LibDem Blogs - Archived!

I've added some photos to the earlier blogs about my trip to Minneapolis. Minneapolis and St Paul are twin cities facing each other across the Mississippi River, which is remarkably wide given its long journey down through the States to the sea. St Paul is the state capital of Minnesota, and on the day after the conference proper we set off on a field trip, first visiting the Capitol - does it remind you of somewhere? We were shown round the chambers for the House of Representatives by one of the members. ...

There have been three major events this year in the British blogosphere - the general election, the call for a different electoral system in its immediate aftermath, and the London bombings. All seem to have excited more or less everyone, whilst in the down periods the political bloggers have either returned to their hobbyhorses or just taken breaks entirely. The comments on this Chicken Yoghurt thread seem to be highly pessimistic. Mr Pastry says "A blogger asked recently - 'can blogging damage your mental health?' - I think he's got a point (seriously!). It's certainly doing my head in." Justin ...

In Greenwich on Thursday afternoon: Two members of the Observatory staff were still in the building at 4.45 p.m. This they described as working "late" - all the other staff had left by that time. Mr Thackeray and Mr Hollis were both in the Lower Computing Room when they were startled by a "sharp and clear detonation, like a shell going through the air". They looked out to see the door porter running across the courtyard and rapidly followed him so as to be able to look down the hillside North of the Observatory into Greenwich Park. They saw ...

I have been reflecting further on Simon Hughes's absurd attack on his party's conference (also dealt with in Jonathan Calder's House Points column this week). Hughes is not the first Liberal Democrat MP to resort to such slander on his own members. Party leader Charles Kennedy launched a more comprehensive attack immediately after the general election, and the echoes can still be heard of David

In Yesterday's House Points I wrote about government's desperation to seen to be doing something after a tragedy. Hence all the talk of new laws against terrorism. The same condition afflicts other bodies too. A few days ago there was a report in the Guardian saying that: A rise of more than 70% in cases of animal neglect have been encountered by the RSPCA, which said today that the "truly shocking" figures showed a new animal welfare bill was urgently needed.Such shock rises generally have more to do with the way statistics are collected or the enthusiasm with which they ...

A local resident has quite properly asked me whether my trip to the States was funded by Kingston council tax payers. I can reassure him that Kingston contributed nothing towards my expenses. I was sent by the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister to represent the Local e-Democracy National Project, and funded by them.

In a move that illustrates perfectly the law of diminishing returns, Robert Kilroy-Silk has quit Veritas to spend more time with his new Sun Tan Party. Comments from historians are welcome as to whether he now holds the record for belonging to and subsequently quitting the most political parties whilst being an elected politician. David Owen must be running him close but for once I think that the former SDP Leader has been eclipsed.

Have just finished the latest (it has been difficult to find the time but it's not exactly challenging) and was left wondering if the world was one big Hogwarts who would be in which house. Griffindor Tony Blair (but just like HP it's a close call between this and Slytherin) Ming Campbell Esther Rantzen Slytherin Derek from Big Brother Quentin Letts (with very little help he could be

Happily most of my constituents are more engaged - here is a conversation I had this morning "Hi, X, How are you? I expect I'll see you at the Hospital meeting later" "Er, no, er well, probably not." "Really, I thought you would have bound to have been there" "Well, there'll be plenty of other people there without me" "Don't leave it to everyone else. If everyone took that attitude there'd be

As reported pretty much everywhere, the four failed London bombers have been captured. This is extremely positive news, especially since they will, hopefully, be able to provide some further insight into the organisation behind them. As counter-intuitive as it may seem, the bombers may fear a long prison sentence more than death. After all, we have to assume that they were planning to be suicide bombers. Personally I am curious to know just how much of the planning was done here in the UK, by British citizens. Was it an entirely home-grown operation, a kind ...