Just been reading Eugene Byrne‘s political predictions for 2010 in Venue. A stonking good read mainly because the The Bristol Blogger is in it. Although another highlight is Helen Holland cracking a decentish joke while KRS will be on the naughty step for the forseeable.
Most of the article is general election predictions and observations. Dawn’s gonna hold Bristol South; Paul Smith might win Bristol West (ha, ha, ha!); Jacob Rees-Mogg is tosser etc. etc …
Unfortunately Eugene didn’t mention Bristol East where the – so far – invisible Tory candidate, the fragrant Ms Adeela Shafi of leafy Westbury-on-Trym in, er, Bristol West, has reinvented herself over Christmas as one of the country’s “most web-savvy politicians”!
And ‘Web wonder Shafi‘ – as we now have to call her – will have an anonymous pro-Tory internet campaign – featuring “cutting edge Tory bloggers” – kicking off in the Bristol East constituency today with the Twitter-friendly title #kerryout.
Despite the rather obvious fact – regardless of how many “cutting edge” Tory public schoolboy bloggers form a circle jerk – that Bristol’s political blogosphere doesn’t have the reach to turn over a 7,200 Labour majority in Bristol East – and lazy-arsed Tory horse Shafi will have to get off her backside and knock on doors to make an impact – this soppy little campaign has obviously rattled Kerry who is already issuing daft legal threats!
Now we find Channel 4 News are taking an interest …
Pull up a chair. The election’s underway folks and I’m off to design my ‘Election 2010’ logo …
Yeah, yeah, I know. Dead tree press loses again; had to file it back in more innocent times (December) … But buy Venue anyway, people! I’m putting “stonking good read” on the business cards.
Should stir things up a bit!
Of the 16 Lib/Lab/Con/Grn candidates in Bristol for the GE, there are 4 I havent met yet:
Adeela Shafi (BE)
Sam Townend (BNW)
Ricky Knight (BW)
Dawn Primarolo (BS)
The connection between them is that they’re rarely around in Bristol (although I do see Dawn P at Remembrance Day every year).
PS Ladbrokes think I’m more likely to win Bris S than Paul Smith is to win Bris W. They’re right on that! ;
)
All very well to say Tory Toffs but I’d prefer them to the current lot – only marginally. I hate David Cameron and the Tories, but I hate them less than Gorgon Brownshirt and his bunch of inept authoritarian morons “doing the right thing, because it’s the right thing to do”.
I wonder if people will revisit Kerry’s expense claims, in particular the one where she paid Jean Corston (and claimed back) no less than £1000 for scabby old furniture in her office left to her by Jean. Furniture that almost certainly had already been paid for once by the tax payer when Jean first bought it because let’s face it, in a time when expense claims weren’t published, Jean was hardly going to pay for work furniture out of her own pocket now, was she?
As for the other MPs, Dawn Primarolo is living proof that most voters in this country would vote for a freshly-laid turd so long as it was wearing the right colour rosette.
Adeela’s been remarkably quiet and anonymous until this.
I don’t know whether getting a load of Tory kids from London to run a bitchy web campaign is the way to go.
Perhaps Adeela should have had a closer look at what Charlotte Leslie’s been doing in Bristol North West?
Charlotte’s gonna win that at a canter without resorting to web gimmicks and more-or-less shunning the local press.
the internet is irrelevant, the treacherous labour party will not win the next election. nobody reads the internet blogs (as a proportion of the electorate) and as interest rates & inflation rise, taxes increase in april and unemployment continues to rise the labour party will be defeated.
if they do win, then i will take my skills and taxes elsewhere as i can’t stand any more of this authoritarian and corrupt government.
“nobody reads the internet blogs (as a proportion of the electorate) ”
So do they read internet blogs as a proportion of something else instead?
Somebody who makes statements like that is not likely to have many skills worth taxing, so shut the door on your way out……unless you can explain why, if nobody reads internet blogs so many national and local newspapers have them?
Of course, you won’t reply because nobody is reading this blog……
what percentage of the electorate do you think read blogs? what percentage do you think are even actively interested in politics outside an election?
the only influence blogs have is over the media agenda, but again, no one really cares. it is the same as twitter.
you tell me to “shut the door on my way out”. fine. the less people here paying taxes, the less of our money you can extort to pay for corrupt pfi deals, debt interest, outsourced contractors, benefits, pointless wars, the apparatus of the police state and government jobs.
go outside the political class and see if anyone reads blogs. do they f*uck.
Ah, I see…
So the fact that residents in Southville and Ashton Gate set up a campaign group to stop a Tesco superstore being built had nothing to do with the plans first being revealed on this particular blog?
And the campaign against the BRT being built on the Bristol to Bath railway path leading to 10,000 signing a petition had nothing to do with the blogs and all those 10,000 were members of the political class?
And the fact that council officers were making deals with local developers to flog bits of the same cycle path had nothing to do with blogs either?
The on-going Health Care scandal?
The brewing story about monitoring of Internet access?
“the less of our money you can extort”
Whose money? And I am an extortionist now for daring to voice a disagreement with your viewpoint?
And finally….nobody cares (what the blogs say) but you had to respond to my comment…why?
You’re both half right.
This blog attracts a couple of thousand readers a week plus, maybe, another thousand on a less regular basis.
This is not enough to directly influence a parliamentary election.
Even if we assume all the readers live within the City of Bristol, only 1,000 would be in Bristol East.
Strip out the politically affiliated and those that have made their mind up and you’re, maybe, left with 500 people to turn over a 7,200 majority.
Where’s the #kerryout campaign going to find all these people it needs?
Social media? Jon Rogers, the most high profile local internet politician after Kerry (who has a much bigger national following than local), has 245 Twitter followers …
However, a blog like this is probably disproportionately influential (advertising and marketing execs please note!) because of its readership – politicians, journalists, marketers, business people, web designers etc – and the fact it can ‘break’ stories for other media to pick up on.
What it doesn’t do is directly reach a mass audience for electoral purposes and I can’t see how a campaign like #kerryout will.
Some averagely professional graphics, a bit of doom laden drum ‘n’ bass and a “scandal” involving a £400 Habitat bed doesn’t seem to offer much new.
Whoever’s behind it knows very little about local politics and the internet and even less about the political internet in Bristol.
Maybe. Maybe they feel they don’t need to know anything about local politics in order to target an MP who is active on a national level (twitter & whip) – after all, this isn’t a local councillor they’re talking about. I think she’s being targeted for her twitter/internet presence rather than she’s a Bristol MP. But how (theoretically) could they have tailored the campaign better to match the “political internet” in Bristol?
Kerry MacArthy – who’s she, my lover? ‘Baint never seen her round my manor of Bristlington.
East Bristol demands change!
It doesn’t matter if the MP is active on a national level. Kerry’s fate will be decided by the 70,000 odd residents of Bristol East.
A national internet campaign in this context is pointless. Wouldn’t they have been better off doing a “Brown Out” campaign, which makes some sense nationally?
Haven’t really given it a lot of thought but I doubt there’s any internet silver bullets or magic techno fixes available to win elections despite what the Observer was claiming yesterday:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2010/jan/03/labour-tory-internet-campaigns
A couple of things spring to mind though:
1. The Tories in Bristol could have spent the last few years developing a local internet presence and support. With the exception of James Barlow and Charlotte’s ultra local effort, they’ve done nothing. No blogs. No Twitter. No Facebook. Nowt. If they had they might have something to build their campaign on.
2. They could probably use the internet to – what marketers call – add value. ie. If Adeela actually did some proper campaigning she could then use blogs, Facebook etc to keep in touch with supporters.
I think the residents of Bristol East would be far better off if they all put their names into a hat and drew one of themselves as the local candidate. £1 each should cover the deposit and election costs.
A lottery candidate would at least come from the community and would return to it. The candidate be far less likely to be some slimey narcissist with big hair and a loud low voice. Such a candidate would not be tied to the whipped agenda of some distant party and its ‘special’ interests and might even be in a position to listen to and act for local voices.
The #kerryout is just hitching a ride on her “national profile” as the ridiculous twitter tzar(ina). Whenever national googlers look her up for that, they will get Adeela’s smears. Its all about the greater good – no-one gives a monkeys about the unwinnable Bristol East, I should know, I have lived here long enough.
BB Westbury is in Bristol North West in the general election, along with Henleaze, Stoke Bishop and old parts of Bishopston and Ashley
Shit. Undone by boundary changes.
Just wait for Vowlsie’s new media campaign … That’ll turn things round for Bristol East.
Adeela Safi, or someone using that name, briefly had a Twitter presence today, but has now disappeared. Was it the real Adeela? Her 4 Tweets seemed credible, but we have a little local history of spoof Twitter identities being set up.
As for #kerryout, I suspect that’s inspired by public school contempt for those who achieve something despite not having been to the right sort of school, and perhaps a measure of misogyny.
Bristol East has changed with Easton nd Lawrence Hill (both Lib/Dem -Labour) being replaced by 2 new wards from Kingswood one of which voted Tory last year and the other one LD.
Labour no longer control a single ward on the council and won only one of the seats contested there last year.
Incidentally the previously Labour voting people in Hillfields (I seem to remember some people saying I was over -optimistic to say we would win that one) had a much higher regard for Roger Berry and the move of constituancy certainly helped us.
By the way Lib Dems were second at the last general election in East.
Ms McCarthy should not feel safe.
Misogyny? Give over, that’s just what she wants you to think. Why is it assumed if a female MP gets stick it’s misogynistic? MPs like Jacqui Smith and Hazel Blears and indeed Kerry McCarthy get given a hard time not because they’re female but because they’re awful MPs. It’s nothing to do with misogyny. I didn’t go to public school but yet I have contempt for Kerry McCarthy, not because of her school choice but because of her unwavering support of this disasterous government, including choice votes in parliament such as being for 42 days detention and against an inquiry into the war in Iraq or against transparency in parliament. I expect, like Dawn P, the whips have never really had to speak to her at all throughout her voting career, so sycophantic has been her support. Oh, but I’m sure her residents are delighted with her support for 42 days detention and against the Iraq war enquiry. Anyone who’s that much of a Blair/Brown-ite deserves the contempt, frankly. It has nothing to do with public schools.
BTW I don’t believe the Adeela Safi twitter presence is legit. For a start, one of the tweets (I can’t find it now) stated that she was “not sure about the whole #kerryout thing”.
Since the #kerryout campaign is basically being run by the Tories I think that her being “unsure” about it is highly unlikely.
Gary has hit on another inanity of the #kerryout campaign. It should be a tactical voting campaign.
With the Lib Dems neck-and-neck with the Tories in Bristol East, any anti-Kerry vote for the Tories needs to attract Lib Dem voters. This campaign doesn’t.
You could just as easily think “Kerry Out”? I’ll vote Lib Dem … or Green (go Vowlsie, go!)
Dave,
of course the Shafi Twitter account is fake. She’ll be keeping her head down trying neither to confirm nor deny. Going into hiding is hardly the best tactic for the start of an election campaign is it?
Good. Anyone but Labour is my feeling on this. Unforunately being a petrolhead I can’t endorse a vote for Vowlsie though 😉
Welcome back TBB! 😀
Is this another case of senior council officers pursuing petty vendettas with my money!!
I rather suspect it is. Make sure you get the full story from wordpress.com, TBB. Oh, and welcome back!
Blimey! High drama on the high internets – Welcome back and all that!
It seems WordPress do not like people who expose corruption in high places. So the bastards get to screw us over twice – first when they steal from us and then the second time when they silence anyone who complains about being stolen from.
This is the sort of thing Indymedia was supposed to fix of course, but they’re too busy blowing Galloway and his terrorist chums, not to mention the odd white supremacist conspiraloon. Fuckers.
Welcome back.
Anyway, back to the job in hand… Anyone seen El Barlow lately?
“Is this another case of senior council officers pursuing petty vendettas with my money!!”
Oh you sceptics!
I understand that the council gave up complaining to WordPress years ago.
We have decided if you can’t beat them, join them as the new AskBristol WordPress site demonstrates.
This isn’t quite the same thing. BCC using WordPress as a CMS doesn’t mean they don’t get miffed at the stuff that TBB writes.
Do people “get miffed at the stuff that TBB writes“?
Personally I enjoy the banter, but preferred the “Jolly Jon” soubriquet to the “mad doctor” making “a complete nob of himself and demonstrate he’s a disempowered old fool running a shambles of a department on hot air alone.”
Jon
Yeah, welcome back. If I sound grumpy it’s because we were all looking forward to the campaign of outrage, free speech, free the Bristol One etc. of which we have now been deprived by the victory of our old enemy, Common Sense.
Welcome back BB. My day was marred yesterday when I couldn’t read the latest scurrilous goings on…
Further info’ at:
http://www.bristol247.com/2010/01/05/bristol-blogger-site-taken-down-over-defamation-claims/
http://another-green-world.blogspot.com/2010/01/material-he-had-published-on-sir-howard.html
http://another-green-world.blogspot.com/2010/01/bristol-blogger-off-air-briefly-over.html
http://bristle.wordpress.com/2010/01/05/bristolbloggergate-its-just-a-typical-n00b-mistake/
Keep an eye on http://ecologics.wordpress.com/ too
welcome back B/B
keep up the the good work!! :thumb:
confused – if I come direct to this page I can get in, If I click on homepage BB is still a violator
Go to the homepage then hit ‘refresh’ and you should get it.
a geek can explain more but I think it’s something to do with your cache?