Dawkins on Iraq

Guardian Unlimited | Special reports | Ministers attack US war chaos
Tony Blair has discovered the awful truth. British voters don't like George W Bush. Worse that than, they don't like Blair seeming to act as Dubya's poodle. If Britain joins in Bush's ill-considered war on Iraq, and it all goes pear-shaped, then Blair is doomed.

I have to quote this Guardian article yesterday, listing anti-war quotes from a number of people.

Richard Dawkins, the writer, biologist and professor of the public understanding of science at Oxford, was also firmly against any US assault: "Obnoxious as Saddam Hussein undoubtedly is, it is not obvious that he is more of a danger to the world than 'President' Bush and his reckless handlers.

"It would be a tragedy if Tony Blair, a good man who has so much to offer this country, were to be brought down through playing poodle to this unelected and deeply stupid little oil spiv," he said.

I have to say I'm not a fan of Dawkins. As a Christian I find his anti-religious bigotry repulsive; he's unable to distinguish true religious faith from blind, unthinking fundamentalism. But on the subject of GWB, I think he well sums up the way a great many Britons think. I guess many people wouldn't have expressed their opinion in quite those terms. Tact and diplomacy aren't exactly Dawkins' strengths.