Yesterday while in the car I listened to James Delingpole’s podcast with Tommy Robinson. Unless Robinson is lying through his teeth, which I doubt, it appears he has been the subject of highly illegal treatment at the hands of a panicked ruling class acting in concert with the police, courts, and media. What’s worse, the government gets away with it because they can count on the support of the middle classes. Nobody’s going to stand up for a far-right, racist thug, right?

Hence when he was wrongfully imprisoned, rather than the darling lawyer of the internet pointing out the gross injustice, he or she used the situation to signal their own virtues while slandering Robinson’s supporters. When the truth came out and he was proven wrong, the Secret Barrister wrote four thousand words to the effect of “Well, who can blame me for assuming the worst about this kind of man?” Some barrister. The media’s handling of the subject is even worse, littered with smears, falsehoods, and libelous accusations as they play their assigned role as propaganda organ for the ruling classes. Not without reason does Robinson believe the upcoming BBC Panorama programme accusing him of child abuse is a last-ditch effort by the authorities to make him impossible to support. The campaign led by BBC staff and British politicians to get him banned from social media platforms looks carefully timed to ensure he has no way of responding to these allegations.

Two things sprang to mind when listening to the podcast. The first is that not a single MP, newspaper, or public figure questioned the treatment of Tommy Robinson. Contrast this with the way Labour politicians, Guardian columnists, and other Establishment figures fall over themselves to prevent jihadists, child rapists, and knife-wielding thugs from having to face justice. Apparently Sky News can travel to Syria and give sympathetic interviews with ISIS brides aimed at swaying public opinion towards repatriating them, but are uninterested in the fact that the state conspired to throw a British man who has broken no laws into solitary confinement for two months. When we are unable to deport hooked-hand lunatics inciting terrorism in London mosques, the chattering classes stroke their chins and deliver earnest sermons on the importance of human rights. But when Tommy Robinson is chucked in jail they say nothing, except perhaps to remind us of his real name and his highly suspect mortgage fraud conviction. Who do you think this inconsistency will harm in the long run? And where are the Conservatives in all this? That’s a rhetorical question.

The second thing that sprang to mind is the ruling classes had better be sure of their position here. Things are changing fast; the government is on the verge of collapse, the streets are boiling with anger, and the status quo is looking shaky indeed. If things get really chaotic and British politics flipped on its head, there is a reasonable chance Robinson might find himself in a position of power before he hits retirement age. It might seem unlikely now, but history is littered with pariahs who were jailed by failing governments and found themselves in charge a few years later. Now I doubt Robinson is ever going to be Prime Minister, but who knows where power and influence will lie if the current system is upended by a populist revolt? If even half of what Robinson says on the podcast is true, he will be fully justified in finding those politicians, judges, policemen, prison staff, and CPS agents who were responsible for his treatment and holding them to account. What form that will take I don’t know, but I’m not sure I’d want to rely on principles of human rights to save me if I were being fixed with a blindfold. That ship sailed in May last year, and the chattering classes were fine with it.

Go and listen to the podcast, and tell me I’m wrong.