political commentator * author * publisher * bookseller * radio presenter * blogger * Conservative candidate * former lobbyist * Jack Russell owner * West Ham United fanatic * Email iain AT iaindale DOT com
Sunday, July 19, 2009
Labour's Latest Winning Campaign Trick
This is Labour's latest leaflet in the Norwich North by election. Words almost fail me.
Awww. I think the fox is going to get it. Poor eating by the way. Grouse or Partridge is my cup of tea. I really hope all those labour voters..... You know who you are. Bye all
Could Iain (or any Tory members), please tell me if there is any feeling within the grassroots of the party that the ban on hunting with dogs should stay? Something I'm very curious about.
If there is no great feeling, then I for one hope that the fox doesn't get it, be it from Labour of the Tories.
Utterly laughable. It shows the utter desperation Labour are facing. Their vote is in meltdown. THe interesting thing will be where it goes, and as there is only one party other than the Tories campaigning across the constituency, I am feeling mroe and more confident of a good Lib Dem result.
I live in a very rural, very Conservative area. There is no desire to keep the hunting ban and almost everyone round here was against its introduction.
Anon 8.06: did you think foxhunting had stopped? Do you think it's enough for these Labour snobs to pass a law like that and every one immediately behaves differently? You need to get out more.
Anyone want to buy my oil painting of a hunting scene near Beverley? It's become politically incorrect. I have pasted a picture of a pretty fox beneath it to create a balance on my lounge wall.
I live in a rural area and foxes often visit my garden. They are NOT cute and do not look like the Muppet in the photo. Once smelt, the stink they leave will never be forgotten. They are cold blooded murderers, of rabbits, cats, dogs, chickens, lambs. Not for food, just for the hell of it. "Vermin" is a perfect description for them.
The hunt ban, Labour's pitiful little bout of self-confessed class warfare, had nothing whatsoever to do with animal welfare. But it did have one positive outcome. Fox hunting has never been in better shape, more popular or better supported.
It may well be a desperate tactic but I don't believe this is an issue that the Tories are shouting about from the rooftops for the key reason that they know fox-hunting is electorally unpopular with the wider public.
I think Labour have every right to highlight the fact that the Tory candidate is a supporter of aninal cruelty.
You can hunt them with hounds. A frantic race for life, with a chance of getting away. Otherwise a quick death, a wild animal's death. This is illegal under laws passed by Labour.
You can shoot them, probably not killing them outright and leaving them to die slowly and horribly of gangrene. This is legal according to Labour.
You can poison them, another slow, painful and lingering death. This is legal too.
@7.41 "I think the fox is going to get it. Poor eating by the way."
Recipe for fox casserole, from Peter Mayle's A Year In Provence: "Skin the fox, and cut off its parties. ...Leave the cleaned carcass under cold running water for twenty-four hours to eliminate the goût sauvage. Drain it, bundle it up in a sack, and hang it outdoors overnight, preferably when there is frost.
The following morning, place the fox in a casserole of cast iron and cover with a mixture of blood and red wine. Add herbs, onions, and heads of garlic, and simmer for a day or two ...In the old days, this was eaten with bread and boiled potatoes, but now, thanks to progress and the invention of the deep-fat fryer, one could enjoy it with frites".
well I have to say I didn't see that leaflet, but my blog has some reflections on two days spent down in Norwich, as well as a pic of a rather funny note posted on someones door...!
@ Joe Public - that's been widely mentioned in the local press. I'm sure it was even in some of the Labour campaign leaflets. Chris (whatever his name is) joked that "we all make mistakes when we were young"
That and being stupid enough to represent a lame duck party.
I dont mind £1.4 trillion national debt, economy going down the pan, heading for 3 million unemployed and British tropps being sent to die without the proper equipment...
...as long as the little fox cub is safe from those tories.
(PS still checking my testicles wherever I am - at least once an hour - is this excessive?)
Old Reynard just pinched off a rather large loaf in the middle of my lawn, so if I have anything to do with it Foxy will be getting a size 10 hobnail boot up the fundament.
To everyone who thought this ad was original ... ask yourselves, when did the socialists have a clever thought?
When did they say something mildly interesting, never mind rivetting? Although the notion itself is worthy of a laugh.
This ad is derives directly from a cover of Mad Magazine in the US in around, oh, the 1970s sometime.
It had a photo of an adorable little puppy on the cover, and a male hand holding a gun - looked like a .45, and the headline reading: Buy this magazine or we'll shoot this puppy!
It's famous. It's as iconic as fat Ché's one good shot in his entire life.
You didn't seriously think the Labourites had had an idea, did you? Didn't you notice they'd used American slang? It's sophmoric socialist. Pathetic.
Anonymous 10:40 - Agreed. Agreed. Agreed. It has to be outlawed, as does kosher, which is the same. Those days are history and why we are permitting the import of ancient desert habits long outlawed in our country is a puzzle.
The animal that is losing its life, its blood of life draining from it, and knows it, doesn't give a crap that a Muslim or a kosher Jew will now find its death acceptable.
The terror and panic of the animal thus slaughtered makes my skin crawl, and I hope the bad karma creeps into every bite of anyone who eats it.
When I first saw this I thought it was a "wind up" to be honest but seemingly it's not.
Labour have finally lost the plot !!!! Do they really think that given we have almost 3 million unemployed,public debt of almost £2 trillion;a war in Afghanistan that is badly resourced and proving difficult to see a successful outcome for; public spending cuts after an election linked to higher taxation whoever wins and finally the scandal of MPs expenses that the electorate feel the welfare of an animal that is generally regarded as vermin in farming communities and doesn't even register on the majority's radar will win the Norwich North By-Election ??
On a more serious note - I was speaking to a farmer yesterday who was telling of the problem on the farm with foxes after the new born calves before the mother has risen to her feet. He told me they had shot 13 foxes in the last week and 4 that previous night - what do labourites think of that? No survival of the fittest here. The farmers know not if they shoot young, old, vixen, dog and, because of the build up of foxes in an area, due to lack of normal hunting, they are having to do it at a time when the Hunt is observing a closed season which normally leaves the foxes to bring up their young. Hunts work with nature, they do not try and re-arrange it.
No, I'm sorry. It HAS to be a wind-up. In my 20 years in the Labour Party I knew many people who were devious, malevolent, spiteful and corrupt, as well as racist, misogynist and homophobic (obviously) but rarely since the late 1970s have UTTERLY STUPID people been let anywhere near the party's campaigns. So this can;t be real.
Symptomatic of the paucity of political debate and what passes for an issue to the British public.
Having had our democracy removed from us, having had our liberties crushed, facing an economy which will be bankrupt in a generation, fighting a war with a deficit of equipment and Government care and building a state where more people spend taxes than generate them...Labour play the fluffy foxy-woxy card.
Ah yes, those lovely little furry things who keep ripping my rubbish sacks open, have killed my neighbours cats and bitten at least 5 locals.
I hope they do "get it". Their numbers are growing at an ever increasing speed and they are nothing but vermin.
Using them as an election tool is a little sad to say the least. But then in desperate times political parties do desperate things, and there's nought more desperate than the Labour party at present.
As a rootin’ tootin’ hunt supporter I’m delighted with this!
Mike Hobday and his pals made so much of the popular mandate from ’97 to justify 700 hours of parliamentary time the draconian use of the Parliament Act to try to ban hunting.
So, when the labour candidate crashes into third on Thursday with a massive swing away from Zanu Liebour after putting fox hunting at the centre of his campaign Mikey boy and I can deduce that there is a massive mandate to repeal the Hunting with Dogs Act.
As the results are announced and (hopefully) the NuLabScum candidate loses would it not be appropriate for hunt supporters to blow their hunting horns!?
Verity’s about right. It was the cover of National Lampoon magazine from January 1973, with the caption “If You Don't Buy This Magazine We'll Kill This Dog”
There’s an image at http://www.flickr.com/photos/scriptingnews/3116706556/
Anonymous 6:03 - Thanks. And that headline was written by none other than the wonderful P J O'Rourke who went on to become a terribly funny and astute political author starting with, I believe, "Republican Party Reptile". My personal fave is "Eat The Rich".
I’ve no time for jumped-up townies on horses with their packs of yelping hounds charging across the land, but I tell you that the fox is pest and if one gets into a chicken shed there won’t be a single bird left alive in the morning.
1 in 6 support getting rid of the hunting ban!?! What bollocks.
MORI polls for LACS are nonsense as Iain has pointed out before. The only MORI poll worth considering in recent years is the one commisioned by the BBC in 2005 which showd that less than half of people supported the ban:
One assumes that the poster reflects the current funding priorities of the Labour Party & not that the fact that foxhunting has always been of supreme social & economic importance in & around Norwich, let alone that its candidate has any hope of winning the by-election!
As I understand it, the Labour Party has received substantial donations from PAL, which, it has been suggested, is run by the late Tony Banks' sister & is linked to, & ultimately funded by, IFAW, the US animal rights organisation.
One wonders how this aspect of Labour Party funding fits in with its plans to ban non-residents and overseas-domiciled individuals from making direct & indirect donations to political parties - not to say the fact that it is apparently also in receipt of substantial donations from Swaraj Paul & Lakshmi Mittal.
To be honest, in a democracy you have to give rights to other people with whom you and the majority disagree.
The fact that fewer people support fox hunting than oppose it does NOT give them the right to do so. Democracy is all about toleration of minority activities (some of which you do not like) PROVIDING said activities do not harm other people or their own enjoyment.
@JohnHuttonProphet @12.35, July 20 So Labour not third. So much for your powers of prophecy! Time for a name change? Cruelty is cruelty, no wonder some Tories hide their favourite policies!
71 comments:
Well, as the fox living near me is guilty of digging a large hole in my lawn to get at my much loved pet rabbit, I hope the damn thing does get it.
Awww. I think the fox is going to get it. Poor eating by the way. Grouse or Partridge is my cup of tea. I really hope all those labour voters..... You know who you are. Bye all
Labour are going to kill that fox if the don't win?
Have Labour ever smelt fox leavings? Perfume compared to theirs.
A crap campaign message, but I have to admit, that did make me laugh.
Oh for fox sake! Whatever next? Boiled bunnies?
Anyway, I thought these pillocks had already legislated all forms of hunting out of existence.
Darling Iain, can't you see it is yet another of my little plans to undermine dear Gordy.
This kind of crass electioneering is sure to upset the soft city types.
Much Loves (to anyone plotting to be the next Labour leader (that would be me)).
More examples on my little blog.
fox hunting i thought was banned.not many people will vote for it to come back.
Could Iain (or any Tory members), please tell me if there is any feeling within the grassroots of the party that the ban on hunting with dogs should stay? Something I'm very curious about.
If there is no great feeling, then I for one hope that the fox doesn't get it, be it from Labour of the Tories.
Labour are 4/6 at Labbrokes to come second on Thursday which seemed "generous" at the time I put my £20 on.
But, seeing the crassness of THIS campaign I'm not sure that the liberals might just swing it.
Shit. I just snorted tea out of my nose and all over my keyboard.
That's a very good joke Iain!
What do you mean, it's not a joke?
Utterly laughable. It shows the utter desperation Labour are facing. Their vote is in meltdown. THe interesting thing will be where it goes, and as there is only one party other than the Tories campaigning across the constituency, I am feeling mroe and more confident of a good Lib Dem result.
This really proves that Labour have never understood the problems of a rural population.
A cunning plan worthy of Baldric. They must be truly desperate (is this what they call a dog whistle issue?)
@Luke.
I live in a very rural, very Conservative area. There is no desire to keep the hunting ban and almost everyone round here was against its introduction.
Anon 8.06: did you think foxhunting had stopped? Do you think it's enough for these Labour snobs to pass a law like that and every one immediately behaves differently? You need to get out more.
Brilliant strategy. Tally ho you Tory toffs!
Anyone want to buy my oil painting of a hunting scene near Beverley? It's become politically incorrect. I have pasted a picture of a pretty fox beneath it to create a balance on my lounge wall.
If the Conservatives say they will bring back foxhunting and pistol shooting, they will never be voted out of office ever again!! very very simple!
I live in a rural area and foxes often visit my garden. They are NOT cute and do not look like the Muppet in the photo. Once smelt, the stink they leave will never be forgotten. They are cold blooded murderers, of rabbits, cats, dogs, chickens, lambs. Not for food, just for the hell of it. "Vermin" is a perfect description for them.
The hunt ban, Labour's pitiful little bout of self-confessed class warfare, had nothing whatsoever to do with animal welfare. But it did have one positive outcome. Fox hunting has never been in better shape, more popular or better supported.
A Labour apparatchik has too great a fondness for 'Blaziing Saddles' - where famously Gene Winder said, 'stop there or the enword gets it'
Well, we've lied shamelessly in order to get the country into an illegal war. Why would we have a problem with lying about our Tory opponents?
It may well be a desperate tactic but I don't believe this is an issue that the Tories are shouting about from the rooftops for the key reason that they know fox-hunting is electorally unpopular with the wider public.
I think Labour have every right to highlight the fact that the Tory candidate is a supporter of aninal cruelty.
Bolshy: there are three ways of killing foxes.
You can hunt them with hounds. A frantic race for life, with a chance of getting away. Otherwise a quick death, a wild animal's death. This is illegal under laws passed by Labour.
You can shoot them, probably not killing them outright and leaving them to die slowly and horribly of gangrene. This is legal according to Labour.
You can poison them, another slow, painful and lingering death. This is legal too.
Who's cruel?
What a cheap shot.
Fuck the fox, people right now are infinitely more concerned with jobs, debt, mortgages and their dwindling pensions.
They continue to not get it.
@7.41 "I think the fox is going to get it. Poor eating by the way."
Recipe for fox casserole, from Peter Mayle's A Year In Provence: "Skin the fox, and cut off its parties. ...Leave the cleaned carcass under cold running water for twenty-four hours to eliminate the goût sauvage. Drain it, bundle it up in a sack, and hang it outdoors overnight, preferably when there is frost.
The following morning, place the fox in a casserole of cast iron and cover with a mixture of blood and red wine. Add herbs, onions, and heads of garlic, and simmer for a day or two ...In the old days, this was eaten with bread and boiled potatoes, but now, thanks to progress and the invention of the deep-fat fryer, one could enjoy it with frites".
Strange this is on the ARRSE site & not yours.....
"Norwich North by election:- Labour candidate forgot to tell party officials that he was a member of the Conservative Party when a student."
http://www.arrse.co.uk/Forums/viewtopic/t=128628.html
well I have to say I didn't see that leaflet, but my blog has some reflections on two days spent down in Norwich, as well as a pic of a rather funny note posted on someones door...!
@ Joe Public - that's been widely mentioned in the local press. I'm sure it was even in some of the Labour campaign leaflets. Chris (whatever his name is) joked that "we all make mistakes when we were young"
That and being stupid enough to represent a lame duck party.
bolshy,
Animal cruelty eh?
When will Zanu Labourdo something to stop the bleeding to death of animals in a halal abatoire?
Perhaps someone can explain why killing vermin is bad but bleeding a lamb to death is acceptable?
I dont mind £1.4 trillion national debt, economy going down the pan, heading for 3 million unemployed and British tropps being sent to die without the proper equipment...
...as long as the little fox cub is safe from those tories.
(PS still checking my testicles wherever I am - at least once an hour - is this excessive?)
Conservative Reply -
Picture of Cherie Blair
Vote Conservative''
Or this becomes the FIrst Lady of Europe.
lol @ Tapestry
I live in a very rural, very Conservative area. There is little desire to lift the hunting ban.
Old Reynard just pinched off a rather large loaf in the middle of my lawn, so if I have anything to do with it Foxy will be getting a size 10 hobnail boot up the fundament.
I sort of predicted this line of attack by Labour last year.
To everyone who thought this ad was original ... ask yourselves, when did the socialists have a clever thought?
When did they say something mildly interesting, never mind rivetting? Although the notion itself is worthy of a laugh.
This ad is derives directly from a cover of Mad Magazine in the US in around, oh, the 1970s sometime.
It had a photo of an adorable little puppy on the cover, and a male hand holding a gun - looked like a .45, and the headline reading: Buy this magazine or we'll shoot this puppy!
It's famous. It's as iconic as fat Ché's one good shot in his entire life.
You didn't seriously think the Labourites had had an idea, did you? Didn't you notice they'd used American slang? It's sophmoric socialist. Pathetic.
Tapestry, v funny!
I think it's on The Daily Mash (don't have the link) that there's a report that swines get Cherie Blair flu.
Anonymous 10:40 - Agreed. Agreed. Agreed. It has to be outlawed, as does kosher, which is the same. Those days are history and why we are permitting the import of ancient desert habits long outlawed in our country is a puzzle.
The animal that is losing its life, its blood of life draining from it, and
knows it, doesn't give a crap that a Muslim or a kosher Jew will now find its death acceptable.
The terror and panic of the animal thus slaughtered makes my skin crawl, and I hope the bad karma creeps into every bite of anyone who eats it.
They are cold blooded murderers...
Yeah. They plot, you know. Crazed killers.
They are a problem, they run on instinct (so do kill lots of stuff) but to call them cold blooded murderers is a bit over the top, I feel.
It'll get shot anyway and there's no jobs in that.
Labour reveal Tory policies, shock horror! How dare they?
When I first saw this I thought it was a "wind up" to be honest but seemingly it's not.
Labour have finally lost the plot !!!! Do they really think that given we have almost 3 million unemployed,public debt of almost £2 trillion;a war in Afghanistan that is badly resourced and proving difficult to see a successful outcome for; public spending cuts after an election linked to higher taxation whoever wins and finally the scandal of MPs expenses that the electorate feel the welfare of an animal that is generally regarded as vermin in farming communities and doesn't even register on the majority's radar will win the Norwich North By-Election ??
On a more serious note - I was speaking to a farmer yesterday who was telling of the problem on the farm with foxes after the new born calves before the mother has risen to her feet. He told me they had shot 13 foxes in the last week and 4 that previous night - what do labourites think of that? No survival of the fittest here. The farmers know not if they shoot young, old, vixen, dog and, because of the build up of foxes in an area, due to lack of normal hunting, they are having to do it at a time when the Hunt is observing a closed season which normally leaves the foxes to bring up their young. Hunts work with nature, they do not try and re-arrange it.
@ Norfolk Blogger ( as he will not post my critical comments on his site)
I think people have had enough of moats dont you.
No, I'm sorry. It HAS to be a wind-up. In my 20 years in the Labour Party I knew many people who were devious, malevolent, spiteful and corrupt, as well as racist, misogynist and homophobic (obviously) but rarely since the late 1970s have UTTERLY STUPID people been let anywhere near the party's campaigns. So this can;t be real.
I guess that this is the 'toff' attack without the top hats.
For Mr. Hobday.
No - Labour reveal Labour priorities.
Afganistan ? NO
Swine FLu ? NO
Unemployment ? NO
Public Services ? NO
MP expenses ? NO
The Economy ? NO
Just Hunting.......
Wasn't more time expended debating this subject than was spend considering the Iraq war ?
Worse still, the hunting ban was pushed through without due democratic process - they used the dictatorial Parliament Act.
Oh purleeeze!
Symptomatic of the paucity of political debate and what passes for an issue to the British public.
Having had our democracy removed from us, having had our liberties crushed, facing an economy which will be bankrupt in a generation, fighting a war with a deficit of equipment and Government care and building a state where more people spend taxes than generate them...Labour play the fluffy foxy-woxy card.
Christ help us all.
Ah yes, those lovely little furry things who keep ripping my rubbish sacks open, have killed my neighbours cats and bitten at least 5 locals.
I hope they do "get it". Their numbers are growing at an ever increasing speed and they are nothing but vermin.
Using them as an election tool is a little sad to say the least. But then in desperate times political parties do desperate things, and there's nought more desperate than the Labour party at present.
Robin.
we have pet fox .
we call him Roadkill.
the children thought of it
so nice
As a rootin’ tootin’ hunt supporter I’m delighted with this!
Mike Hobday and his pals made so much of the popular mandate from ’97 to justify 700 hours of parliamentary time the draconian use of the Parliament Act to try to ban hunting.
So, when the labour candidate crashes into third on Thursday with a massive swing away from Zanu Liebour after putting fox hunting at the centre of his campaign Mikey boy and I can deduce that there is a massive mandate to repeal the Hunting with Dogs Act.
See you back here on Thursday Mike!
And Labour have just signed their death warrant in Norwich North, surely?
Recession, job losses, repossessions, spending cuts, potential tax rises, Afghanistan, defence spending...
... and they want to talk about foxes?
Chances of a sub 2nd place result for Labour?
Apparently support for bringing back fox hunting now down to one in six nationally - according to Labour Matters.
That doesn’t surprise me.
As the results are announced and (hopefully) the NuLabScum candidate loses would it not be appropriate for hunt supporters to blow their hunting horns!?
Tally Ho!
"Simon Gardner said...
Apparently support for bringing back fox hunting now down to one in six nationally - according to Labour Matters.
That doesn’t surprise me."
1 in 6? That's more than the ratio of country folk to "city" dwellers.
Taking into consideration that this is from Labour Matters, we can assume that the real figure is much higher, in favour of bringing fox-hunting back.
Is it not true that the Tories will bring back fox-hunting?? Ergo - the fox will get it?
makes sense to me
Verity’s about right. It was the cover of National Lampoon magazine from January 1973, with the caption “If You Don't Buy This Magazine We'll Kill This Dog”
There’s an image at http://www.flickr.com/photos/scriptingnews/3116706556/
I thought Bel Littlejohn was no longer with us?
The mind boggles...
Judicious use of a stock photograph site allowed me to create the following answer to Labour: shoot-the-fox.jpg
Anonymous 6:03 - Thanks. And that headline was written by none other than the wonderful P J O'Rourke who went on to become a terribly funny and astute political author starting with, I believe, "Republican Party Reptile". My personal fave is "Eat The Rich".
Who do I have to vote for to make sure that the fox gets it?
....” we can assume that the real figure is much higher, in favour of bringing fox-hunting back.“
I shouldn’t think so. Even in the countryside the majority was always against. That can only have hardened.
I’ve no time for jumped-up townies on horses with their packs of yelping hounds charging across the land, but I tell you that the fox is pest and if one gets into a chicken shed there won’t be a single bird left alive in the morning.
1 in 6 support getting rid of the hunting ban!?! What bollocks.
MORI polls for LACS are nonsense as Iain has pointed out before. The only MORI poll worth considering in recent years is the one commisioned by the BBC in 2005 which showd that less than half of people supported the ban:
http://www.ipsos-mori.com/researchpublications/researcharchive/poll.aspx?oItemId=416
Oscar
Time to ban chicken sheds, or at least stop buying the filth that is chicken flesh.
One assumes that the poster reflects the current funding priorities of the Labour Party & not that the fact that foxhunting has always been of supreme social & economic importance in & around Norwich, let alone that its candidate has any hope of winning the by-election!
As I understand it, the Labour Party has received substantial donations from PAL, which, it has been suggested, is run by the late Tony Banks' sister & is linked to, & ultimately funded by, IFAW, the US animal rights organisation.
One wonders how this aspect of Labour Party funding fits in with its plans to ban non-residents and overseas-domiciled individuals from making direct & indirect donations to political parties - not to say the fact that it is apparently also in receipt of substantial donations from Swaraj Paul & Lakshmi Mittal.
To be honest, in a democracy you have to give rights to other people with whom you and the majority disagree.
The fact that fewer people support fox hunting than oppose it does NOT give them the right to do so. Democracy is all about toleration of minority activities (some of which you do not like) PROVIDING said activities do not harm other people or their own enjoyment.
....up Mike Hobay's.
Norwich North Result in
Labour trounched having made the ban on fox hunting central to their campaign.
Democracy in action.
Bring on the repeal.
Tally ho!
@JohnHuttonProphet @12.35, July 20
So Labour not third. So much for your powers of prophecy! Time for a name change?
Cruelty is cruelty, no wonder some Tories hide their favourite policies!
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