If this doesn’t change, and very, very soon, then I shall have to come to the conclusion that this is not just a series of embarassing cock-ups and stupid comments, but a calculated attempt to marginalise those of us who consider ourselves ‘liberal’ and ‘left’, but who consider that a political party has to actually do something we agree with more than once a decade to be worthy of our support.

Y’know, speaking as someone who also considers myself to be on the liberal left but isn’t a member of a political party and doesn’t think my posts betray a particular partisan leaning (I’ve written in praise of Labour, Lib Dem and even the odd Tory politician in the past and am currently writing a bit about the libertarian line on drugs), I’m struggling to relate to this. LC’s had a bad week; it’s had bad weeks in the past and there will be bad weeks in the future. But will those bad weeks to come really be a calculated attempt to marginalise? I don’t see it.

From my own point of view, most of what I write about (domestic social policy and international relations) is pretty marginal in the context of the blogosphere, but it still gets lifted from my little, tinpot blog – where it’s read by about six stray cats and a lost pigeon – to the 3rd most linked-to in the country. I’m certainly not the only non-affiliated blogger who enjoys this kind of promotion, either.

If, on the other hand, we’re talking primarily about seeing more posts on Lib Dem policy (though the policy section of your party’s website is horribly designed), or more posts by party members, then I’d agree that this is something which could be improved. It’d be nice to see those Lib Dems who’re already valued contributors writing a bit more, it’d be nice to see the odd web-savvy pol dropping in for a guest post, and it’d be nice to see us hosting more content by less well-known writers. The site needs to figure out how to do that; not because it will banish the slightly batty notion that LC is a Labour 5th column, but because it’ll improve the range of voices above the breadth it already boasts.

The Lions post is a case in point. It even talks about Vince Cable and his approach to CGT, but then goes on to say that there’s no progressive party for people that feel that way.

There palpably is, thus I feel obliged to point it out. I’m fairly reactive in comments, and I do feel at times like I’m merely beating my head against a brick wall—articles or comments that pretend the Lib Dems aren’t an option at all are just frustrating, I joined them (recently) because I feel they’re the current only option, and to see so many people doing the “so now who do we vote for” thing and then rule out the LDs because “they’ll never get anywhere” is just stupid.

If half the people that, like us, thought the Lib Dems would be worth it if they had a chance actually gave them that chance, Vince’d be in #11 right now.

I could, and should, post original articles more. Worth noting that when I do post actual articles, it’s virtually always non-partisan policy or issue based stuff.

Hell, my last post was defending Jack Straw over FOI. That wasn’t something I thought I’d ever find myself doing.

It was a non-story, played up by the Tory press machine, and picked up by the mainstream press as a way of attacking Brown/Labour knowing full well that most people either wouldn’t know or wouldn’t understand what it was about.

The Red Rag website was touted as being a left leaning gossip blog, they were discussing setting it up, and were playing around with daft story ideas—the tone of the emails makes it clear they don’t think the stories were serious.

The timing of the release is apposite—just after the G20 meeting, that Gordon had been planning for good publicity. The emails had been doing the rounds of the press offices for months, why release them then?

Non story, non issue, playing into Tory hands.

Other than that I agree with you—there has been good stuff and bad, and a lot of the bad is sorted as issues—Sunny’s publicly apologised for the Mahon thing, and Sunder’s agreed the blogging article coulc’ve been done better for the site. I could, and ought, to be writing more there, I can post what I like after all, but I wonder if the reason I don’t is the atmosphere the site has these days, it’s becoming more of an inward looking circle jerk all the time, and that bores me.

As I’ve said over there, if you’re trying to build a ‘broad coalition’ but one of the groups in that coalition is feeling excluded – *WHETHER THAT IS YOUR INTENT OR NOT* – it is a sign that something is wrong.

I didn’t say “the Labour members” are being partisan – and indeed I have nothing against partisanship, just against the assumption, which is *only* made by *some* Labour contributors, that everyone on a supposedly cross-party site belongs to and supports one single party. You don’t get posts on there talking about “what we need to do to save the Liberal Democrats” or “why you should join the Greens even if you disagree with everything they stand for”. If you don’t make posts like the ones I complained about, then you’re not being complained about – I deliberately spoke about posts rather than people.

“Finally, presumably as an author you are included upon the email list and were witness to the great commotion ”
You presume wrong. The only LC mailing list I’m on is tips@ . This post is *only* based on my own opinions about what has been posted publicly on the site itself, either as posts or in the comments.

“You will also presumably have been witness to offer by Sunny to discuss an editorial line or method of organisation”
Ditto. I also suspect those emails were probably confined to a private list because the people involved didn’t want their contents made public, so I’d appreciate it if private emails (whether or not they’re on lists I’m on) weren’t mentioned in the comments here.

“I think the recent public declarations about ending contributions”
What ‘recent public declarations’? The only one I remember is Alix asking for her name to be removed from the contributors page, which given that she hasn’t contributed anything there for a long time (I think over a year) and doesn’t agree with the editorial line she perceives in the site, is fair enough. As far as I know, no other regulars there have made any ‘public declarations’ at all. I certainly haven’t – and given that I did in fact contribute today’s Netcast, and fully intend to contribute next Thursday’s, it should be clear that I don’t have any intention of doing so at the moment (not that anyone would notice – I am far from the biggest contributor there).

I am a Labour Party member (though we’ll see for how much longer) and in none of my articles for LibCon – which, like yours, go through the editorial process – will you find me encouraging people to join Labour. In fact at least two of my articles for the site openly question whether or not it’s time we made a break for Labour in favour of more flexible forms of organisation. Therefore, I rather resent this nonsense about how it is the Labour members of the site who are being partisan.

Finally, presumably as an author you are included upon the email list and were witness to the great commotion caused by the article about Alice Mahon. You will also presumably have been witness to offer by Sunny to discuss an editorial line or method of organisation with the various regular contributors. Bearing that in mind, I think the recent public declarations about ending contributions are reminiscent of children throwing their toys out of their pram.

To take your points one at a time.

1) One or at most two posts on ‘Smeargate’ would have been appropriate, but having it be two-thirds of the blog’s content for several days isn’t, and the jokes about disability and repetition of slanders about David Cameron’s sex life should never have been posted *anywhere*, they were an absolute disgrace.

2) True. But that kind of ‘lapse of judgement’ does happen rather a lot, and always with Labour-oriented posts rather than Lib Dem or Green ones…

4) Oh, as a post itself it was fine – it’s not an opinion I think should be removed from the site or anything, although I happen to disagree with it vehemently. But as part of a larger pattern of posts it’s annoying.

5) I agree (not necessarily about every specific example, but the general point),but I think I did address this adequately in my post, pointing out that the good posts (just) outnumber the bad ones.

And I certainly don’t want to ‘stick the knife in’ to Sunny or any of the contributors to the site – Sunny’s a good bloke, and when he gets things wrong it’s usually with good intentions. But some of the stuff on there recently has been irritating, and other posts have been absolutely disgraceful, and I think it’s incumbent upon me as a contributor (albeit a minor one) to say “this isn’t what I support or stand for” as loudly and clearly as possible…

1. I think Sunny was right to run the articles on “Smeargate”. It wasn’t just a blogging issue, it was front page of most Sunday newspapers on Easter Day, and affected quite a few of the bloggers who write for or use LC in a semi-direct way. So I think Sunny got that right.

2. The “Progressive Blogging” post by Sunder may well have been a lapse of judgement, given that Liberal Conspiracy is not a Labour site. It should have been more clear that it was a re-print and not intended to speak for everyone. But I don’t think anything more sinister than a lapse of judgement occured.

3. I too was very surprised by the article attacking Alice Mahon, not simply because it was nasty and unresearched, but because it was so badly written I’m surprised Sunny let something go up which was so evidently below the usual LC standard.

4. I thought the piece about leftists joining Labour was pretty good. I didn’t agree with all of it, but I think it made for reading which would be interesting for both Labour and non-Labour party memebers.

5. Lot’s of other articles went up over the past 2 weeks: a response to Rowenna Davis’ criticism of the left’s reaction to the global crisis; a good article about anti-semitism and the left, and how to deal with Nick Cohen generally; a thoroughly excellent and perhaps even magical article about VAT posted by some unknown person, discussing the strange dearth of reaction on a key tax issue from all parties, and so on.

In summary: it’s only fair to point to the good stuff that went up on LC as well. I think perhaps Sunny had “a bad week at the office” regarding a couple of things that went up, but it’s no more sinister than that. Considering that i’ve had a very bad week at the (real) office, I don’t want to start sticking the knife into people for a couple of misjudgements, especially when they normally do a really top-rate job.

Incidentally, I’m not going to censor comments or anything here, but I have a policy of not mentioning a few ‘high-profile’ bloggers (the one you mentioned and two with surnames beginning with D, one Tory and one Labour) just because I don’t want to give them publicity. I’d appreciate it if you didn’t mention their names here in future…

God, I even think Paul Staines has better served the cause of checks-and-balances on the executive than that bunch of circle-jerkers