Position Sought

Strangely Joe's public online CV neglects to mention his time as the Labour Party's London Region Press Officer and the weeks he spent campaigning for Ken's re-election recently. Strange...

Why Guido Backed Boris

Guido's old friend Harry Phibbs can claim to be the first person to promote the idea of Mayor Boris Johnson. The Hammersmith councillor and Evening Standard diarist first posited Boris running in January 2007 on the Social Affairs Unit's blog.

Guido thought it an inspired idea and posted a comment in reply:

Draft Boris, this is a tele-democracy, he is a performer. He will crucify Ken.

For what it was worth Guido then did everything in his power to encourage Boris to run. Guido made the succint case for Boris ten days before Tory nominations for Mayor closed. Here was the argument for Boris winning on psephological grounds. Guido's July 2007 poll that showed 83% of Guido's readers wanted Boris to run was unscientific but encouraging for him.

It was Guido who set up the "I'm Backing Boris" Facebook group which gained over a thousand supporters in the days before he announced he was running - and was actually taken over by the Boris campaign team when he formally announced he was running.

"How much influence do bloggers and the internet have in politics?" is a question Guido is often asked. My reply is that we only have influence over politicians, journalists and thus the climate of ideas. We don't have any influence over the voting general public except through that opinion leading influence. Guido set out last July to encourage one political journalist to seize the moment, if Guido succeeded in that objective, his mission was accomplished.

Some co-conspirators have suggested that Guido compromised his USP and libertarian principles in backing a politician's bid for power - the first time this blog has endorsed a politician. Well Guido has hated Ken Livingstone's brand of municipal socialism for decades, at one point it looked possible the Tories would again choose Steve Norris to lose to Ken again - that was not a prospect Guido welcomed. Boris has admirable libertarian-conservative instincts and is a refreshingly direct politician who speaks his mind. In a personal note to Guido after he won the Conservative nomination, Boris indicated that the admiration is mutual. So with an opportunity to encourage someone like-minded to lead London, it would have been churlish to remain aloof from the affray.

Boris as mayor will also hopefully provide Guido with lots of fun material...

London is Officially Liberated

Twinned with Edinburgh

Good Morning London

Twinned with Edinburgh

How Do You Like This Big Tent Gordon?

Kate Hoey will be Mayor Boris' sports adviser in the run-up to the Olympics and if some rumours are to be believed, Brian Paddick, not Boris himself, will be his chair of the Metropolitan Police Authority. That would be sweet revenge for Paddick, although it might not be so comfortable for Sir Iain Blair...

One Labour insider has just told Guido that Labour will implement a scorched earth policy in an attempt to sabotage Boris at every turn. Just as they have squeezed the SNP government in Scotland budgetarily from the centre they will do the same in London. Central government under their control will collectively punish London's voters for not voting Labour...

Lights Go Out at City Hall

Like a biblical omen, darkness has fallen on Ken's City Hall.

Due to flooding in the basement the power has been switched off. Has London ground to a halt? Has the lack of advice from diversity officers brought commerce to a halt? Will the lack of active bureaucrats halt the transport network?

Guido suspects London would function better without the extra layer of Mayoral bureaucracy....

UPDATE : Some jokes in the comments that the over-working paper-shredders probably fused the electricity - as with the Stasi before the fall of the Berlin Wall. Would be funny except Ken has boasted of doing exactly this before the 2005 Freedom of Information Act came into law.

+++ YouGov: Boris 11% Ahead on First preferences +++

10% after second preferences...

Post-It Note Won Gilligan Journalist of the Year

Inside Andrew Hosken's new biography Ken: The Ups and Downs of Ken Livingstone (after the slightly tedious chapters about left-wing politics) we learn that a City Hall worker on the eighth floor was the source of the emails which may prove to be the downfall of Ken Livingstone. How was this incredible feat of political espionage achieved? A temporary worker read the password off a Post-It note...

He/she was able to log in as Lee Jasper and print off the emails, by the yard, which ended up in Andrew Gilligan's welcoming hands. General Lee Jasper had to stand down as a result and we all got to laugh at a few hot and steamy emails that he had sent to a female colleague.

Gilligan won the Journalist of the Year award on the back of the the stories. Coincidentally a survey by Infosecurity released today found that

"women are far more likely to give away their passwords to total strangers than their male counterparts, with 45% of women versus 10% of men prepared to give away their password, to strangers masquerading as market researchers with the lure of a chocolate bar as an incentive for filling in the survey."

Guido hopes the source got more than a choccie bar for his / her efforts.

BBC London Mayoral Hustings

Last night's hustings will be dissected and the post-match spin applied by the various teams. Two things struck Guido. Firstly Ken seemed uncharacteristically lacking in confidence. He talked about "the new mayor" and what Boris would do as a mayor. Not his usual chirpy cockney character.

Secondly, on balance whereas none of the candidates made a compelling case, Andrew Neil was very good. Well briefed, firm, aggressive enough, refusing to accept bullshit spin. He had tough questions for them all that were thought out with supplementary comebacks. Whereas Paxman would sneer, Brillo laced his interrogative aggression with humour. The victor of last night's hustings was definitely Brillo.

Schrödinger's Guardian

Guido is really getting into the concept of quantum politics, it certainly raised the tone of the discussion in the comments on the blog above the usual webmong level on Saturday. It appears that the developing theory of quantum politics will also have to factor in the time dimension to explain the Guardian's headlines. The subs must be under instruction to make every poll positive for Ken Leavingsoon. Last Wednesday it was good news for the newt lover. He was in the lead!Today it good news as well. Ken is catching up on Boris!

How do they do that? Quantum duality again?

Elsewhere Sir Michael White says (There is no alternative to Gordon) his Guardian colleague Polly is only writing nasty things about Gordon because she is bored and it is parliamentary recess. There may be some truth in that, still Guido is so enjoying the whole meltdown by former Brown fans. The most vicious attacks on the Brownies are coming from Guardian writers and readers. It is really getting like here over there (with a little less swearing).

Boris is Right, Tories Wrong. London Should Be a Shining City

Anyone who believes in free markets and free trade has to believe as a corollary in the free movement of people. Guido is the son of immigrants who came from Ireland and India to London in the 1950s and 1960s for economic and social reasons. They came, primarily, to better themselves. Now having lived and worked in some of the world's greatest cities Guido still believes that London is the best of them all and is grateful that the city took in his parents.

Sure the public transport system sucks, it does in Tokyo and New York as well. Culturally New York is very self-centred and less internationalist, Tokyo is a bit of a mono-culture that just about tolerates foreigners. London is much more cosmopolitan than even New York with better French food than Paris, more bankers than Frankfurt and better nightlife than Berlin.

Many people have come here without the right paperwork, they have come here to work and better themselves. They are not the problem and should be allowed to stay and given if necessary an amnesty to make them legally resident. They enrich us all. It is the people who come here to abuse the welfare state and commit crimes that are the problem.

Cameron disavows the policy and ConservativeHomies are up in arms about Boris supporting an amnesty for illegal immigrants. They should remember that one of their heroes, Ronald Reagan, supported and implemented an amnesty. London should be a beacon to those who want to be free to prosper for themselves and their families. Disqualifying newcomers from abusing the welfare state and deporting convicted foreign criminals might reduce the opposition to immigrants. Ronald Reagan did something like that when he had an amnesty for immigrants in 1986, because to him, the ultimate conservative optimist, immigration was a vital part of his vision of his country as "a shining city upon a Hill".

Boris is an optimist in the Reagan mould who would like London to be a shining city for those seeking freedom and prosperity. An amnesty might not be a popular stance to take, illegal immigrants don't have any votes, but it is the right stance.

Who Said This?

"I can't help it, I'm like a broom handle in the mornings"

Was the Ken Video "Leak" a Ploy?

Ken's supposedly accidental leak of this video doesn't add up.

Sam Coates on The Times got it first. "So where did it come from?" Guido asked, Sam is obviously not saying. The video is clearly recent, filmed by a campaign-friendly video-camera, rather than a hostile journalist.

Guido suspects that given that the Labour Party is polling double digits behind the Conservative Party, Ken is shrewdly distancing himself from the party that is a liability. Why else when asked "what would you say was your proudest moment?" would he laughingly reply: "Oh it's taking on and smashing the New Labour machine in 2000 when Tony Blair wouldn't let me run for mayor and just grinding them into the dust. But you won't be able to use that one."

But they did use that one, didn't they? Ken got coverage and distanced himself from the party to which he is only semi-attached at the best of times. Smart tactics? Ken is no April fool...

Boris Will Do PMQs Tomorrow

Guido can confirm the Times' Sam Coates exclusive that Boris will lead for the Tories against Harriet Harman tomorrow at PMQs. Repeated misleading references to Boris by Gordon Brown were the trigger for Cameron's decision to give Boris an unprecedented right of reply in the PM's absence. The last time a backbencher was given such an opportunity was during Asquith's time.

"Lets face it, Boris is better known than most of the shadow cabinet, this will give him a chance to show leadership, he will crush Harriet Harman at the dispatch box". Is this a high risk strategy? Not really, he is up against Harriet Harman...

"Block Boris" Says Ken's Transport for London Commissar

As panic starts to grip Ken and the London Labour Party things are getting pretty desperate. Gordon lies at PMQs regularly that Boris wants to cut police numbers - as if a Tory mayor would ever cut back on coppers. Now Ken is pulling whatever levers he can to hold on to power. London's transport commissar, Peter Hendy, has ordered his spin team to counter the popular Boris message on killer bendy-buses. Transport for London has also told taxi drivers not to issue receipts with "Back Boris" logos. Guido understands that 50,000 books of these receipts have already been snapped up by cabbies. This is a mistake by Ken, cabbies are not ones to succumb to authority. Petty diktaks like this will only get their backs up and ensure they do back Boris.

More sinister are the implicit threats to police funding hinted at if police sources don't stop telling the truth about the appalling safety record of Ken's bendy-buses. Ken clearly favours his friend Castro's policing methods, where the police follow the party line...

UPDATE : In the comments there was some dispute about whether Hendy threatened police funding. Here is the quote from an email: "The statements clearly come from the Met traffic officers involved in the investigation (and are manifestly incorrect). It makes me inclined to cut support for TOCU in future budgets as clearly their support for us is limited to taking money and is one way."

TOCU is the Transport Operational Command Unit, the Met division charged with tackling road safety and bus crime. Funded by TfL, it has 1,200 police officers, community support officers and traffic wardens and is a key part of the Met's anti-crime strategy.

When Ken Met the Chinese

On a trip to Beijing in April 2006, Ken Livingstone shamefully compared the 1990 Poll Tax riots in Trafalgar Square with the massacre of hundreds of peacefully protesting students in Tiananmen Square in 1989.

Not really a valid comparison is it? The Met Police didn't shoot or kill anyone. The violent Poll Tax Riots were a response to the policies of a democratically elected government whereas hundreds of peacefully protesting Chinese citizens were murdered by a dictatorship in Tiananmen Square. Of all Ken's many pitiful apologies for dictators like Chavez and Castro, this was just about the lowest.

The Olympic Torch will be in London on April 6. Guido will be supporting the Free Tibet Campaign's Freedom Torch Relay in Argyle Square on that day. That burning Olympic torch should not pass through London unhindered while the flame of freedom is extinguished in Tibet.

Who Hacked Lee Jasper?

Something that has been amusing Guido is that clearly the original source(s) for the Standard's stories were email records. So who hacked Jasper's email account? Is there a Boris secret agent in the I.T. department?

+++ Ken : "I Will Re-Hire Jasper" +++

Guido is trying to get confirmation that Ken told a meeting of supporters last night that when re-elected he would re-hire Lee Jasper.

Boris Now Punter's Favourite

Guido managed to get a few extra quid on Boris before he went better than evens. Guido has felt ever since Mike Smithson drew attention to the second preference polling that Boris should be odds on. He is now.

The sheer ferocity of the attacks from Labour figures at their spring conference suggests they know it as well. Labour activists don't like him and therefore don't understand how he could win. Two months to go before they will find out...

Whisky Business at the GLA

These pictures of a "lively" Ken are from a recent meeting.