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07/04/2005:

"First steps in world's 'moral crusade'"

Gordon Brown made an impassioned call on Saturday night for the "greatest moral crusade of our times ... to tackle the greatest evil of our time".
Speaking to an invited audience of Christian Aid supporters and Scottish and African church leaders, the chancellor said the reason governments were acting on Africa and aid was because of pressure from churches and faith groups.

An estimated 250,000 people, many of them members of British charity and faith groups, joined the protest march through Edinburgh, making a symbolic ring around the city's castle. It was believed to be the largest political demonstration in Scottish history.

In what yesterday was being called Brown's Sermon on the Mound - it was delivered in the Methodist assembly hall on the Mound - he said Africa had become the test of the world's humanity.

"It is because of your moral outrage against poverty ... that nations have come together. Through your campaigns from churches and faith groups, 13 countries have now declared a [timetable] for 0.7% income devoted to aid.

"Is it not a moral sense in each of us that feels the pain of others and believes in something bigger than themselves, that calls us to answer the needs of the needy, the suffering of the sick?

"We are one moral universe and ours must become the greatest moral crusade of our times. It is our duty to answer your call for action," he said to cheers.

Mr Brown quoted Christian, Jewish, Sikh, Hindu, Buddhist and other religious doctrines, as well as political heroes including Gandhi, Mandela, Adam Smith and Abraham Lincoln as justification for immediate action.

He pledged that Britain would write off its share of the debt payments of 70 countries, that 38 countries would have complete debt forgiveness and that European aid would be doubled to $80bn (£45bn) a year by 2010.

In words echoing those of Bob Geldof to the Hyde Park crowd, the chancellor said: "Live Aid 20 years ago was about charity for the poor. Our aim [is] justice for the poor ... How long until the world can achieve justice for the poor? Let us say not long ... because weeping may spend the night but joy comes in the morning," he said in conclusion.

There was some heckling from the audience. Hector Christie, the son of Sir George Christie, the founder of Glyndebourne Opera, raised his kilt to flash a grinning Tony Blair codpiece and questioned the chancellor's enthusiasm for the privatisation and liberalisation of developing countries' economies.

"When will you stop the rape of the poor's resources? Why are there so many conditions on aid?"
Full: guardian.co.uk

Africa is always 'becoming' something for some European. Whose 'universe'? Whose 'moral crusade'? Who is 'we'? This is indeed the 'greatest evil of our time,' the crude banality and reptilian emotionality and cynical hypocrisy. This is the devil.
Mark him well.