"Lying Labour rat Phil Woolas".

Today's Sun editorial couldn't be much clearer in its views on the now ex-MP Phil Woolas (temporary link):

SO voters in Oldham East and Saddleworth must wait to find a decent MP to replace lying Labour rat Phil Woolas.

Speaker John Bercow rules a by-election must be delayed to let Woolas have a judicial hearing.

At least Mr Bercow's Labour-supporting wife Sally will be pleased. That was what she asked him to do.

It's good that judges have seen off Woolas.

Could the paper possibly be covering for something? Like being quoted approvingly by Woolas in his now notorious 8 page newspaper-esque missive? Surely not. Here in full is just how impressed the paper was by "lying Labour rat Phil Woolas" less than two short years ago:

IN one interview, Phil Woolas speaks more sense on immigration than every minister combined in 11 years of this Government.

Such good common sense, in fact, that he'll need to watch his back.

Not just because it'll rile so many left-wingers. But because it so harshly exposes the abysmal failure of previous Labour immigration policies.

Woolas leaves no stone unturned.

He'll wipe away the scandal of immigrants handed a golden life of benefits and council homes.

He'll make them spend five years earning a passport and up to five more earning the right to welfare.

He'll ensure they don't take vacant jobs from Brits in the recession.

He'll prevent our population from topping 70 million - and attacks his own Government for failing to check numbers in and out and making it too easy for illegals to stay.

He even savages Labour's beloved multiculturalism that allowed insular immigrant communities to fester dangerously on our soil.

We can only hope the Woolas revolution, in a Bill next month, gives us the fairer society he wants.

Meanwhile we can applaud both his vision and his bottle.

Silenced already once by the Home Secretary, he knows he is walking a tightrope, but it doesn't faze him: "If I lose my job, I lose my job."

Let's hope not.

Maybe we should give the Sun the benefit of the doubt: it might just be subtly hinting he should have kept to his previous promise.