Here is Lord Nazh's take on the next President, as he sees it.
Obama is clearly a stalking horse and Giuliani is unelectable outside of
Good luck, America.
Here is Lord Nazh's take on the next President, as he sees it.
Obama is clearly a stalking horse and Giuliani is unelectable outside of
Good luck, America.
My Top 20
An apology to Guido straight away. Of course he's the top blogger in the
20] Iain Dale
19] Chris Dillow
18] Devil's Kitchen
17] Mr Eugenides
16] Tim Worstall
15] Croydonian
14] The Englishman
13] UK Daily Pundit
12] Chicken Yoghurt
11] Ellee Seymour
10] Tony Sharp
8] L'Ombre
7] Tom Paine
6] Praguetory
3] Andrew Allison [local issues]
2] Thunderdragon [very slow for a month]
1] Notsaussure [currently not blogging]
Trouble is, there are also these to fit in:
Guido, Reactionary Snob, Unity, CityUnslicker, Flying Rodent, As a Dodo, Dizzy Thinks, Clive Davis, Stephen Pollard, Political Umpire, Fabian Tassano, Trixy, Gavin Ayling, Man in a Shed, Martin Kelly, Mars Hill, Shuggy, The Select, Normblog, Oliver Kamm, Stephen Pollard, Wat Tyler, Two Wolves, Pub Philosopher, Matt Wardman, Bel Today, Bryan Appleyard, Guthrum the Old, Toque…
… even before we go to the unsung people I'd love to include for encouragement.
And even then I've possibly forgotten key people. Who have I missed who could genuinely be seen as a top blogger in the
[By the way, I'm going to try it on with Iain and send the lot but don't think I'll get too far.]
As Iain Dale explained about his own system: I mark each blog out of ten on the following 10 areas: design; frequency of posting; writing ability; personality; comment; humour; range; interaction; popularity; independence of thought. This generates a mark out of 100.
James Higham uses 9 of these, sometimes combined, adds a few others and posits these as the criteria of a great blog:
1] fearless independence of thought and the ability to come out with new ideas and new perspectives on a more or less regular basis, in a spirit of genuine enquiry, unfettered by dogma, party line, prejudice or one issue obsession e.g. the 4th player, managerialism or flat rate tax; the ability to attack both sides equally and the opposite – to praise both sides equally;
2] enormous range of inclusion – either every possible aspect and ramification in a one issue blog or global scope in the issues covered in most fields, the only criteria being whether they are a] important b]
3] sheer writing ability – the ability to string words and phrases together with hardly an error [or typo], the blogger clearly educated at a reasonably high level in the language he or she was born into;
4] authority behind the writing – bona fides based on obvious [to the reader] ability in the field, life experience, a wide range of reading about the topic but not on formal qualifications or position;
5] personality & humour – this also includes ‘niceness’ or the ability to attack targets tongue in cheek, with dignity and wry humour. Quirkiness is not essential but it’s a sign the writer doesn’t take himself or his position too seriously;
6] innovative blog design as a reader service – not only pretty headers and nice colours but providing one touch information in the sidebars, accessible to readers - treating the blog as a service to the reader, rather than as a forum for one’s own opinions;
7] major works of substance from time to time – a blogger must display his bona fides by producing something substantial in fine detail, academically sound and capable of defence. This doesn’t necessarily mean a tome but does mean a long piece from time to time, on a worthy subject. This then needs to be followed through and the theme will appear in subsequent posts.
8] frequency of posting and consistency of identifiable style – maintaining the service with no huge experimental changes and giving the reader what he or she comes for over and over and over;
9] willingness to tweak - constantly working to improve everything from layout to comment, never resting on one’s laurels and saying ‘here’s my package – take it or leave it’ but rather listening, reading, learning and most importantly, growing as a blogger. A smug blog is a dead blog;
10] interaction with other bloggers and readers, comment of value on the issues of the day, mutual support e.g. this tagging business, e-mailing and well – interaction overall.
I’ve left ‘popularity’ off the list because I see it as a consequence rather than a criterion. If one takes care of the 10 criteria above, I feel popularity will come and I worry awfully about bloggers who are in it just for the stats. Mea culpa and the interesting thing is – once I stopped worrying [now I might view the stats once a day and sometimes not even that] and started concentrating on the product, the stats improved markedly anyway.
Update: Tiberius Gracchus, in his Ten-Meme-Never list, has done a similar sort of thing to this.
Iain Dale has been kind enough to include Blogpower in his notification that that time of year is here again.
To
To all
Last year, Iain brought out a 32 page guide to the Top 100 UK Political Blogs [you'll see banners displayed on the sidebars of all the top bloggers] and very quickly it spread like wildfire across the
Make no mistake, indulge in no sour grapes as this blogger did. These lists are hugely influential with the wider public, as well as with the blogosphere itself,
The Rules
In September Harriman House will publish the 2007 Guide to Political Blogging in the
Instead of me picking my Top 100 UK political blogs (as I did last year) I'd like fellow bloggers and blog readers to send me their Top 20 UK Political Blogs by email. I'll then compile the Top 100 from those that you send in. Just order them from 1 to 20. Your top blog gets 20 points and your twentieth gets 1 point.
The deadline for submitting your Top 20 to me is August 15th. Please email me your list to iain AT iaindale DOT com and type Top
Personal Note
Let's make no mistake here - to be included in this list with the heavyweights of the sphere like Devil's Kitchen, Mr Eugenides, The Englishman, Dizzy Thinks, Croydonian, Praguetory and so on would be a great honour. If you feel you're not really all that political, no matter - there is the non-aligned section, which I have my eye on.
Nominate twenty
Remember
This is NOT Iain's personal list, as it was last year but nominated from all over the UK:
2007 Guide to Political Blogging in the
How Do I Assess a Blog
Here are Iain's criteria [embedded in the second paragraph].
And here is my reply and my 10 modified criteria.
Last Year's Lists
Almost half of the suicide bombers in
Interesting article and it leads into tomorrow morning's post on Islam, which I usually don't touch as a topic. It's not a smiling matter but the Arab comment I read today about the way the U.S. can stop the terrorism is by stopping it - i.e. not doing it - is not exactly designed to bring Uncle Sam onside.
Still, Jonathan Swift's post today on Scott Thomas Beauchamp was an eye-opener.
First stop was Wiki, which said:
As personification for the goddess, Thérèse Momoro, wife of a printer, was chosen. The goddess was celebrated in Notre Dame de Paris (she was put on the high altar in the Cathedral by the Freemasons).
Now that's rather choice because I wasn't even thinking of having a go at the Freemasons this time. What did strike me though was that the story I knew, of a dancer/prostitute laid across the altar and "extolled as the goddess of reason", now seemed to be a chaste wife of a printer after all.
So I looked around and stumbled on this, from the Catholic Church, which you'd expect to say it:
This is clear from their subsequent action of enthroning on the altar in Mary’s place a nude woman, the Goddess of Reason.”
Also clear was that this required corroboration. I found this:
The
Mademoiselle Maillard? And this was confirmed here. But Wiki had said: "Thérèse Momoro." Curiouser and curiouser. Then came this:
…just as they’d done to Notre Dame in
Again, officially Catholic and so difficult to confirm or deny. However, it's possible to piece it together with that Reason they were extolling.
The mob was in a mood of mockery. Mademoiselle Maillard was a popular singer, maybe opera, maybe something more Moulin Rouge, [yes, I know it was built later].
Round the choir stood tables over-loaded with bottles, with sausages, pork- puddings, pastries and other meats. The guests flowed in and out through all doors: whosoever presented himself took part of the good things: children of eight, girls as well as boys, put hand to plate, in sign of Liberty; they drank also of the bottles, and their prompt intoxication created laughter.
... and in that atmosphere, she may well have been prevailed on to at least partially disrobe [half-naked], especially if she herself had imbibed a few.
There's nothing new in such outrages, as Caligula could testify:
Alexandrian Greeks had resented the Jews' exemptions, and demanded that Caligula's statue be emplaced in the Jews' Temple in Jerusalem. Riots broke out in support of this in Alexandria, and Caligula, who was engaged in propagating his own divinity in any event, took over the notion, and commanded that his likeness -- tantamount to an idol -- be put in the Temple.
Perhaps the truth lies somewhere midway but one thing quite clear is that the modern scribes attribute the act to a different woman to those of the older sources and play down the debauchery which is apparent in the last quote.
Of this modern scholarship I am deeply suspicious.
And one last thing - why do people descend into debauchery and mob violence when societal constraints are removed or whenever they're invited to? Why don't they march, en masse, to the national library and have a giant "readathon" about Reason?
What force actually moves them, drives them, possesses them to commit outrages?
Just wondering.