Tunisia, Libya, Egypt, Bahrain, Yemen, Oman, Luton! Massive cuts of public jobs, increased fuel costs, VAT rises, ‘Allah is a paedo.’ The ‘unstoppable’ English Defence League continue to prove themselves hopelessly out of step with the reality of politics both locally and internationally and insist that the ills of the UK are created by millions of Islamic extremists. In the UK, Muslims represent 3% of the population and the % of extremists is slight. The EDL believe that we are about to be subsumed by sharia law and that Muslims are ‘out-breeding’ ‘white Brits.’ Lads, in grown-up politics the real issues are the Middle East, the economy and the ideological attack on the public sector by the Tories. You have yet to identify or expose any extremists in any of the places you have had your piss-ups. The only extremists arrested have been EDL members. The ‘inclusive’ EDL claim to ‘peacefully oppose’ Islamic extremism and think that ‘ordinary’ Muslims will not be offended by chants of ‘Mohammed is a paedo.’ The leadership blame this on a few ‘loose cannons’ but do not understand that the point of leadership is to control the ‘loose cannons’ and prevent this kind of thing. And this ‘loose cannons’ excuse has no political credibility because it has happened on every demo so far.

The EDL’s Jewish division is also a ‘loose cannon.’ Roberta Moore of the Jewish division has blundered massively over her affiliation with the Jewish Task Force and even the EDL have realised that the JTF, and indeed Moore herself, are a political liability who do no-one any favours. But she is a ‘loose cannon’ and a girl so she is probably just confused, the poor dear. The EDL think that anyone who opposes ‘Islamic extremism’ must be okay and on their side but the reality – which is where the rest of us who can read exist – know otherwise.

Another loose cannon in the morbidly obese shape of Bill Baker has been ‘proscribed.’ The portly leader of the English Nationalist Alliance, friend of pasties everywhere, has been booted out of an increasingly fragmented EDL. In case you don’t remember, the ENA have been piggybacking the EDL for a while now and have had a couple of sparsely attended demos here and there and were utterly humiliated in Brighton last summer. Even the ‘leadership’ of the EDL have realised that Baker is an unreconstructed Nazi and is doing their ‘multicultural racism’ pose no favours. Baker is after the kind of cash that sympathetic idiots willingly handover to the EDL for a ‘burka’ facemask and the thrill of being part of a barney now that they can’t get away with it at footy matches.

The embarrassments continue and it is almost sad to list them. There is the ongoing row over the Birmingham division’s tactless photo op with masks, guns and loyalist flags which the EDL are claiming that us nasty ‘fascist-anti-fascist UAF’ (i.e., anyone who does not like the EDL) have photoshopped. Best of all was the Richard Price incident with Stephen Napoleon-Lennon first supporting him, then saying Price was never part of the leadership and then the total turnaround and saying he was leadership but after being exposed as a sex offender he is now ‘proscribed.’ Some callous wag suggested anti-fascists sing ‘Pricey is a paedo’ at counter-demos but that just not nice. (Oh, and remember, when the EDL go on about ‘Asian drug gangs’ remind them about Price’s conviction for crack and cocaine which I am sure he bought from a respectable ‘white’ dealer and the fact that many EDLers are partial to a toke and a snort now and again and members have been arrested for drugs on demos).

The EDL blunder from crisis to crisis with the diminutive Steven Yaxley-Mainwaring at the helm of an increasingly contradictory, naïve and misguided ship of fools, still convinced that political efficacy is judged by how many pissed idiots you can gather at a Wetherspoons of a Saturday. Well done. Coke snorting woman beating ex-convict Napoleon-Lennon claimed on Newsnight to a rather bored Jeremy Paxman that ‘I ain’t political nor nuffink’ but forgot to mention that photo of him at the BNP meeting with Richard Edmonds. Something the EDL trolls have yet to comment on.

The EDL are always going on about opposition being middle class as if being a balding, fat, unemployed, football hooligan was somehow inherently noble. They should remind themselves that double-barrelled Caxley-Lennon owns a tanning business as well as ‘a couple of properties.’ Not very working clarse that, is it? And neither is Alan Lake founder of the EDL. Captain Yaxley-Mainwaring’s bank account has been frozen over money laundering allegations and it is a commonly held view that he has done a Griffin and siphoned off cash from the burka and hoody proceeds. He has been accused of this in the past by former EDL ‘martyr’ Snowy who also claimed Caxley-Trousers was an Irish republican. And speaking of Ireland, EDL supporters claim that their chant of ‘no surrender’ has no loyalist overtones, i.e., no relation to the footy chant ‘no surrender to the IRA’ – which is like saying the Hitler salute is in fact a Roman one and no negative connotations were intended.

The undoing of the EDL could well be over money like the BNP and Nickclops Griffin who could not keep his hands off all that lovely lolly. There were moves to make people pay for access to the EDL website but this seems to have been shelved as it is such an obvious racket. The website itself still features pro-BNP sentiments which are eventually deleted by the dozy moderators and the section for opponents to comment has been removed. So as the British government are making massive cuts in public spending and affecting pretty much every area of life the EDL fail to expose any extremists. They limp from PR crisis to PR crisis blaming Islam for the world’s ills and Stephen Hyphen-Mainwaring’s legal troubles are coming to a head. But will his Special Branch handler step into the breach and save him in time? No.

The next EDL demo is set for Rochdale on 5th March. See you there.