Monday, 9 February 2009

"Real people"

A comment from one of Tory Bear's lectures today really reminded him of how bad the lefty bias amongst most of those teaching at British universities really is. While discussing Proposition 0 in California - making English the only language on ballot papers - the lecturer actually said:

"...and it wasn't the right wing conservatives calling for the measure, it was the real people, the liberal people."

The real people!? WTF?

Casting some light on the matter...

Things aren't looking good for Jacqui Smith - an official complaint has been made by a little friend of Tory Bear's to the Parliamentary Standards Commission. Although you wouldn't know it from the BBC, luckily Sky have been running the story this afternoon and it looks like the papers are

getting involved
.




Almost as satisfying as sticking it to the Home Secretary is causing
Derek Draper
to have a hissy fit.

What larks.

Rules of Political Life #106 - Never ever sing.

Questions are often raised about the mental state of the Prime Minister, but now TB has to wonder about his enemy - Scottish First Minister Alex Salmond. Video footage of him singing a duet with uber-nationalist folk singer Sandi Thom has emerged and it's painful to say the least:



What on earth was going through a) his head, and b) the heads of his massive media and spin team when they allowed this to happen.

TB can't make it to the end of the song.

Exclusive: CF to lose only member of staff.

Word has reached TB that the only member of staff in CCHQ who works on Conservative Future and the party youth is set to lose their job. Michael Lunn who has been running the administrative side of CF since September 2007 is set to be one of the members of CCHQ staff let go in the recently announced wave of cut-backs. While being a marmite character in the murky world of CF politics, Lunn's position had not been helped by the reported recent fall outs with key players as well as various controversies. Regardless of people's opinion of the man himself, the fact that CF is back to square one in terms of representation in CCHQ and the ability to get things done is a blow to the organisation.

A shocking incident...

Staff and students at the University of Connecticut are this morning attempting to return to normality after a truly horrific incident shook their campus over the weekend. The University put the alert out after a man had the audacity to walk past a woman...

University Alert Status:

UCONN Police Reporting a Suspicious Occurrence and Safety Alert:

On 2/7/09 at approximately 6:35 PM a suspicious incident occurred at Hilltop Apartments, in the parking lot between the Beard and French buildings. A male approached a female from the opposite direction and came up within several feet of her personal space. The female turned around and left the area. The male walked away in the opposite direction. The male did not say anything or make physical contact with the female. The intention of the male is unknown. Description as follows: a white male 6’ 0” with shoulder length brown hair wearing a red or brown cloth jacket and jeans. Male described as older than college age. The male had a round face and large build.

If you have any information or witnessed the incident please call UConn Police at 486-4800. As always, you are encouraged to travel in groups at night and in well lit areas. Please notify police of any suspicious activity to police immediately.

How very dare he.

Sunday, 8 February 2009

When two tribes go to war... ah ha!

The biggest of battles often happen in the strangest of places, but it seems that left and right will soon be pitched in an open fight on the streets of errr Norwich...
In the red corner we have Wes Streeting, the President of the National Union of Students. Wes is a man - as the photo above proves - literally propped up by
Labour
. He is gearing up to fight for another term in office but has an obstacle to overcome first. In the blue corner we have Michael Rock, a bastion of soundness and the chairman of Conservative Future. The two are due to battle it out in
a debate hosted by UEA
on the 17th. Education is on the agenda but Tory Bear is fairly sure this debate will descend into much much more...

Watch this space.

Err wrong campus?

So say you were were running in an election for an esteemed position, one awarded to someone who has shown their loyalty and commitment to an institution. An institution who in return will proclaim you their chief. In order to win this election it would be recommended that you reach out to as many students and staff as possible, rather than focusing on a tiny clique. So it comes to the weekend before the election at Edinburgh University for the new Rector...
And what does Lord George Foulkes
do
He spends it at the Glasgow University Union of course, as guest of honour at... Yes, you guessed it again - the Scottish Labour Students Burn's Night Supper.

It's almost as if his entire campaign is either a pisstake, or just horrendously managed.

Wounder...

Word is reaching Tory Bear tonight from deepest darkest Hampshire. Dan Hannan MEP, recently selected for the safest seat in the country - #1 on the Euro Election South East list, was speaking to a flock of his most loyal fans at a dinner tonight. TB is surprised anyone made it though, as the flyer he received for the event when he was last in London failed to include the date or even the location.  While the more metropolitan Tories who did make the journey down weren't too impressed with what was described as "a airport travel lodge on a council estate," it was, however, Conservative Future national campaigns chief Patrick Sullivan who has been left permanently scarred by his venture from SW3. Details are sketchy, and obviously Mr Sullivan isn't answering his phone, but apparently the combination of a mad dash for a taxi and some ice has left him with a shattered shoulder and elbow and he might be staying in Hampshire for the foreseeable future. Patrick's leafleting and campaigning skills may suffer as he is apparently currently having his arm pinned back together...

Ouch.

Owned...

Resign.

Saturday, 7 February 2009

I am not, nor have I ever been an Abba Fan.

Hilarious little
story
doing the rounds today about Putin denying he flew an Abba tribute band to a secret gig in the Motherland. One of the band members reports that there was dancing and much fun had by all.
TB recommends she avoids sushi resturants for awhile.

AC has a sense of humour...

Some of you may know that TB has a lot of time for Alastair Campbell, and he's pleased to see that he, or at least the person moderating his

blog,
has a sense of humour. What a relieve compared to other prominent, David Brent like, Labour bloggers. TB decided to see what could get through the moderation process and it does indeed seem that...

"2009-02-06 16:38:58 is it true you have the Burnley FC logo tattooed on your bottom?"

...is just fine! Also a bit odd that AC has included the footage of Mandy resigning in one of his videos that goes through the glory days of New Labour. How odd.

Comment away!

Friday, 6 February 2009

More spin and lies...

So Tory Bear is really beginning to enjoy this Rector election that is going on around him at Edinburgh while he is busy with his dissertation. Blogging has taken a hit in the last couple of weeks as he is a very busy bear. For those of you who are not particularly interested in what is essentially a campus election only have another few more days, so panic not.
This election is showing just how tired Labour Students have become. What was once a forceful and tight campaigning unit have become stale and old, as the video they have put together for the Foulkes campaign shows:

Instead of showing their candidate out and about talking to real students and staff, actual members of the electorate if you will, they instead chose to stage the whole thing with... yep you've guessed it... members of Labour Students.
It starts out rather tame... Just a little chat with the Chairman of Scottish Labour Students, must have bumped into him completely randomly on the steps of the Union:
Next we have the classic meet and greet shot...
Something tells TB that George might know this bunch though...

Firstly we have Matt McPherson, the campaign manager. Then Dean the Chair of SLS again, next up it's Laura Jayne Baker a former Womans Officer of the Labour club and finally Naomi Hunter, Vice President of the Students Association and member of the Labour Party.

Finally it seems George has bumped into a random student and is having a chat:
On closer look though it just so happens to be the chief writer of The Journal, a campus newspaper,
Paris Gourtsoyannis
... Hardly a random stranger. The only person missing seems to be
Kez Dugdale
, Foulkes's chief of staff and chief campaigner... Then TB wondered who was holding the camera...
The whole thing is a sham.

Great video from ConservativeHome...

And then there were two...

George Galloway has
pulled out
of the race to become the Rector of Edinburgh University. He claims that he doesn't have the time to fully commit to the role. While this may be true (he's barely been around to campaign,) it is more likely that he realised he didn't have a hope in hell of winning as most students either start meowing at the thought of him winning, or get genuinely angry about the hatred he has been spreading around through his stump speeches.

So it's a straight fight now between Foulkes and MacWhirter. Labour vs every other political party. A candidate in it for the prestige vs. a candidate who actually wants to help students.

Should be an easy choice now for the staff and students.

Thursday, 5 February 2009

BFF

Barry and Tony didn't invite Gordon to their party...

Christian May goes after beaver...

Not as smutty as the headline but CF deputy chairman has gone after the LSE student rag... 

Read all about it.

Wednesday, 4 February 2009

NUS has money to burn...

Great piece over at
Students for Freedom
that TB reckons is worth reproducing in full:

The NUS advertises for a new regional organiser for the South West 

in the best place to find well-paid non-jobs: GuardianJobs.

£29k AND a car?! Compare that to the average university lecturer, who earns £31,840 a year, and obviously no car (duh!).  For the £29k of students’ and universities’ money that the NUS is throwing at its representatives, universities could pay for 700 hours of teaching at that pay grade 
at the suggested £41.23 an hour
.  Each of my eight courses has 100 or so students, and has forty hours of ‘teacher-student interface’ time a year.  That is to say, for the cost of the NUS hiring a regional coordinator to peddle its trash to the South West of England, 219 more students could have been taught for a year. Thanks for standing up for students’ interests once again, NUS!

Something tells TB that Oli Cooper won't be standing for an NUS position anytime soon.

Turning a blind eye?

Further to Tory Bear's story that Adrian McMenamin, the CBI's head of campaigns was writing for LabourList, TB got in touch with the CBI press office...
After an hour or two they got back to TB with... "No comment!" 

Special Ties... and special suits.

David Miliband represents the United Kingdom on the world stage. As he proved yesterday he
meets some
 of the most powerful people in the world, yet TB can't help but wonder if he is the worst dressed Foreign Secretary ever...
While meeting with the Obama administration, a President who is
famed
for his soft spot for very good suits, BananaMan Miliband rocked up in creased and very cheaply cut, dreadfully high lapel shocker. Now Tory Bear knows that the recession is taking it's bite but surely David, as the face of the best dressed nation in the world, can fork out more than £79 for his shiny
Moss Bros number:
He should look like our representative on the world stage rather than a Phones4U salesman...

Quote of the day... or week even.

TB doesn't mean to have a bit of an
Iain Dale
lovin' session this morning but has to highlight this from his interview with the new
CF website

Why should people get involved with organisations like Conservative Future?

For the sex. Pure and simple. What other reason could there possibly be? OK, I can think of one. Because you want to do something to save your country. And by joining CF you will be joining an organization which is going to do its utmost to help candidates in marginal seats beat their opponents on June 4 2010.

The new website is very good and TB hopes the traffic is reflecting that. Well done to Richard Jackson who has been working hard in making this happen.

Worth the wait and beats the other parties youth websites by a mile.