Rather like a dam bursting after a almighty rain storm, suddenly 12 comments have blurted out below Linda Jack's post entitled: Man Woman Woman Man...........its all of no consequence in a by election, isn't it?????? . This post of Linda's beautifully answers the question "What is Lindylooz Muze for?" and tells us that if Lindylooz Muse didn't exist we would have to invent it. I love Linda dearly in a strictly platonically internally partily typily way.
But Linda appears, in her reply to comments, to have moved the preponderance of her argument. She's shifted her ground (and we all know that a moving target is harder to hit). Linda is now majoring on whether or not general election candidates are told they will have to re-apply for by-elections, whereas the overwhelming weight of her original post was asking 'why was a woman dumped for a man?' (I've now re-read it for the third time to check that this paraphrase is accurate and I apologise if I have been too broad-brush or inaccurate).
However, I find Linda's whole main argument totally illogical and well, er, "squiggly". We have two by-elections and the local parties, yes, the
...have selected one man and one woman. Even stevens. Problem? Yes, if you were the general election woman candidate (I'm not even sure she was on the short-list) who wasn't selected or the "general" man who wasn't selected (who certainly wasn't on the shortlist). But the party gets two locally selected candidates to fight for, one of each gender.
I really think a few cogs have flown off Linda Jack's rotor-blade on this one. I saw the pressure of a by-election at reasonably close quarters in Newbury. Here's just one little example of the heat a candidate can be under: David Rendel had been working for 14 hours and at 10pm one night, someone approached him as he left the by-election headquarters. They asked about his thoughts on Europe and taxed him on some points.
Then someone ran out of the by-election HQ to tell David something important. The person asking the questions, unseen to David, was holding a microphone behind their back so that they were recording everything David said.
That's just a little sample of the pressure which by-election candidates and their families come under. Alex Wilcock is right in his comments under Linda's post. Most general election candidates who are not re-selected for the by-election just knuckle down and support the eventual candidate.
Nothing personal Linda, and apologies for any patronising sanctimony in the above post.
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5 comments:
So a woman complains about the removal of a 60 year old local councillor and men such as you call her mad for daring to complain about it.
If only life were so simple, but there is madness all around!
It is important to get away from man-woman, woman-man divisions and get back to what this is all about - improving the representative capabilities of our democracy.
As LibDems we support democratic initiatives, but we won't be swayed into getting dogmatic over it.
There is a wide range of different responses to localised considerations, but generally we are on top of the debate.
Demographically-speaking I would prefer it to have a more balanced membership than we already have, and I would prefer it if the pressures of personal siuations enabled a more representative choice.
The problems we LibDems have in our party do however represent the challenges that still exist in our society as a whole, and we are working to improve both.
Anonymous 1 - But I attacked John Dixon and Bob Shaw when they made a similar point about C&N (http://paulwalter.blogspot.com/2008/05/cobblers-about-crewe-and-nantwich.html) telling them that they were talking "complete cobblers" so why should I put the mufflers on when making the same point (albeit in a different constituency and with a reverse gender situation) to a woman ? Wouldn't that be extremely patronising? And don't most people in the blogosphere know that Linda can give as good as she gets - with great charm ?
I wasn't seriously calling Linda mad and I have modified the posting to make this clearer. I was very careful to refer to the blog, and therefore some of its postings, not the person, and it was in gest. The councillor was not "removed". General election candidates have to automatically re-apply for by-election candidatures. And it happened to a man in Crewe and Natntwich where a woman was chosen and the general election candidate was a man. So the process has come up with a gender balanced couplet; which shows that the process is reasonably (although I accept not perfectly) based on fairness in choosing the best candidate, in the view of the local party members) regardless of gender. It's not just men who have an issue with Linda's posting - see Jo's Jottings here:
http://libdemjo.blogspot.com/2008/05/its-not-about-your-career-this-is.html
I am in Belfast waiting for a bus to Newcastle so I will be brief being as there is a misunderstanding about what I was saying. You need to read both blogs to make sense. I don't in principle have a problem with there being a reselection for a candidate when there is a by election, but this should be made clear to candidates at their orginal selection, it isn't and I have had a number of PPCs tell me that. But I do think this would be avoided if we had a grading system. The second point is that if we want to represent one of the selection criteria has to be how representative we are. We are an overwhelmingly white male party and we just don't seem to be bothered because of a vague notion of having those who are best for the job - a decision based on what we see is what we get mostly. Who can challenge a selection committee in an ET for example??? So, the message is yet again we don't have women of the calibre to do the job. Its no good saying the local party decide when it is stitched up nationally in terms of the choice they have. But I do agree that if someone is ditched, for legitimate reasons, they shouldn't throw their toys out of the pram - we are part of a party because we want to change things for the better, not for our own ends I trust.
Thanks for that clarification Linda. One fairly obvious point is that if our membership doesn't reflect the general population then let's go out and sign up more members - but as I know you are someone in closish proximity to Dave Hodgson I know you know that and already do that.
The other somewhat tangential point I would mention is that Henley LibDems have an excellent record in promoting women - in the shape of Catherine Bearder. One of the ironies is that if this by-election had happened a few years ago, Catherine would have been a shoe-in for the candidacy - but of course she is now right up high on our Euro election list.
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