Saturday, March 17, 2007

 

Sin of omission

I thought I knew all of the misdemeanours a man can be guilty of in a relationship.

Apparently there's one I wasn't aware of: neglecting to tell your other half at a Lib Dem function that the person she is talking to is Vice-President of the European Parliament.

So now apparently Diana Wallis MEP will always remember Katie as that person who watches The Apprentice and drinks 15 cups of coffee a day...

Wednesday, March 14, 2007

 

Meet the new boss - same as the old boss


This indicision's killing me
Danny Finkelstein has a post in Comment Central exploring the significance of Cameron's hair changing from a parting on the right to a parting on the left.

Da Fink even drops in an understandable reference to The Who.

But wait! Read on! Townshend's lyrics are spookily accurate:
And the morals that they worship will be gone
It's true! Just ask ConHome!
The change, it had to come
We knew it all along
My god, the entire Cameron strategy is in here!
We were liberated from the fold, thats all
And the world looks just the same
Sing it, Cameroonies!
Theres nothing in the streets
Looks any different to me
And the slogans are replaced, by-the-bye
And the parting on the left
Are now parting on the right
Bring it home!
Meet the new boss - same as the old boss
Ooo - spooky!

Sorry Dave - we won't get fooled again.

Photo credit: Nils Jorgensen / Rex Features

Sunday, March 04, 2007

 

I've officially given up on the BBC

What a load of rubbish their coverage of Conference has been. Having to endure The World at One's take on the weekend (which included a lengthy interview with the Tory candidate in Sutton & Cheam saying how she was going to beat the Lib Dems at the next election) was painful enough. Now I see that they've put up this piece claiming that Ming's speech means he is "setting out the conditions for a coalition with Labour".

The optimist in me likes to think this was just a piece of lazy reporting - the cynic in me thinks it was a case of wilful misunderstanding. But having been in the room for the entire speech I can honestly say that the thought of coalitions did not cross my mind. In context, the "five tests" section came across as a way to draw key distinctions between us and Labour that Brown is very unlikely to change - and in such a way to echo Brown's "five key tests" on joining the Euro.

My guess as to what has happened is that the reporter who wrote that article didn't even watch the speech - most likely they have simply reproduced this press release and got the message totally, totally wrong.

And Ming did mention proportional representation - it got the loudest and most sustained round of applause in the entire speech. So there.

Edit: If anyone knows who the anonymous "senior party official" mentioned in the BBC article is, do tell. Is it someone who actually speaks for the Leadership or just a random officer with a grudge? Either way, they have questions to answer.

Saturday, March 03, 2007

 

Goddamn journos

Having watched his conference speech live, I thought Ming had a good day today.

That's why I couldn't be more annoyed to get home and find that the top politics story on the BBC News website is the following:

"A Newsnight poll suggests voters want Charles Kennedy rather than Sir Menzies Campbell as Lib Dem leader."

To which I say to BBC editors:

a) The results of the poll were exactly the same last time someone ran it, and you ran exactly the story then.
b) Of course they bloody will if you keep running stories like this!

That the BBC is falling in line with the dead tree press's anti-Ming agenda is really starting to get on my wick! Funny how no-one at the BBC runs stories about Cameron when his approval rating dips into negative figures (as it does more often than not).

Bloody press!

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