Alastair Campbell: He's feeling a bit bullied, y'know...

A "tearful" (surely proof of some sort of karma) Alastair Campbell defending the "honourable" (pah!) Tony Blair:

"I've been through a lot on this Andrew. And I've been through a lot of that inquiry... and... Tony Blair, I think, is a totally honourable man."

Hmm. Those who deceive millions of people and then have to go through an inquiry tend to feel like they have been through a lot. Difficult to feel a lot of sympathy for them, though. It's a bit like being expected to pity Richard Nixon for being put through the mill over Watergate - next to impossible to actually achieve.

Oh, and using the word "totally honourable" in connection with Tony Blair without a "not" is basically saying "I am talking total shite."

But the shamelessness of the inspiration for Malcolm Tucker is startling:

Mr Campbell said the media was obsessed with "settling your scores and setting your own agenda".

"You did it again this morning, which is probably why I'm a bit upset, this constant sort of vilification.

"You compared the novel to the dossier, and it's all fiction and all the rest of it. It's not. And I just think the way that this whole issue has developed now where I don't think people are interested in the truth anymore, Andrew."

That's right, we've got Alastair Campbell - who helped to hound a man to his grave - complaining of vilification from others. At the same time as complaining that other people aren't interesting in the truth while discussing his part in constructing a dossier that lead this nation to war on an utterly false premise. I suppose the scope of his ambition could be admired - although I really can't think of any men less likely to achieve the aura of "put-upon truth-seeker" than the ever atrocious moral desert that is Alastair Campbell.