And on the sixth day, God made Leighton
Tuesday, May 01, 2007
For them, politics is like a cult. They congregate around certain figures, whom they hold in great esteem. It's almost like hero-worship. If you can call a man in a suit a hero.They are, of course, the followers - the political enforcers who will not have a word said against their man. And for some reason, don't ask me why, they tend to congregate around the right wing of the Labour party.
For England, see Blairism. For Wales, see Leightonism.
Whatever you might say about Leighton Andrews, he is first and foremost a very effective Labour assembly member for the Rhondda. He is outspoken and combative - just the type of guy the assembly needs. Perhaps followers are an inevitable consequence of strong leaders (although Mr Andrews leads nothing much yet). What's certain is that they exist, and they put themselves about.
Let's take for example, David Taylor, Mr Andrews' researcher. He has a track record to make the Labour right proud:
- 2003: DT registers the domain shortchange.org.uk - a vicious attack on Clare Short after she resigned her cabinet post over the Iraq war.
- June - October 2004: DT writes a blog under his own name in which he calls Liberals 'stupid' and Welsh nationalists 'unashamedly racist'. Leighton Andrews tries to defend his colleague on his own blog HERE.
- August 2004: DT goes off to help with the Hartlepool by-election campaign. His friend, Adrian McMennamin, is heavily involved in it. Liberal Democrat candidate Jody Dunn is the first ever candidate to use a blog to try and get through to voters. It is savaged by anonymous comments of the most personal nature. The campaign becomes so heated the police are called in to break-up a Labour placard offensive!
- April 2005: DT creates the rememberredwood.com website - an election time reminder of the Tory days.
- July 2005: A bitter anti-nationalist website called Natwatch is launched. DT denies being the man behind it.
- 2005: Is there no end to this chap's online empire? DT is also the man behind shutthebackdoor.co.uk - a campaign to stop failed constituency candidates getting elected on the regional list. We know from the early days of his blog that this was a pet hate. Anyway, the petition only gets seven signatories. Six of those are spam. Nevertheless, the latest government of Wales act means the door is now firmly shut. Success!
- September 2005: DT is famously rumoured to have ejected Walter Wolfgang from the Labour party conference, shouting, "You can hear the f***ing heckling on Sky News. Shut them up, or take them out."
- January 2006: DT's mobile phone number appears on the advert for a service called New Media Council, offering "hands-on strategic targeting helping hundreds of individuals and organizations in getting their message across." It is hosted anonymously in America by DomainsByProxy.com.
(In May 2006, natwatch.org is registered in the same way, as is arsembly.org in April 2007. This service is used by thousands of people who prefer to remain anonymous).
- September 2006: DT sets up a website called keepingthefaith.org.uk. It's devoted to "backing Tony Blair against a minority of MPs who want to bring him down." The page was quickly hijacked by people who'd prefer to see the back of Tony Blair, the amusing archived results of which can be seen HERE.
- September 2006: DT registers the domain gordonbrown.org, offers it for sale and links to articles which do not show the Chancellor in the best light.
- September 2006: It's a busy month for DT. He registers the domains johnson4leader.org.uk, johnson4leader.co.uk, johnson4leader.org AND johnson4leader.com, leading to speculation about a 'plot by Blairites to undermine the Chancellor and push Alan Johnson as the next Prime Minister'.
- October 2006: Wherever Leighton Andrews goes, David Taylor is not far behind. This time it's the Keep Burberry British campaign. DT did the website.
- April 2007: Remember DT's rememberredwood.com? It now also hosts the official Welsh Labour election 2007 website.
DT is currently the registrant of a number of Welsh Labour websites including: leighton4rhondda.com, votehuw.com, rhondda.tv, sandymewies.com, huwlewis.co.uk and marktami.co.uk
It is, I'm sure you'll agree, a fairly impressive CV. There's evidence of a lot of graft here, and I can't imagine it's been done for no reason. These people are well-organized and ruthless. The territory, it seems, has been set. And after this election, there may just have to be a battle.
So, how long will it be, do you think, before that crucial Leighton4leader domain gets registered too?
Generous hat doffs to Tim Ireland, Dizzy and The Register.
Labels: blogging, blogs, David Taylor, Leighton Andrews
posted by Blamerbell @ 12:04 pm,
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