Link of the Week
The link of this week is to Iain Dale's new blog. Iain will already be known to most political junkies as owner of Westminster's Politicos Bookshop, a shop so impressive a friend finally got me to leave recently only by walking out and setting off home. But he was also selected a few months back to be the Conservative candidate for the very marginal Lib Dem seat of Norfolk North, where the incumbent has a majority of just 483. Anyone within the party who believes the route back to power consists of grovelling before leftist identikit politics will be disappointed to know that while Mr Dale is a homosexual, he is also a firm Thatcherite and a leading Davis man. Indeed, as he reveals on his blog, it was he who insisted on the shortlisting of the home defence law which won Radio 4's recent poll.
Iain also has - a rare thing this - a pretty impressive campaign site, with a news page worth reading; one I may scavenge for blog entries in the future. Now we can just hope that, providing it doesn't take away from his campaigning efforts, the new blog is updated more than the last one.
Thanks to Anthony Wells for the link.
UPDATE: Iain Dale's Top Ten Ways of Spotting a Bleeding Heart Liberal (from The Unofficial Book of Political Lists):
1. You go pink with rage at the thought of paedophiles being executed, but defend the killing of unborn children as an expression of choice
2. You believe animals can think, trees have feelings and the foetus is a blob of protoplasm
3. You don't believe in marriage, except for homosexuals
4. You are quite happy to legalise drugs and outlaw handguns
5. You are permanently 'worried' about things and you use the word 'community' a lot
6. You don't think Gerry Adams is all bad
7. You think the rehabilitation of criminals is more important than punishing them
8. You think that whatever their level, taxes should be increased
9. Gordon Brown's neo-endogenous growth theory turns you on
10. You don't understand people who are against positive discrimination and are more than happy to sacrifice someone else's job to assuage your own guilt
