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Iain Dale: no heart, no brains, no courage

I may have mentioned before that I'm not a big fan of cats; by and large, they're selfish, mean little buggers and they have a bad habit of jumping over my fence, crapping in my yard, and then running off.

Most of Iain's and Paul's bullies act like this (and the worst offender so far has been Jackie, who was kind enough to publish libel on other people's weblogs before running away).

Last night, Iain took a step beyond his usual trick of allowing (or creating) anonymous comments to smear me. Now, instead of just letting what he knows to be outright lies stand without challenge, he is deleting my challenges to them!

A screengrab of just such a comment, a fair and concise response that never saw the light of day, is here (as you may have guessed, the related link points readers to the comment exchange under this post).

I could point to many examples of anonymous bullies on Iain Dale's website making claims that simply don't stand up, but (paranoia warning) currently, permalinks to individual comments on Iain's site don't work; they are broken (another of life's happy little accidents).

Funnily enough, Iain Dale uses similar dirty tricks on his pissy little television show; he will often cut guests off and insist that they back up or qualify one statement or another, but he himself is allowed to make claims with no foundation, and he rarely gets called on these because he's the host. (On the rare occasions he *does* get called on these, look for the sudden appearance of the words; "Moving on...")

Iain Dale, abuser of power and wannabe MP, does this a *lot*. Dig though the video archives, watch, learn... and think twice before entering his den.

One baseless claim he made (and got away with) on his show was that I am a 'nihilist'. He then denied saying it, and has made no comment since being called on the baseless smear, and the outright lie.

And he's *still* at it today, playing the victim, playing the expert/upstanding blogger, and publishing (and not challenging) a series of anonymous comments about me being the smearer and the abuser of power (speaking of such things, I can't *wait* to see the 18 Tory Street appearance that Caroline speaks of here... apparently I'm a 'blogging fascist').

This, ladies and gentlemen, is where we finally stray into the personal.

I'm well and truly ticked off... but some people have difficulty in understanding what it is that I'm most ticked off about:

This 'blogging expert' is a disgrace to blogging and his influence on up-and-coming bloggers (especially Tories) is clear. The more people who follow his example and that of Paul Staines, the more crap there is going to be in my back yard... and yours.

To help make this point, and to make clear that I've made this point to Iain Dale, I'm going to publish in full* the email I sent to Iain in the early hours of this morning.

(*An unrelated 'PS' has been removed; you'd need to read two or three other emails to understand its meaning anyway.)

----- Original Message -----
From: Tim Ireland
To: Iain Dale
Sent: Friday, February 09, 2007 1:47 AM
Subject: For the human being that lurks somewhere inside of you

While you're busy playing the victim (i.e. while you're 'in the zone'), just imagine for a second what it would be like to be a gay candidate and have this gang of fuck-heads messing with you:
http://www.bloggerheads.com/archives/2006/08/guildford_tories.asp

They're one of your lot, too.... approved by Head Office:
http://www.bloggerheads.com/archives/2007/01/indulgences.asp

Take a look at how close their techniques are to Paul's...
http://www.bloggerheads.com/archives/2007/01/briefing_astro-turfers.asp

and yours*:
http://www.bloggerheads.com/guido_fawkes/2007/02/manics-tips-for-becoming-successful_02.html

*This still applies even if you don't write the defences/trolls yourself. You hide behind them and/or use them as weapons on a regular basis. And if you don't reign the bullies in, they're your bullies. You own them. Here's a small example for you to follow (best I could find at short notice)... see comments:
http://www.bloggerheads.com/archives/2007/01/onmarks.asp

The longer you keep this shit up and ponce about as a very poor example, the more damage you do and the more common this kind of thing becomes.

Now, perhaps, you will understand why you have finally managed to make me angry... especially when you insist that you are the victim of a smear/attack.

You, Iain, are the potential father of countless smears and attacks.

Wake the fuck up.

Tim

I think it goes without saying that there's been no reply. Iain Dale either doesn't get it, or doesn't care.

UPDATE - Well said. Thank you.: Paul, I don't think it is a row about nothing. Iain insulted Tim on 18 Tory Street and then point-blank lied about it when challenged. And there's been no apology and no withdrawal of the spurious accusation. Tim has an online reputation and Iain has attempted to damage it with an unjustifiable smear. He's been caught bang to rights but he refuses to even acknowledge it, never mind offer an apology. Instead, he's doing everything he can to hide the truth of what he's done from his readers. This ties into the wider point. I'm all for the free flow of information and ideas. It's another reasons why I started blogging. I'm not all for the right to gratuitously smear/insult/rubbish people who ask awkward questions. The latter, it seems to me, damages the ability of the blo****ere to do the former.

UPDATE - I just tripped over this. Read the post and the comment. Try to act surprised.

Posted by Manic on February 9, 2007 11:47 AM in the category The Political Weblog Movement

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