation, from what I know of police officers, if they were to make up something that a government minister had allegedly said to them as an insult, 'pleb' wouldn't figure on the list of possibilities.  However, I can imagine that it is exactly the sort of thing a Tory bastard like Mitchell might say to someone he considers 'inferior'.

But none of this seems to matter to the media which, as it all too often does, is simply swallowing the Tory line that Mitchell is now the injured party and should be allowed to return to the cabinet.  All of which conveniently ignores their previous baying for his blood when they were uncritically swallowing the police line - which they also do all too often.  Most dismaying is the way some so-called satirists and comedians are also now changing their line on the issue, using the supposed injustice to Mitchell to have a go at the police instead.  For God's sake grow some balls!  Have the courage to stick to your original comic position!  But we really shouldn't be surprised as all too many of them are really spineless apologists for the establishment.  The fact is that we should be praising the police - they've obviously learned the lessons of things like the Stephen Lawrence case.  Harassing and fitting up wealthy white Tory bastards is infinitely preferable to doing it to the poor and ethnic minorities.  Not that they did fit him up.  They didn't need to - he did that himself when he decided to behave like an arsehole.