Bloggerheads

*sigh*

Iain Dale is a slow learner.

Iain aired a report on The Smith Institute without declaring an interest in a very similar outfit (Policy Exchange) and he could not understand what the fuss was about.

His TV station aired an anti-Livingston ad and no mention was made of Iain’s relationship with potential mayoral candidate Nick Boles (via Policy Exchange), and still he could not understand what the fuss was about.

Then this happened.

The main issue is – and always has been – a general lack of honesty and transparency.

But Iain appears to be under the impression that the solution is *less* honesty and transparency.

PeteBlogging has discovered that a cleansing is underway on the 18 Doughty Street website.

Of particular interest is a key passage on this page, which has been changed from this:

18 Doughty Street is much more than a fine Georgian residence that has been renovated to the highest standards. It truly is a home and not just an office or studio. It is the home of the conservative movement.

To this:

18 Doughty Street is much more than a fine Georgian residence that has been renovated to the highest standards. It truly is a home and not just an office or studio. It is the home of an anti-establishment movement.

(Psst! Google and Yahoo have since indexed the new page, but if you’re quick you can still catch the MSN cache. A side-by-side screen capture has been included below for those who miss it.)

You are instructed to be encouraged by the sudden introduction of modesty. That is all.

This rocks.

FFS, give the guy a break! This happened decades ago! Surely he’s grown up since th….

Political Penguin – Paul Delaire Staines AKA Guido Fawkes, Hull University and the article he doesn’t want you to see: Only someone with an incredibly high opinion of themselves would take this kind of action and make their own failure the object of such publicity.

Oh.

Um…

(thinks)

Perhaps if he throws some more anonymous bullies at it…?

UPDATE (26 Feb) – An important update has been posted to Guido 2.0

… and here it is:

Political Blogging for Adults

Share and enjoy.

Back soon.

Cheers all.

This is a very special link. Please share it with any readers or journalists that you happen to have access to.

Cheers all.

Iain Dale – Nicholas Boles Steps Down from Policy Exchange

Well, we all know how Paul ‘Guido’ Staines would play this… he would claim full credit even if he were a casual bystander.

Perhaps, if he were in one of his less-conceited moods, he would link to two or three related items and say “What a coincidence!”… so let’s try that one on for size and see how it feels:

Bloggerheads – Iain Dale and the Nick Boles question
Guido 2.0 (Bloggerheads) – Nicked
Bloggerheads – Nicholas Boles
Bloggerheads – Nick Boles: if you *really* want to be Mayor of London…

(pause)

What a coincidence!

Iain Dale has also decided that perhaps now would be a good time for him to step down as a Trustee of Policy Exchange (and scream “Conspiracy loon!” in the same breath). I suppose, in his mind, that makes this a non-issue from now on.

Ministry of Truth – Guido, The Smith Institute and the Think Tank he’s not writing about.
Ministry of Truth – Opening cans of worms…
Ministry of Truth – Open letter to Iain Dale

(pause)

What a coincidence! Again!

One especially nice touch is that this began with Iain hiding behind his anonymous trolls and bullies, but he has suddenly decided that he doesn’t want to play such games right now; “If you can’t be bothered to identify yourselves, your comments won’t be posted. And that goes for anynmous [sic] posters in general. If all you want to do is slag people off, go and do it elsewhere.”

This, the day after he sent his anonymous trolls and bullies after The Labour Humanist with this softball.

What a hypocrite.

(Note – If Nick had been man enough to face this head-on, I would have been far less inclined to pursue this into his candidacy. As it is, I have very little respect for the man… and zero-to-no trust in his ability to handle other people’s money responsibly.)

UPDATE – A further thought from Clive:

The UK Today – Rattled?: Personally I’d be more critical of a trustee who took eighteen months to realise that they couldn’t commit to the necessary levels of support. That seems to be like the behaviour of someone who either places their image ahead of the charity’s wellbeing or a person with a rather blasé attitude towards it. Either way it isn’t the attitude I’d expect of a committed trustee. As for Nick Boles, the fact that it has taken him this long to realise that being chair of a Tory think-tank isn’t compatible with running for political office strikes me as either naive or arrogant. Neither one is an endearing characteristic in an elected official at any level.

Also, Unity has noticed that the official announcement on the Policy Exchange website makes a none-too-subtle point about Anthony Browne, Nick’s replacement: “Anthony comes to the charity with no political affiliations…”

This goose is cooked. Now comes the part where the Tories desperately scramble to hide or downplay the significance of the wonderful aroma wafting from the oven.

UPDATES + EXTRAS (22 Feb):

Ministry of Truth – Look into my eyes…
Guido 2.0 – Nick Boles and Iain Dale part company with Policy Exchange
BSSC – Swift Boat Veterans for the Tories

Ahahahahahahaha! Check out the size of that ego!

I wasn’t sure if that was real until I saw Beau Bo D’Or making fun of the same ad series while giving ‘Guido’ a nudge over his image-leeching.

And speaking of image theft…

This morning Iain Dale used a photoshop of mine for this ‘hilarious’ post. He then apologised and delivered a picture credit after claiming that he didn’t know it was mine.

If you’re at all familiar with the Beau Bo D’Or Vs. EMAP/Zoo affair, you’ll be aware that the most common excuse newspapers/magazines offer for nicking other people’s stuff is that “it was sent in anonymously by email”… and, as you may have guessed, this is often an outright lie.

Well, my goodness…have a look at what Iain Dale has to say for himself here (oh, and ‘Guido’, too).

Open letter time…

Dear Iain,

To save you time and effort, I’m going to make the issue of permission very easy for you:

You no longer have permission to use any of my work on your website.

I, however, reserve the right to lift what I damn well please from your website or Flickr account and satirise the hell out of it (1, 2)… not least because of this little collection.

Now get the hell off my coat-tails, you loser.

Tim Ireland

PS – Beware, little man… my patience grows thin and my Kung Fu is stronger than yours: