The revelation was made in an hour long interview with Jeremy 'Rottweiler' Paxman on BBC2. Utterpants were fortunate to secure the highlights of the programme in exchange for supplying the names and addresses of those visitors to our website who have been careless enough to express their disapproval of Mr Blair's policies in public.

Jeremy Paxman's aristocratic upper lip was seen to stiffen into an uncharacteristically patronising sneer as Mr Blair explained the chilling chain of bizarre coincidences that had led to the untimely death of the jobbing sparks from Brazil. "US religious intelligence experts provided me with detailed and authoritative intelligence that the seven-horned Goat of Mendes—"
"Who?"
"Um—a ruthless supernatural, Biblical terrorist—who Mr Bush has personally assured me might well affect a South American accent and be dressed in casual denim—had been seen leaving premises known to be associated with demons."
"Are you telling us that a newsagents selling horror videos to kids now poses a threat to national security?"
"Now, hang on a minute, the intelligence I received clearly showed—"
"And after the Butler Report you still believe American intelligence?
"Well I do actually believe this intelligence—"
"—Because there are a lot of grieving relatives in Brazil who don't."
"Now come on, Jeremy. This intelligence was backed up by the Bible and in any event, you know, we're not coming to this without any history. I mean let's not be absurdly naïve about the very real threat supernatural terror posed to the God-fearing citizens of Salem in 1692."

"The Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police said Señor de Menezes posed no threat at all to the citizens of this country."
"I'm sorry, Jeremy. But what Sir Ian Blair actually said was that Mr de Menezes did not cooperate properly with the police."
"I should think not!" exclaimed Paxman. "You shot him!"
"No we didn't. The police shot a demon possessing the body of Mr de Menezes."
"Prime Minister, you must see the evidence you're presenting is laughable. It's positively Pythonesque—the demon electrician sketch."
"Well I don't think a monstrous, horned goat with supernatural powers is laughable at all. Which is why Sir Ian Blair ordered his officers to shoot Jean Charles de Menezes seven times aboard a tube train on the 22nd day of the seventh month. Seven horns and seven bullets. Menezes—Mendes; Coincidence? I think not! Particularly when I tell you that another name for the hideous Goat of Mendes is Baphomet—a form of the name Mahomed used by mediæval Islamic clerics and recently revived by Al Qaida."

"Don't you think that's a rather tenuous series of threadbare coincidences with which to justify the murder of an unarmed civilian?"
"Look—the rules of the game are changing. The War on Terror is moving into what Mr Bush has called the 'religiotory phase' in which we will be wrestling with Supernatural Evil in human form—if not Satan himself. In wartime we have to except some incidental, collateral damage."
"So you're not going to apologise to the relatives of Señor de Menezes?"
"Well—um, if you want me to—um, apologise for—um, shooting a demon I'm afraid I can't say I'm sorry we shot a demon."
"You mean Señor de Menezes?"
"I'm sorry, that is simply not right. It was a demon. The servants of the Antichrist leave their victim's bodies the moment they have no further use for them."
"So what was Señor de Menezes—"
"—I prefer the term 'demon."
"Fine..'demon.' So what was this—'demon'—hoping to accomplish by possessing the body of an unarmed Brazilian electrician? Fuse the lights in the carriage and then bludgeon the passengers to death with an insulated screwdriver?"

"Well—hang on—this is the supernatural we're dealing with here, Jeremy. We had extensive, detailed and authoritative intelligence that Mr de Menezes was possessed by supernatural evil."
"With respect, that's nonsense, Prime Minister."
"No it isn't. Look there's no doubt—"
"—It wasn't extensive and it wasn't detailed and it wasn't authoritative."
"I'm sorry, it was. The great thing about this regrettable incident—thanks to the work of American fundamentalist Christians—is that any member of the public can go and look on the Internet and study the intelligence reports I got and see the intelligence that was given to me."
"With respect, Prime Minister, that's poppycock. A mediæval grimoire which no one outside the Vatican librarian and Mr Bush's special religious advisers have seen, is hardly 'extensive', is it? Nor, by even the wildest stretch of your colourful imagination, can a three minute transatlantic telephone call from an individual who has publicly expressed his belief in the physical resurrection of a jobbing carpenter who died 2,000 years ago, be described as 'detailed and authoritative,' can it?"

"Yes it can, Jeremy—"
"—I'd call that extremely limited intelligence, Prime Minister."
"Now hang on a minute. Of course intelligence always is limited, particularly where President Bush is concerned. I'm not an expert on the occult—I—um rely on—um—reliable intelligence from intelligent US religious intelligence agents—and the stack of books on Black Magic Cherie got from Father Chasuble. You must understand that we're dealing with the supernatural where the normal rules of intelligence simply don't apply."
"So you don't accept any responsibility for—"
"Now look, it's not a question of accepting responsibility. I acted on the intelligence given to me. I had Mr Bush's advice. And Mr Bush made it abundantly clear that there was a serious and immediate threat from supernatural forces. The decision I had to take was whether to allow a demon to run amok through the streets of London or to ask the police to remove him—um, it. I decided to remove him."

"An unarmed Brazilian electrician?"
"No, a demon. Look, you can go on and on about this, but at the end of the day someone had to make a decision and I made it."
"So you don't deny that the police shot an innocent man in cold blood?"
"Look, I want to make this point to you. Mr de Menezes may be innocent now, but he wasn't when the police shot him. That's the trouble with demons. They can pop in and out of their victim's bodies in the blink of an eye—or in this case, the time it took the brave police officer to pump seven bullets into him in rapid succession."
"Aesss...Prime Minister," drawled Paxman. "That all seems very convenient. So what's to stop the police shooting anyone your American chums have identified as hosting a—"
"—Demon." supplied the Prime Minister.
"Aesss..um—a demon?"
"Trust and Faith."
"Trust...faith?" repeated Paxman dubiously. "In what, precisely?"
"Well—the omnipotence of Mr Bush—the Lord's annointed on earth, obviously. Carrying a rosary, a national identity card and being a member of the Labour Party wouldn't hurt, either."
"None of which Mr de Menezes possessed?"
"Exactly!" affirmed the Prime Minister, reinforcing his conclusion by rubbing his hands together triumphantly. "The servants of the Antichrist flee from such manifestations of holiness, just as vampires flee from garlic and crucifixes."
"Vampires, Prime Minister?"
"They have them in America, you know."
"Do they..."
"Absolutely! So it's only a matter of time before they commence a reign of terror here—unless we act decisively and promptly to neutralise the demons."
“What do you have in mind, Prime Minister?”
“Well—you see, I think we all know that in every generation there is an – um – chosen one…”
“—Prime Minister,” interrupted Paxman. “Buffy the Vampire Slayer is a television programme…”
“Maybe so but— um—the stakes are simply too high for us to rule anything in or—as it were—out, at this stage.”

"Aesss, fascinating. Tell me, Prime Minister, do you really expect the British Public to swallow this ridiculous cock-and-bull story of yours?"
"Well," smirked Blair, "They swallowed the story about that microbiologist chappie, didn't they?"
"I take it you mean the 'microbiologist chappie' who committed suicide by slashing both his wrists and then attaching two electrodes to his chest, Prime Minister?"
"That's the chap; Dr David Kelly. Serve the bugger right for telling tales out of school and then rambling naked in a wood in the middle of the night and falling on a bloody razor blade!"
"Aesss," drawled Paxman. "We're fortunate that an able and impartial judge like Lord Hutton was available to chair the Public Inquiry."
"Lord Hutton?" ejaculated Blair excitedly. "Of course! Why didn't I think of that? He's the very man for this job. Thank you Jeremy."
"Don't mention it, Prime Minister."

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Story © 2005 Miranda S Givings and utterpants.co.uk / 141005