The Bubble

The telly in TB's room is finally working! He's having a very civilised morning with a surprisingly decent coffee and Sky News. For once he was able to sleep in without missing some shameless chance for self-promotion. It was a strange one last night, lots going on but everything very hush hush. The suites at the Midland are no doubt buzzing. A stream of aides and shad cabbers were heading up to the higher floors all evening. Access denied to the bear, except one. Mum's the word.

Given last week's blinder, the News International crash was always going to be ambitious. The blonde on the door was charming but ultimately firm, at least TB wasn't so desperate that he used the "I'm Andy Coulson" line - "Oh really, why does your pass say James then?"

TB managed to get a decent sleep for the first time since about last Friday but word is reaching him that not everyone had the same idea. Three hacks, who he won't cringe by naming them, decided by 5am it would be an excellent idea to just keep drinking until the the 7.30 round of fringe events. Hannan's early morning speech was apparently worth still being trashed and turning up to as part of an seventeen hour conference bender. TB is impressed by their stamina and terrified at how keen they are!

The mood here is fantastic, no cock ups as of yet. There are journos desperate for this to go tits up and have been plying tory boys with gin and trying to get them to say stupid things. It's not that people are being deliberately on message, more that the message has the support of every level of the party. Dave is on form and has a hell of an enthusiastic bunch behind him. The Mirror's actions this morning were a disgrace. Their hacks are having a great time but should get out of journalism and head to a pr company.

"Evil Tendencies" - updated.

It was always going to be a tough gig for the New Statesman's political editor James Macintyre. Having just weeks ago smeared the Conservatives as "institutionally racist", James was doing his best to charm the crowd at their reception on Sunday night. First up Dale was cornered for a chat, but others went in for the kill. Mr denied smearing and indeed swore he hated Draper,Mcbride and even Gordon, who he claimed had "evil tendancies." What was he so adamant to deny to TB though?

Amazing how champagne can loosen the tongue eh!

Caption Contest

This gem from TV's

Shane Greer

cracked TB up:

A seat for karaoke guru and ConHome's co-editor Mr Isaby? Pah!

Over here!

Alan Duncan cuts a lonely figure as he strolls backwards and forwards across the media scrum zone between the conference venue and the hotel. TB clocked him attempting to catch BBC hacks eyes for a good ten minutes, they seemed to be more interested in chasing the Shad Cabbers for comment though.

Horrible job, who'd want to be an MP these days.

Back Hander..

The rumours are flying that

Keep Right Online

are in the pay of YBF. TB has the proof:

Wish someone would pay TB.

Here Bear and Everywhere

Good morning conference,

TB is feeling fresh as a daisy after an epic karaoke session last night. He was up bright and early and definitely not still slightly drunk when speaking about the future of the BBC in a new media age. Hic.

The pictures and videos from last night will no doubt surface somewhere, but TB had a great time, thank you to everyone who came along. He will never forget the double encore of Things Can Only Get Better. A hundred drunk hacks claiming New Labour's anthem of choice was quite a moment. Especially given the rumour the guy that wrote the song has come out, as a tory.

TB is rather busy, mainly drinking with

Dizzy

, but he thought he would share some snaps from yesterday:

Lad!

Look closely:

Rivals:

Wes for Pres...

Will blog properly later...

Karaoke!

TB is gearing up for Karaoke tonight. Just to confirm - The Studio at Chigago Rock, Peter Street at 11pm.

Tenner on the door.

Quote of the Day

Tory Bear's intern for the week, well not quite intern but roomie, came out with this classic over lunch:

"There seems to be £50 missing from my wallet that I can't account for."

Five minutes later... "God damn it. Champagne."

Aww.

They actually bothered coming down to the entrance to the secure zone:

Solid effort.

Tune into Radio 5 Live at 12

If you aren't at

#cpc09

. Click

here

to listen to TB on the Victoria Derbyshire show.

Highly impressed the hashtag had reached the 4th most popular topic on twitter.

And we don't even have a twitter czar.

Poor Kerry McCarthy. No seat come May and an utter failure at her job to promote her party on that interwebby thing.

Sunday

So perhaps the 7am Google Breakfast was ambitious. So conference has been open for less than an hour and already it is the ninth most talked about subject on Twitter in the world. TB had a cracking first night - thank you Labour controlled Manchester Council for the fish and chips and lashing of err pudding wine. TB quickly made his way to the New Statesman party to cause some ructions. All in all a success, he ended up chatting to James Macintyre, their controversial political editor for a good half an hour. It could be described as a broad conversation and TB isn't yet sure whether to laugh or feel sorry for him.

The CF drinks were a blur of old faces, and more importantly lots of new ones. For a party that is often viewed as aged, there are a hell of a lot of passionate and extremely articulate and on message Cameroons here who make even TB feel old. The evening ended in style in Midland with an even bigger flurry of old faces and Lord Strathclyde up to his usual tricks - whispering in a young lady's ear.

The Midland is lobbyist central, and given it's six quid for a G&T TB can't say he's disappointed.

The Stage is Set

and yeah.. it's awesome.

Conference Totty Watch - Episode 1

There were some pretty damn funny stories to come out of Birmingham conference last year. This hilarious one has been doing the rounds, but TB never thought it would be the one to

make it into a newspaper

:

The sting, news of which has been passed around political circles, was hatched while Ms Squire was enjoying a round of evening receptions. At one, she was approached by a middle-aged delegate who told her: ‘You must come back to my room.’

Despite Ms Squire’s refusal, the man continued to press his case, eventually thrusting one of his room cards for the Birmingham Hyatt into her hand and saying: ‘Come to my room at 3.30am, when the parties are over, and I will give you the time of your life.’

Ms Squire, who was a model and journalist in South Africa and New York before joining the campaigning group, accepted the key – but with no intention of taking him up on his offer.

She then went to another reception, where she was pestered by a second, younger man in similarly persistent terms.

Exasperated, she eventually reached for the first man’s room card and smiled: ‘OK. Here is the key to my room. Come up at 3.30am and I’ll give you the time of your life.’

She was left in little doubt that her ploy to bring the two ardent men together had succeeded when she encountered one of them the following morning, who expressed his fury about his early-hours meeting."

You have been warned boys. Though you all know what to do with your conference rumours!

NO2ID Rally

Conservative Future

has a long history of supporting the NO2ID Campaign and given the Labour Government is using Manchester as a guinea pig for this unnecessary and wasteful scheme it seems there a plan brewing.

Manchester's huge student population will be some of the first victims of the scheme with the Government planning to refuse student loans from those who don't sign up for the 'voluntary scheme'. So CF is hitting the streets.

The rally is Tuesday 6th October, 12.30pm at Albert Square (next to Manchester Town Hall.) Damian Green MP is speaking at 1pm. Michael Rock, Chairman of Conservative Future states “working in conjunction with the NO2ID team, we're aiming to have the largest CF rally to date, incorporating the 'Reclaim your DNA' message and bringing together local students and workers, Conference delegates and MPs.If you value your ID, your DNA and your freedom then I urge you to come along, get involved and send a message to this out of touch Government."

TB will be there, and can he just say, the new CF press operation is getting slick.

Just Bears and Bags

Not really any room for anything else in the case:

6am start. Bed.

Thieving Paws...

Hmmm TB is sure he has read that story somewhere before. At least the Evening Standard referenced where they got it from when they covered it.

Invoice on the way Monkey.

Bag-Carrier Invasion of the News International Party

This section from TB's favourite Labour lady-blogger

Sadie Smith's

conference round up made him chuckle:

The news of the the Sun's "Labour's Lost It" editorial started doing the rounds about 9pm the previous evening, at precisely the same time that the News International chaps - and this was a courageous decision in retrospect - hosted their champagne reception for the most important and influential people at Conference.

In the next room was the Co-op party, a good do by all accounts. Both events were proceeding pretty much as planned until some enterprising comrade in the News International do realised there was a fire door that linked both parties. Outraged, as we all were, at the Sun's attempted hatchet job, this individual opened the joining door and, with the rallying cry, "free champagne this way!" caused a minor riot as a stampede of the hoi polloi took the News International reception by storm.

I was at a dinner outside the Conference centre but heard an account from a friend who was a witness of the insurrection. It was reported to me that a comrade was caught wandering off with a glass of champagne, only to be accosted by a News International woman who demanded to know whether Moet was being stolen.

"Er, yes," replied the criminal, without blinking.

"Well," huffed the woman, "I think that is very immature."

This coming from from a corporation that the next day would publish a teenager in blue panties declaring her love for David Cameron struck us all, after the event, as hilariously rich."

Anyone thinking what TB is thinking?

Well, will see if he can blag an invite first...

And it won't just be Labour slurs...

As TB mentioned in his previous post, the kitchen sink is coming. While Nigel Farage isn't a tory, he is one of the most articulate and shrewd defenders of freedom out there. So obviously the Lib Dems are all up for smearing him with

baseless and pathetic shit

:

Lib Dem Voice claims to be a sensible website, a conversation etc with Lib Dem members. It hardly does itself justice by running slurs such as that. The cheapest of cheap shots.

No wonder nobody reads it.

The Kitchen Sink is Coming

Sunny Hundal, head honcho of Liberal Conspiracy,

says

:

"There needs to be an increasing drive towards investigative blogging, finding news and digging up dirt on the opposition. Just writing opinion is no longer enough. Left-wing blogging has to focus on two things: collating and publishing news, and doing distributed investigative journalism. More on this another time.

Not only will it get dirty and partisan – I’d say that is exactly where we need to be."

Dirty and partisan eh?

Last time Tory Bear heard anyone recommend that as a game plan it was our dear Derek, and that didn't go too well. The left have become increasingly desperate in the last few weeks. While obviously some attacks are

done with a sense of humour

, Kerry McCarthy "Twitter Czar" and her harem of minions are getting bitchier and bitchier, as are the likes of Chris "sailing close to the libel wind" Paul of

Labour of Love

, a bitter and clearly very warped individual.

The whole Labour supporting movement, bar, ironically,

LabourList

which has been rather sensible recently and some more serious policy types (Will Straw and Jessica Asato come to mind) are really beginning to clutch at straws. Expect the Damian McBride School of Political Campaigning™ to really come of age during conference. TB imagines dirty and partisan

James Macintyre

, who got his fingers burnt pushing Hundal's Hannan-is-a-racist meme to be a key figure in this mud slinging.

Do your worst, it only proves what everyone knows already - Labour is fighting like an failing opposition party, in a state of utter desperation.

Murdoch Two, Brown Nil

Without the excellent

campaign by Sky News

Gordon would still be cowering in his bunker. Instead the nation's voters are going to get the chance to see the real choice of Cameron or Brown, with periodic interruptions from Clegg who will no doubt be loving the publicity boost and another chance to pump out hollow and shallow promise of gold, knowing full well he will never have to implement them.

Blair would have been perfect for this, but Brown, given his recent TV appearances could well crack up live on television. His personal disdain for Cameron is well known and putting them head to head, not once but THREE times is going to be popcorn worthy.

It was Sky wot won it.