Welcome to the Golden Dozen, and our 303rd weekly round-up from the Lib Dem blogosphere … Featuring the seven most popular stories beyond Lib Dem Voice according to click-throughs from the Aggregator (2 – 8 December, 2012), together with a hand-picked quintet, normally courtesy of LibDig, you might otherwise have missed.

Don’t forget: you can sign up to receive the Golden Dozen direct to your email inbox — just click here — ensuring you never miss out on the best of Lib Dem blogging.

As ever, let’s start with the most popular post, and work our way down:

1. European elections: saving the Lib Dems from wipeout by Matthew Green on Thinking Liberal.

Matthew’s advice to the party on strategy for 2014.

2. Tim Farron in Richmond Park by Dan Falchikov on Living on Words Alone.

What has the Party President been up to ?

3.“Clegg forced me to quit” says Isle of Wight Lib Dem Parish and Town Councillor  by Neil Monnery  on The Rambles of Neil Monnery .

Neil takes a closer look at a resignation letter.

4. Liz Cohen wins Shenfield by-election for 2nd Lib Dem gain in ward in 7 months by Neil Monnery on The Rambles of Neil Monnery.
Good news from Brentwood.

5. Lib Dems win Sutton by-election by some distance by Lester Holloway on Lester Holloway.
More good news from Sutton, where new Cllr Nick Emmerson took more than 50% of the vote.

6. The problem with Liberal Democrats in Government by Jennie Rigg on Jennie Rigg.

Jennie argues that when it comes to problem solving, our leadership needs to look beyond Westminster Bubble to the experts in the party.

7. Do the Liberal Democrats have a political future? by Andrew Page on A Scottish Liberal.

“championing an active, vibrant liberalism, especially in relation to issues of public liberty, is likely to be far more effective in recreating our social relevance than endless defence of participation in government” says Andrew.

And now to the five blog-posts that come highly recommended, regardless of the number of Aggregator click-throughs they attracted. These are normally chosen using the LibDig bookmarking website for party members, the site where you can highlight blog-posts you want to share with your fellow Lib Dems. Remember, though, you’re still more than welcome to nominate for the Golden Dozen a Lib Dem blog article published in the past seven days – your own, or someone else’s – using the steam-powered method of e-mail … all you have to do is drop a line to [email protected].

8. Making the same mistake twice by Cicero on Cicero’s Songs

A critique of Leveson which makes the point that the people who buy newspapers need to question what they are reading.

9. Leveson, Liberals and Legislation by Alex Marsh on Alex’s Archives.
“The best liberal analysis I’ve read so far on Leveson.” (Submitted by email.)

10. We are all Alliance now by Spineless Liberal.
A plea to join and donate to the Alliance Party following the violence and intimidation against their elected representatives.

11.2012 political conference accreditation results by Zoe O’Connell on Complicity

The results of Zoe’s FOI request to the Home Office on accreditation throw up some interesting results.

12 Nil Desperandum by Reece Edmends on The Libertine .

Reece sees a bright future for the party.

And that’s it for another week. Happy blogging ‘n’ reading ‘n’ nominating.

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* Caron Lindsay is Editor of Liberal Democrat Voice and blogs at Caron's Musings