It seems that to celebrate the upcoming publishing of his new book, Michael Savage has once again decided to try to shake down former British Home Secretary Jacqui Smith.

Long-sufferers of this story will recall that Smith, as the H.S., placed Savage on a list of 21 other individuals who are prohibited from entering the United Kingdom. He’s also on a list of 16 of those folks which was published on May 5.

Savage instituted a law suit against the Home Office and, I believe, other offices in British government, claiming defamation and asking, primarily, for a ton of money.

Now, however, Savage’s British lawyers have broken out their crayons once again to send another letter to Smith, this time not as an official, but as a private citizen.

The letter restates everything Savage has been whining about since May, and adds some snippets from what the letter purports to be emails securfed by Savage’s lawyers through a freedom of information request.

But here are the money paragraphs (literally):

13. In order to remedy your actions in respect of the Press Release, our client requires that you respond within 14 days of this letter, that is on or by 1 September 2009,  undertaking the following:

(a) the payment by you to our client of a substantial sum in damages to be agreed; …

A substantial sum. See, that’s what this is all about, and always has been. From the minute Savage learned he was on this list, little cash registers dinged in his pointy head. He can go on and on about how he’s fighting for free speech (someone please explain to me how his freedom of speech has been abridged, in light of the facts that he still has his US radio program and it has spread into England, where he was not heard before this ontroversy) and how his civil rights have been abridged (how can another nation abridge the rights of a US citizen when that citizen is within US borders?), but we know that he’s fighting for the green.

He brings new meaning to the word “hypocrite,” doesn’t he?

Keep the faith.