Tuesday, January 12, 2010

Liddle for the Independent?

If you judge a Facebook Group by the number of its members, Rod Liddle doesn't stand a hope in hell of becoming editor of The Independent. The group If Rod Liddle becomes editor of The Independent, I will not buy it again has more than 2350 members, while the group supporting his candidacy (if one can call it that) has a mere 86 supporters.

The left is up in arms at the very thought. I suppose that ought to make me warm to the idea, and indeed, the naughty side of me rather looks forward to the prospect. Editors ought to be idiosyncratic and iconoclastic. But I have never really seen Liddle as a newspaper man. Yes, he writes brilliantly, and always has an opinion on everything, but that doesn't necessarily mean that he would be a good newspaper editor.

Guido has suggested that Matthew D'Ancona would be a better candidate for the job, and I think he is right. I do think he Independent needs to get a new identity and to plonk itself on some new territory in the newspaper world. D'Ancona could reposition it to become the only Cameroon paper on the newsstands. Would that increase sales? Well, they can hardly be worse than they are already.

18 comments:

paulstpancras said...

Might as well have d'Ancona, what with John Rentoul, Bruce Anderson etc its editorial stance is already a Blairite Tory Lite.

Steve Richards, Jane Merrick etc could be the 'token' progressive professionals to add Metrosexual street cred to the 'progressive' conservatism - so strongly supported by its rural base - of Cameron's Tory Lite.

OldSlaughter said...

Some nuts somewhere in our broadsheets would be good.

I am for Liddle for the reason that it will shake things up and hopefully provide mirth by the barrel load.

Anonymous said...

Who reads the Independent anyway? It is a very dull paper. It seems to me that the people who join groups to boycott papers don't read them - as was the case with the boycott by Guardian readers of the Sun after it came out for Cameron.

Unknown said...

Yes the Indy used to be good with a good crossword but that was nearly 20 years ago. I suppose the important questions are not just who will buy but who will happily work for Liddle?

Jimmy said...

At long last Fleet Street would have a newspaper which supported the Conservative Party.

Anonymous said...

Isn't the 2,350 figure you mention also the total readership of the indy or perhaps it is down to 86 readers....

Simon Gardner said...

Remember "editor" Janet Street-Porter.

Penfold said...

Let the wretched paper go to the wall.

Tapestry said...

Maybe The Independent could tackle the secret targeted child seizure programme, which takes 25,000 children away from their parents in Britain every year, with no appeal allowed for parents or any publicity.

The Conservatives should make it a manifesto commitment to end the secret regime of Family Courts and the secret imprisonment of parents who try to campaign for the return of their seized children.

LINK.

Conand said...

It should be re-started as an overtly Green/Communist Truthpaper. It could then be pulped before it is sent out to Newsagents, therefore saving quite a lot of time, energy, carbon etc.

David Lindsay said...

More seriously, politically speaking, than at least one other doing the rounds, http://www.facebook.com/#/group.php?gid=249956543490&ref=nf seeks to make the most of the best opportunity for a very long time, which seems most unlikely to come again any time soon:

Rod Liddle's editorship of a national daily newspaper would give a voice to:

- The alliance of the traditional Right and the traditional Left against the neoconservative war agenda and its assaults on liberty at home, including, with Alexander Lebedev as proprietor, against any new Cold War with Russia;

- The socially and culturally conservative, strongly patriotic tendencies within the British Left's traditional electoral base;

- Those who recognise that we cannot deliver the welfare provisions and the other public services that our people have rightly come to expect unless we know how many people there are in this country, unless we control immigration properly, and unless we insist that everyone use spoken and written English to the necessary level;

- Those who refuse to allow climate change to be used as an excuse to destroy or prevent secure employment, to drive down wages or working conditions, to arrest economic development around the world, to forbid the working classes and non-white people from having children, to inflate the fuel prices that always hit the poor hardest, or to restrict either travel opportunities or a full diet to the rich;

And many, many more.

Bill Quango MP said...

Let Rod do it. At least it would be different.

Dangerouslysubversivedad said...

Oh David, like I said on Facebook, lighten up a bit!

I started the 'pro' group on a whim just to annoy a few of the more humourless types at Harry's Place - I'm actually amazed that its gathered 120 members in two days. I'd just love to see it outstrip the 'anti' group because, well, I love annoying those 'of the Left'. It's a gift that never stops giving.

Malcolm Redfellow said...

Sorry: still trying to come to terms with your logic. If the syllogism proposes:
"It is. Are you?"
"... the only Cameroon paper on the newsstands"

The only possible conclusion to those premises has to be:
"Shop shut by the autumn".

prj45 said...

Who's a member of the support Liddle for the editor facebook group? It must be entirely made up of people that dial up the GMTV phone in quizzes and get the answer wrong.

Man in a Shed said...

As Guido points out the old the Telegraph has move to a cross dressing position with the like of Mary Riddell etc - so there's room in the market on the right.

Though if the Speccie were a little more imaginative they could have it.

David Lindsay said...

Dangerouslysubversivedad, I am in your humorous group. But this is the only chance in years, and for years to come, to secure a platform for the Left-Right alliance against neoconservatism, for the conservative and patriotic Left, for the left-wing opposition to unrestricted immigration, and for the left-wing opposition to warmist hysteria.

Paul Linford said...

Has anyone paused to consider whether the Independent would be able to afford Mr D'Ancona?