Saturday 7 November 2009

Neil Clark on the GDR

It had to happen, Neil Clark has defended the defunct German Democratic Republic, more accurately known as East Germany.

After the police monitoring of political protesters was revealed a fortnight ago, Neil Clark's response was to suggest his opponents should be substituted. He is not against police surveillance of legal activity.

Perhaps he should have included an explicit defence of the Stasi in the article.

Tuesday 3 November 2009

To err is human

When selecting Liz Truss as the candidate for South West Norfolk, no member of the Conservative Association in the constituency would seem to have used Google. Had they pursued an online enquiry they would have easily discovered this Mail article from three-and-a-half years ago revealing her affair with another married individual. And a demonstration of Cameron's pretence that the Tories are now a modern party, rather than a reactionary one, might have remained unknown.

Instead they have openly displayed themselves at their worst, and she is under the threat of deselection for what is a safe Conservative seat. Unsurprisingly, the sitting MP is standing down after the expenses scandal revealed he is a tree hugger at public expense.

According to The Sunday Times, Liz Truss was a radical Lib Dem while at university and attacked the monarchy at that party's annual conference. One cannot help wondering what happened to change her. Those old sentiments though, from more than a decade ago, have been enough for one nominally non-conservative blogger, possibly still writing online for the Telegraph, to finger her as a "Trot". While some Tories, such as Iain Dale, are responding sensibly, one can finally only agree with Tanya Gold's comments.