Popinjay jibe triggers US brawl of the Brits
http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/...558610,00.html
Duncan Campbell
Monday August 29, 2005
Not since the Rumble in the Jungle, when Muhammad Ali fought George Foreman in Kinshasa in 1974, can there have been such an eagerly anticipated punch-up as the one due to take place in New York in a fortnight.
Odds as to whether the bout will go the distance, or on who can deliver a knockout punch, are already being offered as ring-side seats are sought.
The Grapple in the Big Apple will pit "Gorgeous" George Galloway, the MP, against Christopher Hitchens, the writer and polemicist, in a public debate over Iraq and US and British foreign policy. Political junkies in America are drooling at the prospect.
When the anti-war Respect MP for Bethnal Green visited Washington earlier this summer to deliver a lecture on Iraq to a gobsmacked Senate and to denounce allegations made against him by Republican senators, he briefly exchanged verbal fisticuffs with the pro-war Hitchens, and accused him of being a "drink-sodden former Trotskyist popinjay".
Now it's time for a re-match. The event will take place on September 14 in the Mason Hall at the Baruch College performing arts centre in the Gramercy Park area of Manhattan. It may not have quite the whiff of Madison Square Gardens, and the cornermen will be more likely to have to deal with wounded pride than bloodied cheekbones, but the venom will be as potent as in any title bout.
"Galloway is the most electrifying man in political entertainment," says one US political blogger. "Hopefully, George will follow up on his ... 'drink-sodden former Trotskyist popinjay' jibe. That will take some beating, but I am confident he can top it."
Galloway is described on promotional material for his American talking tour as "the Brit who set Congress straight about Iraq". The referee - or moderator - will be Amy Goodman, veteran broadcaster for the leftist Pacifica radio network, who has a no-nonsense style of dealing with any troublemakers.
Supporters of Hitchens are hoping their man can prevail. He was seen in light training at the Hay-on-Wye festival, when he dispatched anti-smokers who objected to his lighting up with a couple of low blows.
On the conservative New Criterion magazine's website, one fan ponders: "Heck, I thought the UK deported Galloway back to Egypt with the rest of the clerics ... This is one cage match I surely plan to see."
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