LORD Michael Ashcroft, the billionaire Tory donor who fell out with David Cameron, has published a book accusing the Prime Minister of bestiality with a dead pig – alongside a series of other allegations relating to drugs, lying and debauchery.
Relating to Cameron’s behaviour while a student at university, this political rift is perfect tabloid fodder. The puns will be trotted out for years to come. But, sadly, there is also a lost sense of perspective when sleaze or sexual stories distract from more serious political acts. Even if the specific allegations were true, Cameron would have done nothing illegal and no one was hurt.
Deprived, perverted, stupid? Sure. But that’s nothing compared to the deaths from his wars or the poverty from his cuts. As Noam Chomsky has said: “When the press focuses on the sex lives of politicians, reach for your pocket and see who’s pulling out your wallet, because these are not the issues that matter to people.”
If the story of the Prime Minister’s penis and a 1980s pig titillates you, fine – but Ashcroft’s other claims that Cameron hosted parties with cocaine and that he lied about his colleagues’ non-domiciled tax status are far more significant.
One claim is a monumentally embarrassing allegation of Cameron’s youth. The latter cases are abuses of power and hypocrisy. Cameron, alongside much of the establishment, is willing to lie to protect powerful colleagues over avoiding tax. While now enforcing a war on drugs which destroys thousands of lives, Cameron has been more relaxed about recreational drug use. He has backed down on reform for political expediency.
Cameron’s most serious guilts have long been public. The attacks on human rights. The cuts to services. A campaign of lies and fear against Scotland. A delusional approach to peace and disarmament in the world. Benefit sanctions, now confirmed, that lead to unnecessary deaths.
None of these issues – which are real issues of power – can compete with shock factor of ‘Pig Gate’. It’s a case of the Prime Minister’s penis as a weapon of mass distraction, and it isn’t the first time this has happened.
Both US Presidents Bill Clinton and Richard Nixon faced prolonged impeachment investigations over their personal conduct.
In Clinton’s case the public and media obsession became the morality of the Monica Lewinsky affair. As Christopher Hitchens detailed in his book No One Left To Lie To, Clinton’s abuses in politics – and with women – were far more serious.
Clinton, for instance, directed the execution of the mentally ill Ricky Ray Rector; the bombing of the Al-Shifa pharmaceutical plant in Sudan; and an escalation of cash for access in Washington. This was minimised for a sexy soap opera.
Nixon’s case was even more absurd. Bombings of Vietnam and Cambodia left hundreds of thousands dead. The COINTELPRO programme was an unprecedented war waged against democratic liberty. Nixon’s obsequious dealing with corporations sold the independence of his office as he descended into a bunker of paranoia and anti-semitism.
But it was Watergate – when the President’s dirty tricks threatened the Democratic Party – that led to establishment outrage. Just like in the case of Lord Michael Ashcroft, power defends itself.
The most amplified political scandals often focus on the narrowest of ground and have the most minimal of consequences for those that hold power. In Cameron’s case it was not bowing low enough to the entitled that has earned him this backlash. Tax-evading Ashcroft had expected the reward of a high ranking job after Cameron was elected. He was disappointed.
“After ploughing some £8m into the [Tory] party, I regarded [the offer of a junior post] as a declinable offer,” explains the now rogue billionaire. Privilege and patronage simultaneously spurned, Ashcroft then concocted a book designed to destroy Cameron’s reputation.
This in itself is a scandal and a disgrace. It is because Ashcroft is wealthy, powerful and well connected that his allegations – however flimsy – can splash across a tabloid cover. And he knows he can meet the legal fees to fight any libel case in court.
That’s not the case for Natalie Rowe. As a commoner, her similar writings on alleged political debauchery have coincided with being arrested and having a close eye kept on her by the police. In this way criticism and who can do the criticising remains controlled.
The conservative journalist Hugo Rifkind claimed ‘Pig Gate’ is an expression of freedom, but I think it’s far too shallow to merit such a word. It is comedy in place of substance and an insight into the vicious power politics at the top of the food chain which rules over us. Real freedom is elsewhere.
The Pig Issue: Cameron’s reputation in ruins after intimate porcine claims
Cat Boyd: Cameron's unnatural union with a dead pig's mouth tells us much about him
Twitter in meltdown about tale that some say is ‘porkies’
The National View: A penchant for pig? Fine, but it's the other revelations that really damn Cameron
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