Get some in !

(Oh dear, in view of your apparent youth, I’ll have to explain that comment. It was usually made by National Service men who had served a greater part of their time (2 years) to National Service men with longer to go.)

This seems to be a very popular delusion, but I fear that the only people taking us seriously at present are hard-core Liberal Democrats.

Leadership is a cruel existence, for sure, but the level of strictures is a measure of the importance of the post and we should never be so satisfied that we lapse into complacent hero-worship.

The impatience with our own leadership is partly reflective of the urgency with which we feel we need to defend our concerns as they are being run roughshod over

The number of attacks on Ming do show a disfavour towards him, but not only that, they also show how seriously we LibDems are taken – far better we are criticised than discounted altogether – as well as how seriously we take ourselves: we are players and we are nudging into contention – it is easy to forget that the final step is the hardest.

It is not just Ming, but all their Leaders that Liberals/Liberal Democrats spend their time criticising. Even Jo Grimond, who I believe was the best Leader in the last 60 years.

My recollection of the 2005, 2001, 1997 and 1992 general elections is that your half figure is not correct.

Would you share your evidence and numbers for the claim? Thank you.

“During subsequent exchanges..the broadcasting crews noticed something that struck several Lib Dems whom [Kennedy] spoke to earlier: he smelled powerfully of alcohol. There had been some premonitions that Kennedy had resumed drinking in the run-up to the election, including a fraught visit to Rchmond, south London days before the campaign started. His alchoholism had reappeared at the worst moment.”

By the way, I notice that Rob Fenwick was in the audience that day. Perhaps he might be willing to share his memories of the occasion. Or maybe he’d rather not descend to the level of our slag-fest!

By the way, this is NOT a criticism of the excellent Lib Dems on Manchester City Council.

It is a snide dig at the lame Labour excuse for Manchester City Council dishing out favours to developers who contribute to Labour’s coffers.

Yes CK was pissed at the manifesto launch and yes it had a significant effect on our poll ratings which were static for around 10 days afterwards.

It was wholly uneccessary too – he could and should have taken at least a week off after the birth of his son and left Ming, Vince and Ed to handle the launch.

Not the ones rubber-stamping officers’ decisions, I hope.

Really? Our opinion poll ratings remained static, if I remember rightly – just at the point when they should have been rising, given the history of previous campaigns.

Our ratings rose through the course of the 1974, 1979, 1983, 1992, 1997 and 2001 campaigns, but dropped during 1987. That, you will recall, was the campaign marred by the “Two Davids” fiasco and three dreadful PPBs made by Owen without any kind of consultation with Cowley Street or LPO.

I maintain, therefore, that our ratings would have taken an upward trajectory if Kennedy hadn’t thrown away any lingering perception that he was a credible PM in waiting.

It is always disastrous when a candidate is clean-bowled by a question. Does anyone remember Tony Cooke at Darlington in 1982?

I hope I didn’t suggest that Kennedy was drunk at the Manifesto Launch. Yasmin Zalzala did, I didn’t. In fact, I don’t think even Kennedy would be crazy enough to be drunk on such a crucial occasion. The point I was making was that if one pumps poison through one’s brain, day in, day out, year after year, lasting damage will result.

You mean like repeated references to us “being taken to war on a flawed prospectus”

I’m not sure about that

1) After Kennedy’s explaination the next day a (Labour) MP said that he thought it was quite a fair reason and that the matter should drop

2) Kennedy’s performance at the rest of the press conference wouldn’t seem to support the suggestion he was drunk (in any case I think if he had been drunk at our manifesto launch press conference it would have come out later)

3) There wasn’t that I’m aware of any notable effect on our opinion poll ratings

4) most crucially in my book, speaking to target seat candidates who lost in the 2-3 weeks afterwards no-one mentioned this as a factor. They mentioned lots of other things as reasons why we’d lost votes some of which I thought were rubbish but no-one mentioned this. Such people were on the front line and usually at that point are at their most bitter, reflective and honest and keen to apportion blame so I think it’s a pretty good indicator.

No 20:

Have you any basis for saying this? Or is this just wishful thinking of the kind that leads paper candidates to believe they will win Merthyr Tydfil?

I think any observer with the slightest objectivity is forced to conclude that Kennedy’s behaviour at that press conference was nothing short of disastrous for the GE campaign.

And Paul Walter is quite right with the inference he draws. Ming Campbell would not have done it. Firstly, Ming is more intelligent than CK. Secondly, he has greater self-discipline than CK. Thirdly, he hasn’t damaged his brain with alcohol.

A party that aspires to government needs to behave like one!