Top of the Blogs: The Lib Dem Golden Dozen #321

By Caron Lindsay | Sun 14th April 2013 - 7:00 pm

Welcome to the Golden Dozen, and our 321st 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 (7-13 April, 2013), 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. Chuka Umunna: Wikipedia is the least of it by Mark Pack on Mark Pack . The Labour front bencher’s failure to act over a Labour candidate’s smear of a Liberal Democrat raises questions, argues Mark.

2. Susan Penhaligon leaves the Liberal Democrats by Jonathan Calder on Liberal England. And there’s a wee gem about her second cousin, David, too.

3. How William Morris poisoned Britain by Simon Titley on Liberator’s Blog. Arsenic in wallpaper dye….

4. Thatcher’s verdict on the Liberal Party of Canada by Akaash Maharaj on Mutterings and Musings. “Young man,” she said, “what you believe in is liberalism. Semantics aside, it is unrelated to your Liberal Party.”

5. Lest we forget – the unbridgeable gulf between us and the Thatcher approach by Iain Brodie-Brown on Birkdale Focus A reminder of David Steel in 1985

6. Independent notices Lib Dems’ strong performance in local by-elections by Jonathan Calder on Liberal England. We can apparently face the 2 May elections with “greater confidence than in any main contests since they went into the Coalition.”

7. Thoughts on the death of Margaret Thatcher by Jonathan Calder on Liberal England . Some of the worst parts of her legacy, says Jonathan, were left untouched by Labour.

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. Southport to “block” Radio Merseyside by Cllr Tony Robertson on Sefton Focus. An April Fool which even got some press interest. (Submitted by Iain Brodie-Brown via Twitter.)

9. #libdemvalues – this is what the Lib Dems is about by Dave Page on Jazz Hands, Serious Business. Dave takes part in Alex Wilcock’s meme to redefine Liberal Democrat values for our time. (Submitted by Dave via LibDig.)

(The eagle-eyed among you will have realised that these come from the week before – they were nominated for last week, so I thought I’d keep them in).

10. On the passing of Lady Thatcher by Matt Mclaren on Wisdom and Power.
“The thing to remember about any politician, whether liberal or conservative, local Councillor or Prime Minister, is that they are all, essentially, only human. Complete with all the frailties and imperfections we each share.” (Submitted by Matt via LibDig.)

11. Seven awkward questions for Liberal Democrats by Mark Thompson on Mark Thompson’s Blog.
A sensible selection that we need to find answers to and soon.

12. Enough of the politicisation of a song that is associated with childhood by Maelo Manning on Libdemchild, aged 13.
This song is and should always be about Munchkins not Maggie, says Maelo

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

2 Comments

David Allen 14th Apr '13 - 7:47pm

This blog has featured threads on Thatcher’s philosophy, on her impact, on how her premiership should now be recognised by her opponents, and even on That Song. There has been one big omission – On whether the scale of her funeral, as dictated by Cameron, is appropriate. So let’s start a thread now.

It is a state funeral in all but name. The immediate announcement that it would not be a state funeral may have temporarily defused some protest. We now know that like Churchill, Thatcher will be buried with full military honours. Churchill was of course a great war leader and a unifying figure. Thatcher was neither of these things.

Fortunately Thatcher was (understandably) unwilling to be gawped at. Had it not been for her objections, Cameron would have had her lying in state, enabling half the British people to file past reverently and sign a Book of Condolences. No doubt the other half might have signed up to something rather different.

The Bishop of Grantham says that this funeral is “asking for trouble”. I agree. The Bishop also made it clear that demonstrations against the funeral and rejoicing at the death would be “distasteful”. His concern was therefore that “to glorify (her legacy) with a £10M funeral” is a serious error.

Should not this Party make its position clearer? We should be respectful, but we should not celebrate divisiveness and overbearing arrogance.
A Social Liberal 16th Apr '13 - 11:22pm

Demonstrations against Thatchers funeral may well be distasteful but how else are people to demonstrate that the decision to give that woman a faux state funeral was wrong? How are people to show that we are not all enamoured with the love in for Thatcher that the political class is determined to foster, that the wholesale rewriting of history with regards to her is wrong, and should stop.

Demonstrations at funerals are distasteful – but sometimes necessary