In defence of Vincent Bailey

If the internet existed when I was in my late teens and early twenties and I had had a web presence on it, my profile would undoubtedly have declared that I was an Adonis, a Lothario and a more successful serial shager than either Casanova or Nick Clegg; I'm sure that it would have declared that I was brave and cool and had done all sorts of things that were seen as "manly" and against the rules including drug taking and violence.

The truth is that I was 22 before I had my first fumblingly disappointing sexual conquest, I have never taken an illegal drug in my life and if anybody had threatened me with violence I would have run home to my Mam as my primary way of confronting the threat; as would the vast majority of the lads in my peer group. If I had been truthful I would have been drummed out of my peer group by friends who were as virginal, clean living and frightened as I was – but afraid to admit it. Young lads lie about sex and their social equivalent of drugs and rock'n roll; always have done and always will do!

When I was a young lad those lies were unimportant, unrecorded and are now only remembered by those of a similar age who know that we all lied together for the same reason. Because my teenage fantasies and bravado were never written down, they can't come back to haunt me now, should I decide to stand for election or decide to give support to a candidate for election.

Vincent Bailey, isn't a bad person who has no place in Welsh politics. When he was doing what I did at his age he was caught up in a new technological system without realising its consequences for his future, something I didn't need to worry about!

I suspect that every possible future politician, political aid or political supporter under 35 could find themselves in the same boat as Vincent. Any young person who shows an interest in his or her country's politics may be threatened and dissuaded from becoming politically active because a silly tweet or a profile or a blog comment might come back to haunt him or her forever! That is bad, very bad, for democracy!

The villain in this story is not Mr Bailey, but the person who decided to trawl through Mr Bailey's internet history in order to embarrass him and in order to embarrass Andrew RT Davies' campaign to lead the Welsh Conservative Party!

Dirty Dave, should be ashamed of himself as should his cronies at Trinity Mirror / Western Mail for regurgitating his dirt digging in the ancient history of a political opponents' puerile web presence!

And if Andrew wants to show some leadership skills he should stand four square with the now (hopefully) mature Mr Bailey, rather than throwing him out as a sacrifice to Dave's dirty tricks!

Return of the prodigal

Like most who have an interest in Welsh affairs I was aware of the fact that Dave Collins had been forced to resign by Ann Jones AM because of his Welsh is a brain dead language comment. As much as I vehemently disagreed with Mr Collins' comment I have already stated that putting a young family man on the dole because of such a comment was a gross over reaction by the Labour Party, a party founded to protect the rights of workers.

Today I discovered that Dave wasn't the only employee of an AM to lose his job as a result of the brain dead affair. Apparently Marcus Warner, the author of the Keir Hardly site where Dave Collins' comments were published has also been dismissed by Irene James AM for Islwyn as her press officer/researcher, apparently for an irretrievable breakdown in trust but clearly for hosting the blog on which Mr Collins' unfortunate remarks were published.

I shan't pretend to be Marcus' biggest fan. I disagreed with about 90% of his postings as Keir Hardly and with a similar amount of his other postings as Clear Red Water and Renewed Labour. Marcus has also disagreed with many of my postings on this blog. But as Voltaire (may have) said I disagree with what you have to say but will fight to the death to protect your right to say it. But, of course, Marcus wasn't sacked for what he said, but for what (in effect) somebody said to him!

I am pleased to see that Marcus has returned to the Welsh blogosphere, this time in the guise of Southpaw Grammar.

I wish Marcus all the best and hope that he finds new employment soon, especially as he and his partner are expecting their first child.