Blog changes

I've been making a few changes to the contents panel today, mainly with the aim of improving the signposting and adding some deserving new links.

The biggest change is the subdivision of the "Best of the Blogosphere" category, which was becoming rather long, back into six broad political categories: Non-aligned, Conservative, Labour, Lib Dem, Anti-Blair and Anglosphere. If anyone thinks I've miscategorised them, please email me and I'll change it.

Anyway this gives me the opportunity to introduce a few more links to sites that I rate including:

* Tory Radio, Jonathan Shepherd's increasingly influential podcasting site;
* The Nether World, David Simonetti's latest solo offering;
* Mike Ion, one of the more sensible voices in the Labour blogosphere;
* Craig Murray, who has something to say even if you don't agree with it;
* And finally, the hilarious Hitler Cats which needs no further introduction.

I've also put in a permanent link to the 7/7 Bombings Inquiry Petition, in the hope of encouraging more visitors to sign it.

Some fellow bloggers have suggested I dispense with Blogger and purchase myself a spanking new bespoke website as Iain Dale did earlier this year, but I must say I'm in two minds.

I really like the simplicity and "cleanness" of the Blogger template, and it also seems to load on the page a damned site more quickly than some other blogs I could mention. I would welcome views on this however.

Finally, thanks to everyone who continues to visit the blog and to make it worth my while.

Visitor numbers aren't yet in the Guido/Iain Dale league, well not by a long chalk, but I am pleased to say that they have very nearly doubled over the past month and at the current rate of progress I should be challenging Guido by about September 2013! Not that it's a competition of course.....

Could Hague lead the Tories again?

It usually takes me a few days to plough through the Sunday papers, so it wasn't until I was on the bus this morning that I came across Isobel Oakeshott's
big interview with William Hague in this weekend's Sunday Times.

Hague is quoted as saying he would never, ever wish to lead the Tory Party again, saying that his period in charge gave him the "self knowledge" to realise someone else could do it better.

“I’ve got that all out of my system. Totally,” he says. “I’m glad I was the leader but I’m glad I stopped. I’d had enough. I thought someone else would turn out to be more effective than me and that’s very much the case. I’m a fan of DC and I enjoy working with him, and I’ve only come back to help him win the next election. I don’t ever want to be leader again myself. I could happily write books instead. I enjoy that at least as much as politics.”

“No sane human being who’s done it before would want to do it again. You have to have self-knowledge, in any job. I came to the conclusion that someone else should be doing it.”

There is something that rings true about this. In my dealings with Hague, notably when he was at the Welsh Office and I was on the South Wales Echo, I generally found him to be very straight. And that is not a sexual pun, by the way.

Nevertheless, I think there's a difference between actively seeking high office, and not refusing it when it's handed to you on a plate. Or as the old saying puts it: "Some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon them."

The Tories would never again entrust Hague with the task of returning them to power. But I can foresee a situation where, once in power, they might turn to him, as Foreign Secretary and the nearest thing they have to an elder statesman, to hold things together in some future, currently unforeseen crisis.

Would he say no in those circumstances? I doubt it. He is a politician after all.

Conspiracy theories

Not surpisingly, the number of conspiracy theories about last Thursday's terror said continues to multiply on the web.

Even if you don't believe in them, they certainly make entertaining reading.

* Shaphan suggests the whole thing was set up by the security services to help John Reid, who he claims is their preferred candidate to succeed Blair as Prime Minister.

* Craig Murray argues that the episode is designed to deflect attention from Blair and Bush's domestic troubles, and urges us all to "be very sceptical."

* Guido says it's designed to lay the ground for further harsh anti-terror measures, a claim given added credence by this report in Scotland on Sunday.

Meanwhile Paul Donovan takes all of us hacks to task on the Press Gazette site for our tendency to believe everything the authorities tell us. Yeah right.

My verdict? Yes, there probably was a plot, and yes, it is in the nature of governments - especially this one - to exploit such situations for all they are worth.

But Reid as MI5's candidate for PM? Surely not. Don't they realise he's a former Commie?

Lampard-Gerrard conundrum spelled axe for Beckham

Unfortunately I ran out of time on Friday afternoon to do a post on David Beckham's axeing from the England squad, but I have to say my sympathies were originally with the former skipper.

Beckham may be past his best, but England's dismal World Cup campaign would have been even more catastrophic without his goals and assists, and initially it appeared he had been singled out by Steve McLaren as a "political" gesture designed to show that he is his own man.

Now all becomes clear, however. McLaren has picked the great Steven Gerrard to play in Beckham's old position on the right of midfield, presumably in order to leave the central midfield area free for Frank Lampard.

It was obvious during the Wodld Cup that Gerrard and Lampard were getting under eachother's feet. Now McLaren is attempting to solve the problem, with Beckham's omission the collateral damage.

Greasy pole: is Reid up or down?

As previously billed my newspaper columns and Podcast this weekend focused on whether Home Secretary John Reid's leadership chances have increased as a result of last week's terror raids.

Interestingly, Iain Dale is taking a rather contrarian view on this, arguing that his sidelining of Prescott and apparent eagerness to assume command will be unpopular with Labour loyalists.

My own view is that the chances of a Reid candidature have increased, but not necessarily the chances of a Reid premiership.

I agree with Iain to the extent that there is a fair amount of hostility to Reid and his right-wing, populist agenda within Labour circles, and that if he was to be chosen to succeed Blair, it could only be as a choice made out of electoral desperation:

"A Reid premiership remains unlikely. But what if the Labour Party’s poll ratings started to go into freefall and the public appeared increasingly bored by the prospect of Mr Brown? In that scenario, the press could start to get behind him as a tough leader capable of restoring the Government’s flagging fortunes and re-enthusing a jaded electorate.

"The momentum could then build to a point where not only would Dr Reid look silly if he did not stand, but the Labour Party would look silly if it did not elect him."

On a similar theme, I was suitably honoured to be asked to fill the Guest Slot on PoliticalBetting.Com today, in which I look at the role that Alan Johnson could play in the leadership shake-down.

My current thinking is that Johnson may well stand for both the leadership and the deputy leadership, but with the latter as his main goal.

Leaving my own punditry aside, however, the most interesting article I saw on the Labour leadership this weekend was from Oona King in the Observer.

Although the main thrust of the piece was to call for a woman deputy leader - no great surprise there - the degree of venom directed at Tony Blair was astonishing coming from someone who was previously regarded as a such a loyalist.

It's shaping up for Reid v Brown

Odds are shortening on a John Reid leadership challenge after his assured response to the terror raids, says Mike Smithson on PoliticalBetting.Com.

Hard to disagree, and I'll be saying a fair bit more about this in my weekend newspaper columns and podcast which, as ever, will be available here on Monday.