A quick point on Village Vermin

Beeb, if you must try and utilise the noo meedja to generate interest in your dramas amongst the iPod generation, then you might want to do a little housekeeping semi-occasionally.

On Village Vermin, there's a box which tells the reader which "users" are logged on. "Jake" - who sharp eyed viewers will remember bouncing off the bonnet of an Renault Clio in episode one - is still occasionally "logged on".

Is this a clever ruse which will be elaborated on in series 2: Dawn of the Dead Party Animals, or merely an oversight?

MY taxes pay YOUR wages, therefore I demand to know. Like yesterday. Ahhhh, feels good to not be on the receiving end of that one for once. Heheheheh.

Party Shagging or Prescott Shagging?

Okay comrades, here's the dilemma: tonight ITV are going head-to-head with Austin Powers and Posh Spice Do The Sex Mightily, and have bleddy well scheduled a one-off on the Tracey Temple affair! What's a Hamer to do?

So here's the deal.

Not only is Party Animals compelling viewing to someone like me who's just getting over their Hollyoaks addiction (I'm like a heroin addict on morphine, I tells ya), but also the plot becomes no more incomphrehensible by the second bottle of red, so that's in its favour. It's also got lots of fit people trying, with a greater or lesser degree of success, to act their way out of paper bags which is always a fun sport. And yet, it's a bland concoction rammed full of stereotypes who act in ways that are largely predictable. For example, going on the piss-poor Village Vermin site I can exclusively reveal that on tonight's episode there is going to be a big party for Tories (presumably this is held annually in Castle Dracula) where Posh Spice meets Fat Tony's wife, gets shouted at by his father-in-law, has a "romantic" moment with Austin which Barbie tries to scupper unsuccessfully. Meanwhile Skeletor's upset that Austin has Done It with Jojo. Job's a good 'un, eh?

Pssst, Beeb! On the Village Vermin site, you describe Ashika as a SPAD. Firstly, it's SpAd (as in, Special Advisor). Secondly, these positions are Government ones, consequent upon the employee being paid out of a certain pot of cash set aside for this purpose. So (although you'll know this from your "extensive research") Ashika, by virtue of being an employee of the Opposition, can not be a SpAd, unless it's a new term which you invented which means Sexy Pants Always Down. In which case, fair enough.

But Confessions of a Diary Secretary over on ITV looks like it's going to trump it for me tonight I think. It's got some good reviews and it's meant to be well paced and occasionally sympathetic. I hope so, although I realise this is probably a naive hope. I actually quite like John Prescott, and I think that much of the criticism levelled at him by the sneery "trendy left" has far more to do with the fact that he's working class than their fashionable politics would ever allow them to admit, even to themselves.

As it's ITV, we may actually see nakedness as well. Given the main protagonists, however, I am not sure that this is a point in its favour or against. Bottle two of the vino on standby, methinks!

If anybody is watching Party Animals tonight and fancies doing a guest post on what happened, please feel free to email me.

Nadine Dorries: The Edge of Reason
Paraphrased on the BBF: full horror here

(Hat tip Iain Dale)

Calories: The simply scrumptiousnessly delightful goats cheese tartlets at the posh dinner must have been packed full of the blighters, but I don’t care. LOL!!111!!
Parliamentary Questions asked: 1
Run-ins with whips: 1 (oops! Naughty Naddie!)

Breezed along to Business Questions on Thurs because it’s always a ripping lark, and Jack Straw getting all masterful at the Dispatch Box is second favourite thingummy of my Parliamentary week. First favourite thingummy is watching Dave and Tony Blair slugging it out at PMQs on Weds. Imagine it, girls: in a previous lifetime they would have both been stripped to the waist and oiled, wrestling with the mighty questions of state, like real men. Grrrrr!

Anyway, I asked a real pooper of a question to Jack who responded – most unsportingly – by reading out an extract from my blog!!! Jolly unfair and excuse me, but shouldn’t he be doing more important things than reading my blog? Like running the country or something! Needless to say, my whip was mad!! Alas, I have no idea what it is like to be in the whips good books, so long has it been!

Last night went out to a jolly posh dinner with a load of the girls from the Conservative Party and by Jove, we’re all intelligent, feisty and downright gorgeous!!!!! Then some cheeky tom-cat asked me whether I preferred sex or politics. I was like, duh! sex of course but unlike you I do it with someone else!

Or something. I may have got the punch line in a wangle – silly old me!! LOL!!!111

Eulogy
RIP Idiots4Labour

Sad, sad news that I have been unable to comment upon until now owing to the outpouring of raw emotion in my bosom. Idiots4Labour have downed tools following the news that Meacher is to stand for the Labour leadership. Perhaps correctly, they feel that this news means the end of satire.

I4L has been my favourite Labour blogging site and it was their description of us researchers as "bag carriers" that first inspired the general usage of the term on the BBF.

Although their site no longer contains any of their previous posts, their constant campaign against the "Procedural Tendency" in the Labour Party (which holds that social change will not be brought about through grass roots campaigning and political engagement but rather by tinkering around with the exact meaning of subsections within the Labour Party rulebook) was both brilliantly and entertainingly done.

A sad day for the blogosphere. Right, I'm off to wail disconsolately into my Labour Party Rulebook in their honour.

Separated at birth?

Is anybody else reminded of Foggy from Last of the Summer Wine whenever Ming stands up in the Chamber?

I almost expect him to start on a long reminiscence of derring-do at the time of the Blitz as everyone else rolls their eyes and dozes off.

Don't Mention The War!
The Comment is Free game

Good, clean fun for all the family!

How to play
Go to the Comment is Free site and divide up today's threads equally between the players and then add up your points depending on what comments have been posted on your threads. The player with the LEAST points is the winner.

Scoring
The scoring works according to how many times a keyword appears or a certain issue is alluded to, and at what stage in the debate. For example, if the first comment after the article is on, say, Iraq, score one point. If it's mentioned in the second post, score two points and so on. If the original article is on cabbage farming in the Balkans, and there is a comment on Iraq (ie, the comment is completely out of context and has nothing to do with the price of fish, other than being an obsession for the commentator), divide your point by two.

So, let's assume that Zoe Williams has written a word-salad, sorry comment piece, on how shoes are the new horses. In the second post under her column, somebody has written:

"War is essentially an evil thing . . . to initiate a war of aggression is not only an international crime; it is the supreme international crime differing only from other war crimes in that it contains within itself the accumulated evil of the whole."

Have you got that? Blair has the blood of over half a million dead Iraqi's on his hands. As a war criminal, I despise him. I also despise the toadies who try to make excuses for his vile decision.

So, this appears on the second post and contains two keywords ("Iraq" and "war criminal") (2 x 2 x 2 = 8 points) and is completely irrelevant to the commentator's original article (divide by two) = 4 points.

Work through each post until you have a final score.

Keywords and issues
(a) Iraq;
(b) destruction of Twin Towers being down to the CIA/the planes were holograms/etc;
(c) allusions to Blair being a war criminal/blood on his hands;
(d) MPs slavishly toeing the Party line in a sheep like manner;
(e) The expressed desire for a "good recession" in order to galvanise those lazy poor people into voting against Labour;
(f) the heralding of Rory Bremner as a comic genius;
(g) a disgust of all things "new Labour";
(h) David Kelly committed suicide, right? The CIA, those hologram planes, Tony Blair, and probably the Jews were behind it;
(i) Israel is the new Nazi Germany;

Bonus deductions
Halve your post scores if it includes any of the following words/themes:
(a) NuLab;
(b) BLiar, Tony B. Liar, and variants thereof;
(c) the word "Zionism" when attached to a screamingly anti-semitic statement (it's rarely used in any other context on CiF);
(d) accusations levelled at any poster who goes against the CiF narrative that they have either been "brainwashed" or have been employed by Number 10 specifically for the purpose of trying to stop CiF-ers from discussing THE TROOF!

I am open to other suggestions, but this is a good start I think. Go forth and play! First person to get a minus score wins parbury's Mars Bar that he never claimed last week.

A gratuitous plug

The latest from Gweirdo: Propaganda for Grown Ups

Just brilliant.

A bag-carrier's defence of the nanny state, or at least the circumstances that render it necessary

A bag-carrier, by virtue of the nature of their profession (oppression?), spends a good deal of his or her time dealing with constituency correspondence. And a very mixed mail-bag it is too.

The first green Parliamentary post bag lands on the desk at 8.30am, loaded with promise. What's it to be today then? A passionate declamation on the renewal of Trident? A nuisance neighbour? That bloke who reckons that MI5 is watching him and that news-readers can see what's going on in his living room and are laughing at him? As we open letter after letter after letter, the same words flash up: "as my MP I want you to change the law on...life-long Labour Party supporter who's disillusioned by the war in Iraq...petrol prices are outrageous - it's another of Brown's stealth taxes..."

A frequent accusation levelled at MPs (apart from the one about them being ass-kissing lickspittles joyously serving under the evil yoke of dem whips and that nasty Tony Blair) is that they are all in collusion in creating the "nanny state" under which the noble spirit of Man is crushed in panoptical dystopia.

"Yes!" roars the member of the public as he pays for his shopping at Tesco with a credit card (not forgetting to hand over the reward card so he can pick up his 100 bonus points). "It's all a plot to stifle individuality and make us dependent on the state!"

St Shami Chakrabati has much to say on the subject: there is far too much Government interference on issues that do not concern them. Most people, she contends, are no longer free in a system in which the Government has sought to stifle "civil liberties" presumably, she hints darkly, for their own ends.

Except this is not entirely true, is it? The fact of the matter is that as much as members of the public like to moan about the "nanny state", all you have to do is listen to the Today programme or glance at the average contents of an MP's post-bag to feel your head reel at the constant requirements and demands of a populace who approach political representation as they do everything else: as consumers. Mr Jones wants this law reformed, and Mrs Briggs wants new regulations on hedge heights...none of this is nanny-statism according to these correspondents. They are necessary reforms for a better Britain. Every single one of them. Apart from the ones I don't like personally.

And really, it isn't that bad. Afterall, whenever something goes wrong for a member of the public - from a DFS sofa that is delivered two weeks late to a wonky paving stone outside the community centre - guess what happens? Yup, they write in demanding that the MP "does something about it", in effect utilising the hated "nanny state" for their protection/compensation.

What's the solution to that one, Shami?

Blogger's fucked again.

Brilliant.

The Best Argument Against Democracy...
Question Time

Dimbers: Good evening and welcome to Question Time. Tonight we have a man who has made a career out of being an opposition politician and has the fence post so far up his arse that he can no longer move; a man who has to describe himself in his introduction as a "comedian" who is, ergo, about as funny as a funeral on Christmas Day; the Leader of the Scottish Conservatives, Annabel (gotta humour the ladies, eh?); Baron Foulkes, who whilst a Lord is still a Labourite and therefore a prole who I will patronise; and finally Nichol Stephen. No, me neither.

Mrs Horace-Baxter: Is our beloved Prince Harry (may our Lord protect and cherish him) going to be sacrificed to Tony B. Liar's INSANE BLOOD LUST and DESIRE TO DESTROY THE ENTIRE WORLD?

Applause

Foulkes: Well -

Dimbers: [interrupting and with a sarcastic inflection] Thank you, my Lord, that was very enlightening.

Laughter

Singh-Kohli: Well, I'm not a politician, so I am able to tell the truth [pauses for laughs]

[Audience eventually cottons on and adhere to the unwritten script]

Wild laughter

Singh-Kohli: The war was illegal! Blair is a liar!

Cheers and whooping

Dimbers: Thank you. Now over to Mrs Cholmondley Warner

Mrs Cholmondley Warner: I didn't support the war and I think it's terrible that our boys are over there being shot at and suffering all sorts of jolly nasty japes. But now Blair has said that they are coming home, I need to find another reason to beat the non-Eton educated oaf with; honestly, the lower orders are getting SO uppity these days. Therefore, I would like to know how the remaining troops will deal with the pressure, thus changing my position completely from the last time I appeared on Richard Dimbleby's son's show.

Dimbers: Lord Foulkes?

Foulkes: I think-

Dimbers: I need to press you for an answer.

Foulkes: I'm trying-

Salmond: It was an illegal war! We should never have got involved and even though, if I do say so myself, I have the wisdom of Solomon and have all the answers, I care less about those who die than maintaining my position as an anti-Labour maverick. I am the Martin Shaw of the political establishment, so stop disrespectin' my position.

Whooping and applause.

Fat Bird: I need to drive my fuck-off huge SUV to the organic ethically sourced houmous shop, and now the Government want to charge me to do so. Is this another poll tax?

Salmond: Absolutely! It's an affront against the class I canvass the most. You know, the ones who have too much money, are a little overweight and a little under-educated, and who love the idea of more power whilst claiming their desire to achieve this goal is founded in a wish to increase "freedom", whatever that means (and for whom?). I'll be shitting myself if I actually win this election mind, and have to undertake a referendum on independence but hey! you lot are my natural supporters. Down with a tax on the rich! That's right, isn't it?

Singh-Kohli: I'm not a politician [pauses for laughs] and politicians are all liars. I'd be a politician, but I'm not a liar [pauses for more laughs]. Thank you, I'm here all week. I'm a comedian. Buy my CD. I am a comedian. Politicians are all numpties!

MAD APPLAUSE

Foulkes: If politicians are so shite, why don't you stand yourself? Don't you have a democratic duty if you feel that strongly that your representation is inadequate?

Pause.

Singh-Kohli: Er....I'm washing my hair. Oh, is that the time? I've got a dinner engagement, excuse me.

[sound of running footsteps and a door slamming]

FINIS

A damning indictment of Blair's failure to improve educational standards

Many thanks to all of you (none of you, to be precise) who pointed out that I had written "to" instead of "too" in the last post but one.

Proof, if e'er further proof were needed, that educational standards are slipping.

'Tis now amended.

Right, off to drink booze and shout incoherently and drunkenly at the public. My friend, judge not me; they are the Question Time audience, so I should be applauded for my endeavours rather than awarded with an ASBO.

Party Animals Update!
By guest Hamer, Comrade Deanna

Far too much excitement in one go, so just one storyline: Russian drops in on the PR firm, gets them to act on his behalf to stop him from being extradited back to Russia, why, I can't remember, and I'm sure the scriptwriters can't either.

Russian starts out being a nice guy, soon evaporates and tells PR guy do as he's told or he gets wasted. and maybe his boss too.

??????

Russian wanders around London with PR guy without a single adviser or bodyguard or any sort of entourage. Hmmmm.

Russian sees PMQ and likes. Asks for his own question to be asked, nay insists, something to do with Russian government "appropriating" oil stocks. PR man begs MP, who represents constituency with ailing company that Russian that might take over at a loss to improve his street cred, to ask question. MP (actor from Coronation Street!) throws absolute wobbly. Then he asks the question anyway! Is this a little far fetched?

How does PR man get out of this impending slavery? He's so clever. Goes with Russian to the pub, excuses himself to go to the loo, as he goes slips bag of cocaine into Russian's briefcase (remember no entourage to check), runs out the pub, calls the police, who snap to attention and run to the pub to arrest Russian who has been meekly sitting there for, how many minutes?

Next day it's on the news that the Russian has fled the country, and the PR man breathes a sigh of relief - he's safe from any further retribution!! (note the sarcasm). Credible or what??

A bit like episode 2 when everybody thought the Labour minister was so clever to record the Muslim extremist's views and threaten to run to the police - "I'm telling of you!" And the extremist shat himself.

Why do we watch this???....

Too busy to Party!

Okay, so I was out having a life last night so missed the stirring performances by Barbie and Jojo that have enlivened my Wednesday evenings for the past month. However, I did get extremely drunk and had a tremendous curry, so even given my disappointment at the lack of Fit Birds Doing It in my life, I think I'll survive.

I have gathered from Village Vermin that last night had something to do with a Russian bloke being arrested in "The Snug". Firstly, what the chuff's a Snug? Secondly, the bit about screwing in the broom cupboard wins the Most Contrived Attempt To Shock Award 2007. Thirdly, I know who advised the Beeb on this storyline. Oh yes, my spies are everywhere.

Anyway, what happened? Drop me an email or post a comment. Mars Bar to the first person who flags up a "political" storyline as opposed to those agonising over [snore] personal relationships.

UPDATE: Lord Lucan has this brief but excellent summary on his blog. Read it here.

The myth...and the reality

I am oddly addicted (in a similar manner to the way I am oddly addicted to a full fry-up in Bellamys; it tastes so good at the time but you regret it all day) to the Party Animals viral site Village Vermin.

The writers of this fabby series have clearly misunderstood - as they have with pretty much everything else - quite how political blogs work, and Village Vermin is a cross between Comment is Free and a particularly tedious internet chatroom.

Nonetheless, it is an interesting insight into how the Beeb (if not the public) see the lives of those involved in the joyous task of bag-carrying, and I would like to draw your attention, dear reader to this quaint juxtasposition.

This week on Village Vermin:
This paparazzi snapshot is accompanied by speculation as to who the young lady is that the Improbable Activist is sounding out about her potential candidacy in an upcoming by election. But:

(a) there are only six characters who "post" on Village Vermin ;

(b) they all know each other; and

(c) it is obvious that it's Posh Spice with the Improbable Activist. Hmm.

We are meant to assume, I suppose, that Doing It too much really does make you blind. Because these bag-carriers Do It a lot.

Meanwhile over in the real world, Barry Beef has a more pressing concern:

There is a random shitter in Norman Shaw North, and Inspector Beef of the Yard wants answers to his scatalogical questions.

I think the writers owe it to us to incorporate Barry's "big scoop" into series two if they really want to "lift the lid" (arf!) on what life is like here in "sexy Westminster".

The joys of the Information Age

Just briefly – this is too good to miss. George Monibot has posted an article on Nutters With Broadband about how 11th September was probably down to a bunch of religious extremists with a beef, rather than a CIA-Mossad conspiracy/dem Jews/a Bush inside-job.

Not contentious, you think? Check some of these sample comments out:

“Mr Monbiot. You have lost any respect I had for you. How anyone can watch three towers clearly being brought down by pre-planted explosives and come to the conclusions you havemust have a slate loose or an ulterior motive.”

George is in on it too! Along with dem Jews, the CIA and the Bush family. And Elvis.

“I first went to lobby my MP about the lies we were being told about 9/11 in October 2001. I told him Bush knew and he dismissed me.”

Democracy, as St Helena Kennedy says, is truly not working. Politicians JUST aren’t listening.

“In the history of building collapses, there have only been three which fell like that and they all occurred on the same day and in the same place. Does that not make you a little suspicious?”

Given that two bloody great planes crashed into them, I have to say “no, not particularly” to this one.

“We shouldn’t be too quick to invent yet another conspiracy theory about George being got at by the other side, even though it is tempting to scream, “Et tu, Monbiot?””

I’m finding it hard to see George as the last outpost of MI5 on Comment is Free, but then I am an arse kissing NuLab lickspittle, so I probably would say that.

But this has to be my personal favourite:

“How come George W Bush looked neither surprised nor horrified when told of the incidence by one of his aides during his school visit and continued to read "My Pet Goat"?”

Well that clinches it for me.

No posting today

My inbox has nearly engulfed my boss in paper (the weekend mail was a nightmare, volume-wise) so I have been attempting to attack it so it's clear by Friday. At which point I get two days before the next onslaught of letters arrives next Monday morning.

Sigh.

Iain Dale: the excitement of sitting next to the Nutter on the Bus
...but in the comfort of your own living room!

Hat tip Ministry of Truth for quite the most hilarious graphic thus far in 2007.

The Minister who was misbehaving himself with the extra-large pencil sharpener didn't, it would appear from the Sundays, turn out to be Horace MacCabinetminister MP, in spite of some fairly knowing nudge-nudge-wink-winks from Iain.

Nevermind, eh Iain? Cork up another conspiracy theory and hopefully people will forget that you are clearly no more informed than anybody else who spends their entire day pressing "refresh" on the BBC news page. Let's see...Lord Goldsmith was doing The Sex at the time of the Iraq war. Probably with Elvis, who's still alive you know:

"...when the affair was with a high flying barrister whose career he was in a position to help, it is legitimate to ask questions. Furthermore, the affair was going on while he was giving advice on the legality of the Iraq war. Inexplicably, he changed his mind on the legality of the war overnight."

Quite so. It's all a HUGE conspiracy to make you forget that Iain's predictions are about as reliable as Michael Fish's assurances in the face of an encroaching hurricane...er...I mean a huge conspiracy to stop you, the public, from knowing THE TROOF!

Now, where's my tinfoil hat? I heard a good one about the Policy Exchange the other day you know, and a chap named Boles...

UPDATE: This (hat tip Lord Lucan) is superb. There is no shame in W1 anymore.

Does the Personal always have to be the Political?

We all have television shows that we are addicted to in secret, whilst maintaining our lofty disdain of such low culture in public by sneering at the tabloidisation of society. I will confess now to spending an hour on Sunday night watching ITV2’s Supernatural in which two brothers spend their time driving over America vanquishing ghosts, demons, and other-worldly baddies. It used to be a must-see for geriatric old has-beens such as myself who remember watching Ghostbusters in the local cinema when it came out and replaced our old VHS copies with the DVDs as soon as this became possible.

The first series of Supernatural was excellent entertainment, if the weekly narrative lacked any depth. It ran thus: brothers turn up, elder brother flirts with attractive young woman who is the victim of unexplained hauntings, brothers bust troublesome spirit, brothers move to next town with further spirits and attractive young ladies. What’s not to like?

Well, what’s not to like is that over the past couple of weeks the brothers, instead of zapping Slimers like the audience desires, seem to be spending a hell of a lot of time agonising over their personal relationships with women, each other, and their deceased father. Now, fascinating as I am sure the writers seem to think we’ll find this, this is not why I tune in to watch it. I want things that go bump in the night, dammit, not the Cosmopolitan problem page in glorious technicolour. I don’t watch soap operas for this reason because, and I suspect I am not alone here, why the hell should other people’s problems, relationships, and Oedipal issues concern me?

But now all dramas, news stories, and life in general has been reduced down to the feelings of the characters involved. I understand this always happens in television dramas and is necessary, but look at the difference between, say, House of Cards and Party Animals in this regard. In the former, Urquhart manipulated the weaknesses of those around him in order to clear a political path for himself to Number 10. In Party Animals, politics is merely the backdrop to a series of relationships that could have as easily been set in the supplementary benefits office in Reading as in Parliament. Instead of being a significant factor in our collective experience, a thread that runs through life’s narrative, our personal interactions with each other have become the centre point and the filter for how we view the world.

Even the news media is not immune; politics is presented not as a complex process of negotiation and compromise, but as a clash between the various personalities. To read most papers you would think that the Party is easily and seamlessly split between “Blairites” and “Brownites”, each with a collective set of personality traits and beliefs. When people ask myself which “camp” my boss, or so-and-so MP belongs to, they are met with a blank look. It doesn’t, you see, really work like that in a collective institution like the Labour Party.

Apart from the fact that this change has ruined my ability to watch ghost-busting on a Sunday night, it’s also a pretty damn shite situation for society as a whole. The reason why personal relationships are held as existing at the centre of human experience is partly down to laziness and a lack of imagination on the part of the programme makers, but also because they suspect that people are too self-absorbed to be able to consider any idea or action that’s beyond the realms of their own lives. This situation limits our imagination, understanding, and empathy for situations that we have not encountered whilst placing ludicrously high expectations on certain individuals who become themselves representative of a party or entire group in society. One of the reasons that politicians are held in such contempt is that in elevating Blair and Brown, the media do down the importance of individual MPs who are seen as “sheep” to either one or the other. Obviously as Revolts will tell you, it just ain’t like that, but taking a few minutes to listen as to why this might be the case is a tiny bit complicated. Far better to reduce it to “Blair”, “Brown”, “Cameron” and how they all feel about each other.

In the dying days of collectivism where the individual is king, we can only expect to receive our news and entertainment through a tedious prism of personal angst that we can all “relate to”. Well, speaking for myself, I think this is boring and simplistic. And doesn't involve Slimers.

And to end on a (self-consciously ironic) personal note, unless Supernatural gives me actual ghosts rather than Ibsen-esque ones next week, I’m getting out the Ghostbuster DVDs instead.

The Tinfoil Hat/Green Ink Brigade

We've all had 'em. You know who I mean, the ones who reckon that God is speaking to them directly but MI5 is intercepting His messages, the ones who want the council to relocate them because their house is being haunted by their dead budgie, the ones who think that they are being poisoned by the security services via cyanide in the cress-plants...and then there are the conspiracy loons.

Apparently, the Jews and America (these two are interchangable, it would seem) were responsible for 9/11, and pretty much everything else if the author is of a vaguely left-wing bent. Or, alternatively, the Muslims, "asylum seekers" and The Gays are getting free BMWs on the NHS...oh hang on, that was Richard Littlejohn in the Daily Wail this morning. Where was I? Oh yes, maybe the worst are the ones who see the dread hand of The State (gotta use dem capitals) or The Government in everything, and a heart of unalloyed evil in every politician that besmirches the earth with his or her presence.

Responding to such letters is tricky, not least because such people are unlikely to believe what the MP says and you will receive a scornful and pompous letter back with self-conciously intellectual allusions to the works of Foucault and John Stuart Mill. Luckily, the initial correspondence is usually addressed "TO ALL MPS" so, after a quick check that the address doesn't come from within your constituency, one can file it in the bin.

(Note to non bag-carriers - don't be shocked at this. Parliamentary protocol dictates that MPs can only take up the cases of those people who live within their constituency boundaries. And the unfortunate MP within whose area Mr A. N. Nutter resides will not be grateful for receiving the same letter in the internal mail 650 odd times)

Sadly, occasionally one does have to answer such missives. Many bag-carriers find this an onerous task but fear not! Hamer, in his 234820398 years of service, has long experience in matters such as these. Come, gentle reader, and settle at my feet like a pupil of Socrates, and learn from the master.

Firstly we need a sample nutter letter. Let's see, hmmm. Vast left-wing conspiracy, Stalinist Government, lone soldier of truth after justice? This will do nicely.

Now to the response. Regardez-vous:

Dear Mr Fawkes,

Many thanks for your letter of 16th February which I read with interest.

I take your point about the New Statesman and the Smith Institute being in cahoots in order to bring about a dictatorship of People's Republic of Gordonia and share your concern in this matter.

I think I am in a position to reassure you that I do not necessarily think that the Director General of the BBC is colluding with mysterious forces on the left to keep your theory out of the mainstream media. Nonetheless I will write to him for clarification on this matter, and will write to you when I receive a response. I hope that I have set your mind at rest on these issues.

I remain, sir, your obedient servant,

Hamer Shawcross on behalf of Joe Bloggs MP

Masterful, innit? Mind you, he'll keep writing. They always do.

Theme from a Parliamentary Place

As the "blog wars" threaten to rumble on in all their tedium until the seas boil and the skies fall, I have decided that I no longer care. Back to blogging about bag-carrying I think, but this gem from Gweirdo is well worth a look. Spread the love, people.

Recess is a funny time for bag-carriers I always think, and a bit of a dull one. Of course, it's eagerly anticipated by all and when the annunciator displays those blessed words "HOUSE ADJOURNED" on the final sitting day, the corridors are rammed with cheerful bag-carriers on their way for a few swift pints in the Sports and Social, and de-mob happy MPs clutching tatty suitcases.

The gloss soon wears off, however, especially during the tedium of the long summer holidays. We bag-carriers are soldiers in No Man's Land between local residents and their complaints and the friendly fire emitted from our boss in the trenches. We spend our days desperately drafting letters and trying to make inroads into the ever-expanding pile in a tray which used to have the word "inbox" on the front but is now completely obscured by post-cards and bits of paper piled higgeldy piggedly on top of each other.

The phone never stops ringing: constituents demanding answers for letters not yet received, meetings that the boss has to go to, mentalists from outside the constituency claiming that the boss is reading their thoughts...the list is endless. We cower in the trenches, desperately trying to stave of the attacks but being an MP and working for one is like trying to bail out a rowing boat with a leak; no matter how hard you work, staying afloat is the best case scenario.

All this ends when HOUSE ADJOURNED appears on those green screens and the MP takes his whilwind of energy off to the constituency office for a week or two, and bag-carriers can breathe more easily and even take a lunch break or come in wearing jeans (or chinos, pink shirts, and a Ralph Lauren sweater slung around the shoulders if you're a Tory).

But after a while, the novelty begins to pall. We long for the words "I've just thought of a new campaign!" or "why haven't Mrs Miggin's drains been fixed?"; we long for the sinking feeling when the whips' office phone or the fear that the boss has missed the vote because no one can find his pager. We bag-carriers are foot soldiers in the Parliamentary movement and miss the battle field even whilst we fear it.

Roll on Monday!

Partyballs
The Good, The Bad, and the Downright Ridiculous

As you lot may have guessed given the frequency of my posting today (and the rage with which it has been done), I have been holed up at Shawcross Towers, snorting sneezes into tissues and drinking Lemsip like it's going out of fashion. Nevertheless, I calmed down slightly before the airing of the third episode of Fit Politicos Doing It In Broom Cupboards and am feeling relatively charitable. So here we go.

Ashika (Posh Spice)
An Improbable Activist has a top secret meeting with Posh. She tells her that a Labour MP with liver disease is about to shuffle off this mortal coil and demonstrates the veracity of her statement by producing a large X-ray of various upper chest bones to demonstrate this. I always thought that my liver was located somewhere around my lower extremities, but then who am I to fault the, erm, "extensive research" of this programme? Apparently the X-ray has been leaked by a "sympathiser in the local hospital's X-ray department". Because that's how it works, kids. Improbabe Activist asks Posh to stand as the Tory in the inevitable by-election. Posh is all: "but I'm a bag-carrier to an MP! What higher calling is there?" Right on, sister. Posh promises to think about it and eventually decides to go for it.

James Northcote MP (Fat Tony)
He hears whispers of Posh's intentions and is bemused that writing letters to constituents about fictional asylum seekers and servicing him after-hours isn't enough for her. Speaking for myself, I find it rather alarming that some members of our noble profession choose to indulge in pillow talk about Mrs Baxter's guttering problems but hey! Different strokes, right?

Danny (Skeletor)
Is charged by Cruella to write the obituary for Liver Disease MP. Some shennanigans about his dad and Liver Disease not liking each other (no, I didn't follow this) and is upset that his mum is about to marry some bloke who is a private sector PFI contractor. Apparently this is an Offence To The Principles of the Labour Party. What-evah. I went for a cigarette during the bits that attempted plot, but was nonetheless sadly disappointed at the lack of nakedness.

Scott (Austin Powers)
This young man is the best actor in this sorry charade, and had the best lines but he must have been sobbing between takes at the stuff he had to do. He had to act for a charity called We Love Bears who had some beef with the Chinese Government being cruel to them and then decided that this was an injustice of which the world must be informed. Austin organises a protest against the DEFRA Minister with departmental responsibility. The Minister (Cowardly McSnivel MP) is all: "oooh, don't be mean! You're a disgrace! Officer, arrest him!" Shurely Auntie could have dug up some trade union member in its outfit who'd actually been on a protest? Never mind. He then nearly shags his blonde Barbie-alike assistant (Barbie The Second) in the broom cupboard but doesn't. Still fancies Posh.

Jo Porter MP (Cruella)
Husband is pissed off with her. That's it, apart from a very nice bit when her bag-carriers start loading her up with Jaffa Cakes. Ah, we all have the chocolate bar in the glass case with the little sign that says "break here in case of constituent or whip related emergencies" - it was genuinely a nice touch.

Sophie Montgomerie (Barbie Cholmondley-Warner)
Really, what's the point of this person? Given that, in real life, Barbie is a posh blonde journalist who writes about how posh and blonde she is, one would think that the actress would be able to project a character that was a posh blonde journalist. But apparently not. She doesn't shag Austin although she tries, in a scene that makes absolutely no sense at all, although both of them have very compelling chin-nose combos. "Pip pip! I've been relegated to the sidelines now the writers have found Barbie The Second who is posh, blonde, and can act!"

Matt (Julian)
I like this character, but he's given little to work with: "ooooh, Posh. Aren't you BOLD doing The Sex with Fat Tony?"

Kirsty (Jojo)
Nothing to see here, move along please.

It's oddly addictive in a life-sapping kind of way.

Order of the Brown Nose, 18 Dullty Street, and miscellania
Valentines Day Edition

Order of the Brown Nose
Arise, Nadine Dorries MP; upon you we bestow this prestigious award for this prodigious arse-licking:

"As a new MP I bow to [Sir Patrick Cormack's] knowledge, I respect him without question, I am grateful for his presence. He is a personality and a presence, and a force to be reckoned with. The Prime Minister acted like naughty schoolboy when questioned by Sir Patrick in committee, he has that effect."

I am absolutely sure, incidentally, that Blair wasn't at all abashed at being harangued by a Tory buffer. After all, he was educated at Oxford.

And whilst we're on the subject of Nad's "thoughts", may I draw the attention of the House to her crowing over being selected as one of the top ten most fanciable MPs? Two points, Nad:

(a) politics is, as we all know, show business for ugly people. Boasting that you are one of the least minging is both rather desperate and is similar to claiming that you are one of the best actors on Hollyoaks. You see?
(b) bitchily commenting that Caroline Flint has "zero personality" makes you look bitter and jealous. Miaow indeed. Green was the MP on the fourteenth day.

18 Dullty Street "attack ads"
A well known political phrase involving the words "savaged" and "dead sheep"; please to construct yourselves.

Well done, Iain. They look very nice. And extremely expensive. That one about state funding - wow! You really are an intellectual - what arguments! But you forgot a significant one...why shouldn't the rich spend their money exactly how they like? Personally, I think it's an outrage and an affront to democracy.

I also am sure that many Tories will be delighted that you are getting to grips with the mayoral a good twelve months before the 2008 contest kicks off. Is that nice Mr Boles of the Policy Exchange (of which you are a trustee) still planning to stand?

Valentines Day Quiz
Who said:

"I'll look to like, if looking liking move. But no more will I endart mine eye, than your consent give wings to fly."*

Was it:
(a) Juliet to her mother about her potential suitor, Paris?
(b) Iain Dale to Paul Delaire Staines, driver of the the Tory Shit Smear bandwagon and its contents of putrid turds, asking nicely if he can jump aboard as long as he follows Staines' lead?

Post whatever you like in the comments, but if I don't like what's said, I'll feckin' sue you!

That, my friends, is libertarianism. Happy Valentines Day!

* I may have got the quote wrong, the ol' memory's not what it was.

St Valentines' Day Massacre

Well, Valentines' Day is upon us again.

The cost of petrol shop flowers have increased beyond inflation, and the TV is rammed with adverts which inform me that if I spend £2.99 on a microwavable carbonara and some economy chocolates I will be able to trick ladies into thinking that I am a moustachioed version of Jamie Oliver and con them into bed. Hurrah for feminism!

Even worse, the House is in recess. I may be in a minority here, but frankly I find life pretty damn boring without having to deal with the mad-cap antics of the MPs and the boost to my low blood pressure that is induced by watching Diane Abbott on The Week.

Still, there is the diversion and hilarity to be found at Make it an Issue, the latest campaign of which seems to be for a fully elected House of Lords on the assumption that it is what The People (TM) want. Should The People either not give a flying toss or think that there is some merit in a partially appointed Lords, it will be entertaining to see the brains behind the Power Inquiry get themeselves in a wrangle trying to both simultaneously do what their self-selecting supporters want and trying to enforce the democracy according to the agenda of Power.

Pam Giddy, the director of this noble grouping has some words of wisdom on the issue:

"It is an insult to us, The People...reeks of an arrogance that shouts "we own the system and will retain our power"...New Labour (like the Tories before them) soon found that they too had a vested interest in maintaining the link between patronage and power...politicians will be loathe to institute reforms that might reduce their own chance of re-election, or their party leaders' powers of patronage...indeed, it seems positively cruel to allow these poor souls to be continually put in such an awkward position. Is it any wonder they have trouble distinguishing between what's good for their party and what's good for the country?"

Good job we've got La Giddy to tell us what's good for us, innit?

Lords' reform might be terribly exciting for acolytes of Power who want to "elevate their voices above all others", but the real solution to democratic deficit is to address the problem of the permanently excluded - the silent communities that live in both economic and aspirational poverty who don't vote because they feel (probably correctly) that MPs and Westminster are a long way away from their world and cannot help them. The best way to do this is, in my opinion, to undertake a wholesale reform of local government beginning with introducing a substantial wage for district councillors who will then be able to work full time as local representatives on behalf of their locality.

This would, I believe, forcibly take the "drains 'n' gutters" casework off Members of Parliament who would have to undertake the obligations that were traditionally consequent upon being an MP: raising issues of local importance at a national level and scrutinising legislation. It would also educate the formerly dispossessed as to how to engage with local politics and empower them to improve their communities.

Obviously, this would be somewhat of a threat to the middle classes. Imagine if them poor people started lobbying against all the mobile phone masts and rubbish tips being dumped in their area, and coming up with reasons as to why they should be situated next to Mr and Mrs Power's quarter of a million pound pad instead? It could get nasty.

Mind you, I wouldn't hold my breath waiting for Power to take up this cause. Afterall, it is something of an "inherent conflict of interest" for them, and it "seems positively cruel to allow these poor souls to be...put in such an awkward position".

Is it any wonder they have trouble distinguishing between what's good for them and what's good for the country?

[Boom boom! Thank you, I'm here all week]

How to start a rumour on t'interweb

It has struck me much in the previous week, a week which saw Paul Delaire Staines attempt to smear a "senior Cabinet Minister" with sexual impropriety and a former MP with drug misuse, how little is actually required for an invention plucked out of the air to assume the authority of Holy Writ within a few days.

Seeing as the comrades tend to be a more civilised bunch - or maybe we've just not cottoned on to the skillz deployed by the likes of Staines - we haven't actually done anything like this yet. But seeing that Iain Dale is clearly in trouble with his friends at the Policy