#9 - My Mate Mandelson

Oh, look at that! It finally happened. After a casual three-million-page data dump from the US Justice Department regarding that charming philanthropist Jeffrey Epstein, the inevitable has occurred.

Our favourite slimy, career-clinging creature, Lord Peter Mandelson, has scuttled out of the House of

Lords just seconds before the metaphorical boot hit his backside. Truly, his timing is as impeccable as his choice in "business associates." We can only pray to the gods of actual justice that he eventually lands exactly where he belongs: rotting in a cell.

But let’s be real, this is Britain. As it stands, a high-ranking Westminster ghoul could probably dismember their own grandmother on a Saturday afternoon in the middle of Oxford Street and the Metropolitan Police would likely offer them a damp tissue and a polite caution. Expecting accountability from that den of vipers is like expecting a shark to go vegan. The absolute, pathetic lack of responsibility in government isn't just a flaw; it's the entire business model.

Oh, look at him now! The once "immense" and "towering" titan of the 

Labour Party, a man who wielded power like a god-king, has finally been caught with his metaphorical trousers around his ankles. It’s almost poetic, isn't it? The Prince of Darkness himself, tripped up by his own insatiable need to be "in" with the world's most revolting social circle.

Now, far be it from me to trample over the delicate legalities of a Metropolitan Police investigation. We must all sit quietly and wait for the "process" to unfold regarding his "alleged" hobby of feeding internal government secrets to a prolific sex offender via email. But let’s be honest: calling these actions "alleged" is like calling the Pacific Ocean "a bit damp." It is a linguistic courtesy extended to a man who has spent his entire life dodging the consequences of his own devious, corrupt, and frankly narcissistic existence.

In my opinion, this man isn't just guilty; he’s "guilty as hell" and twice as arrogant about it. He probably thought his emails were encrypted with the same "untouchable" magic that kept him in the House of Lords for decades. But the mask hasn't just slipped; it’s been ripped off, revealing the hollow, power-hungry fool underneath. Watching a man this self-important face even a shred of accountability is the kind of dark comedy the British public has been starved of for years.

I could quite easily write pages and pages, chapters, volumes, an entire coffee-table encyclopaedia, cataloguing this man’s sleazy, oily and downright corrupt political shenanigans over the past four decades. It would be a rich tapestry of backroom deals, whispered favours and that uniquely British brand of moral flexibility that somehow always lands its practitioners another peerage or a consultancy. But doing so would almost be a distraction, because what’s unfolding now is far more serious, and far more unsettling than a few dodgy emails sent years ago or a toe-curlingly tragic photo of a middle-aged man strutting around in white kacks like a budget Miami Vice extra who’s lost his dignity and his shame in equal measure.

No, this goes deeper than cheap optics and historical cringe. This is about judgement. Or rather, the complete and utter absence of it.

Which brings us neatly, and depressingly, to his boss: the perpetually slippery and equally sleazy Sir Keir Starmer, a man who manages to radiate sanctimony and evasiveness in equal measure, and one or two of his closest allies who wouldn’t recognise accountability if it tripped them on the steps of Downing Street. You must seriously ask: what in God’s name was Starmer thinking when he appointed this man as UK Ambassador to the United States in December 2024, knowing full well the extent of his friendship with Epstein? Knowing full well that this wasn’t just a whiff of controversy, but a full-blown sewage leak?

Christ, the mind doesn’t merely boggle, it dry-heaves. The sheer lack of judgement, the staggering ineptitude, the breathtaking stupidity of it all would be impressive if it weren’t so dangerous. This isn’t a minor lapse. This is the sort of decision that makes you wonder whether the vetting process involved anything more rigorous than a nod, a wink, and a mutual understanding that ‘we don’t talk about that sort of thing’.

Or maybe, and this is where it gets interesting, maybe the mind doesn’t boggle at all. Maybe this is exactly how British politics actually functions once you strip away the platitudes and press releases. Whitehall isn’t just riddled with skeletons in cupboards; it’s running a full-scale osteology department. Dodgy cupboards inside dodgier corridors, guarded by people whose entire careers depend on everyone else keeping quiet.

So perhaps, having absorbed “all the facts” from people with a very obvious vested interest in seeing Mandelson parachuted into yet another plum job, and with a gentle shove from the likes of Calamity Lammy and Starmer’s chief of staff, a long-time Mandelson confidant no less, Starmer simply thought: “Fuck it. Let’s roll the dice and hope the shit never hits the fan.” After all, what’s one more calculated risk when your entire political class survives on mutual compromise and selective amnesia?

Honestly, I prefer this explanation. Because the alternative, that nobody bothered to do even a cursory Google search, is somehow worse. A five-minute scroll could have told anyone with a functioning brain that this was a gamble destined to come roaring back and bite hard. This wasn’t bad luck. This was inevitability. The sort of inevitability you can see coming from miles away unless you’re wilfully blind or arrogantly convinced, you’re untouchable.

And now here we are. The only question left hanging in the air is not whether Mandelson falls, but how many he’s going to drag down with him. I’m not a religious man, but I find myself uncharacteristically tempted to pray that the list includes Starmer, Lammy, and a handful of other Labour fuckwits who’ve mistaken smugness for competence. And frankly, it can’t come soon enough.

So yes, stock up on the popcorn. Family-size. Industrial quantities. Because this isn’t the climax; it’s the opening credits. With another three million files still waiting to be released, this slow-motion car crash is only just beginning, and the fallout is going to be spectacular.