The Omen meets the Eiger Sanction

... strangely, a book title not a headline

So, Robin Cook has accidentally died of self-inflicted natural causes.

Still, he had a good run. He made it to 59.

• That’s four years older than former Labour Party leader John Smith was when he had his heart attack.
• Mo Mowlem’s not been looking too well lately and she’s only 55.
• Claire Short had better look out. She’s 59 as well. No walking holidays in remote places for you Claire.

Now, hardcore conspiracy theorists will undoubtedly make something of Robin Cook’s death. But other groups should also be taking an interest. Actuaries and Life Insurance Companies should be looking over their life expectancy statistics and revising their questionnaires to include lines such as…

• Labour Front Bench Politician? YES/ NO
• Cursed with a functioning conscience? YES/ NO
• Outspoken Critic of War in Iraq? YES/ NO
• …with popular support? YES/ NO

Tick yes four times and your reward should be monthly premiums comparable with test pilots and shark fishermen

I particularly enjoyed listening to the tributes to Robin Cook on the news tonight from all his pals in the Labour Party – particularly Tony Blair's and John Prescott’s nauseating statements. The gist being that Robin was a good bloke and they all remained really, really good friends, even after he resigned from the government because he knew it was taking us to war on a lie.

Robin Cook’s resignation speech can be found here. What a corker that was. It didn’t change anything though…

‘... Why is it now so urgent that we should take military action to disarm a military capacity that has been there for 20 years, and which we helped to create?

... Why is it necessary to resort to war this week, while Saddam's ambition to complete his weapons programme is blocked by the presence of UN inspectors?

... that explains why any evidence that inspections may be showing progress is greeted in Washington not with satisfaction but with consternation: it reduces the case for war.’

So, even though Cook announced quite publicly, and repeatedly, that the Prime Minister was a fantasist who took the country to war on a pack of porky pies, terminological inexactitudes, whoppers, or whatever euphemisms Cook chose to employ at the time, we are to believe that he continued to be bestest pals with the Prime Minister and Deputy Prime Minister right up until his face hit the heather.

Yeah, of course. Tell us the one about the weapons programs while you're at it too.

Pals or not, if I was Robin Cook I wouldn’t have taken to walking along dark alleyways at night or clambering up mountains in the middle of nowhere. Hadn’t he seen the Eiger Sanction? Maybe not, it isn’t one of Eastwood’s best.

Having said that, I don’t think there’s a secret service assassination conspiracy at work here, no. A cold hard look at the facts indicates that there is only one logical explanation…

Tony Blair has sold his soul to the Dark Lord Beelzeebub and Robin Cook was knocked off the mountain by a large Satanic raven.

It’s obvious really.

I’ve seen the Omen Trilogy. I know how these things work.

Who’s going to bet that Tony didn’t have an enormous black dog with glowing red eyes when he was four?