It seems that Helen Steel of the Evening Gazette has taken rather a liking to Philtheone.com.
But all is not well. The paper has penned that upon the hallowed pages of this very site there is a hateful distaste boiling; that evil thoughtless commenters have been colluding together in a united front against Blackpool North Conservative candidate Paul Maynard.
They were wrong. The hate campaign is against Blackpool South candidate Ron Bell.
Jokes apart, I don’t know what to make of this article. It is headlined “MP candidate slams hate campaign”, and every source they have quoted is from this website. But there is no hate campaign. There never has been. But the article itself makes no reference to one, either, which is rather bizarre.
Indeed, it was me that the Gazette quoted;
“It is sad but I’ve heard a few comments from people who think Paul Maynard is drunk or ‘they’ve just let him out’, clearly unaware of the condition he suffers from.
“I understand why he doesn’t want to make an issue of it because it’s irrelevant but it may not harm his campaign if people are aware of it.”
In fact, I have been actively correcting people who have made incorrect assumptions about Paul, both online and off. Is this a hate campaign as well?
Yes, Harold suggested, out of his own ignorance or naivety, that Paul looked drunk but he is far from the only one to have thought that. Once informed, he instantly declared respect for the man. For this reason it was obvious to me that Paul needed to inform people about his palsy because his credibility was being questioned.
It’s a shame they didn’t quote Harold’s subsequent comment;
“Christ I didnt know that, well he has my 100% respect there, shame his party is no longer conservative, otherwise he would have got my vote. The man has immense courage.”
I’d like to take issue with Liberal Democrat candidate Bill Greene as well, who seems to have lost the plot completely;
“But candidates should be judged on their policies, not the person behind them.”
What an utterly barmy statement. Of course the person matters – is he suggesting that Paul’s condition is such a debilitating factor that you should ignore him completely and only vote for the manifesto? If I’ve got a hate campaign going on, perhaps the Gazette would like to do an article about Bill Greene’s hate campaign against Mr Maynard too?
Or lets say a candidate had been taking brown envelopes from house builders or never spent time in the constituency, would it be okay to vote for them because the person behind the policies should not be judged?
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Well said Phil,I would love to see what Paul Maynard has to say about a newspaper; blatantly lying in his good name?
Paul, I think you are a great guy,but when you become MP you will have the Gazettte to contend with,just look at what has happened here,as to how low this paper will stoop to generate publicity:let that be a warning to you Sir.
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I have emailed him about it, so will see if he responds. I guess he had nothing to do with the way the Gasjet have spun it.
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Excellent article Phil. My favourate bit was how the Gazette selected certain quotes, misquoted you and didn’t seem to talk to Paul about it at all, who to his great credit is a tough cookie and is just getting on with the job in hand. They could have at least given you a web site link.
Worst still, I’ve tried to correct them and all the posts have been deleted, so poor journalism 1 : what actually happened 0
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Well covered Phil – Glad you brought this out, so your true freedom of reporting and comments can be aired – Shame on you GASJET
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Great article Phil, I have just read this in the Gasjet now, I feel you should make a complaint to the Press Complaints Commission over this sensationalising. It doesn’t refer to your blog in name but it refers to it as ‘a controversial blog discussing Blackpool politics’ clearly the Gasjet have been reading the site.
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TB, this site is a serious threat to the Gasjet, why?
1) No deleters
2) Quality of articles,far superior to anything so called professionals could produce.
2) No censorship,blunt and controversial (me, lol!)
4) Asks the questions we want asking!
5) No campaign against you here, you have had to endure a hate campaign on the Gazettes website, and they refused to sort it!
RIP Gazette.
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To be fair I do comment on a lot of Gasjet’s stories which have been sourced in a proper journalistic way – but I always link back to the Gasjet when I do. There are hundreds and hundreds of links back to the Gasjet from here.
You can’t expect them to give opinions, they’re a newspaper and they report news, however mundane it often is. Censorship on the Gasjet is perhaps the main reason blogs such as this one are growing. At least here you know that what you write will stay (up to a point, anyway) which in itself is a motivation to comment here and not there.
The only reason I really started this site in its current form was not as competition to BtNL but because I was sick of being deleted on the Gasjet and wanted a place to rant without discrediting someone else’s site (BtNL).
I don’t really do hate campaigns. I said I had one against Ron Bell but to be fair I don’t – the campaign is more “don’t forget that despite the posters and leaflets (I’ve just had my fourth Ron Bell leaflet by the way) he still received those donations and the Conservative council still approved the Moss build project so it really is irrelevant what Ron Bell says about it on his leaflets now.”
As Mr_Osato has said, the Gasjet is on the slippery slope with it axing it’s sub editors. If you thought articles were bad now, well, they will only get worse, as he said.
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Christian 1985 ?????
Come on, get a better alias or at least “try” to cover your tracks
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Seems like you’re not the only one to go round calling the electorate bigots, Ruth! lol
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Great BANNER Phil.
Should have one made up and fixed to the Big Wheel
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100% spot on Harold, Philtheone reigns supreme anyday. This was not a ‘hate campaign’ at all. The comments about Mr Maynard were to correct these ridiculous assertions coming from commenters on other sites. Nobody on Philtheone has done anything wrong, I want to know who is behind this story because it has been blown grossly out of proportion.
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Philtheone has got the gasjet on the ropes, they are resorting to desperate tactics and they have backfired.
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Am pretty sure Maynard was talking about a post on UK polling report to that effect. The candidate talking about his disability is legitimate enough, but drumming up a couple of daft comments on a website into a hate campaign? And it can only get worse when they have even fewer staff there…
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Yes I have read comments on UK Polling Report saying things like ‘Was he drunk?’ and such and I feel such remarks are very offensive. Philtheone have never ever made any such comments about Mr Maynard. I feel this should be taken to the PCC.
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TB I asked such a question to you, (was he pissed?) because it genuinely sounded like that (theres been a few mps who have been drunk, Charles Kennedy being one notable example) but you put me in the picture; after which I expressed my admiration for him and still do.No problem.
The gasjet (after all this time) have seized my question as the basis of a hate campaign, which is blatant lies.Asking a question based upon observation does not constitute a hate campaign!
If I were Paul Maynard, I would distance myself from that rag, given what it has said.
I agree a complaint should be made against the Gazette.
I dont think this business does PM any favours either as its so untrue as hes been sucked into it.Its the Gazettes heading, NOT PM’s!
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Apologies Harold, I didn’t know it was you but I did read such comments somewhere else, I was unaware Mr Maynard has cerebral palsy until Zim Flyer mentioned it. But like I have said before it changes nothing for me, I look at Paul Maynard the politician (a very good one too) not his condition.
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I agree TB, he will probably be my MP and I will have no complaints there but the Gazette is a scum rag of the vilest and highest order.
Its pure filth, nothing less.
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Yet despite the continuing deletion of comments, the LEP site has had a revamp where now only registered users can report comments. Why the hell didn’t the Gazette get the revamp first? It is the Gazette that has the problem it just makes no sense.
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Because the Gazette is NON SENSE, lol.
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Too right, lol
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Anyway, its upped the profile of Phils site and I am very happy at that,thanks Gazette! lol
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Funnily enough, the Gazette’s article had the comment “is he fit to be an MP?” on it (long since deleted).
People in glass houses and all that…
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Hm, yeah, I saw that too. Got a screenshot?
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Sadly, no. Not sure they’ll be so quick to restore it, either…
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They’ve been on this topic a fair bit this morning already, so I guess I can kiss goodbye to my Gasjet hate campaign article.
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I’m informed that the Gasjet did approach Mr Maynard first and that he does not believe me to have a hate campaign going on.
Apparently nobody would go on the record with their comments about Paul so the Gasjet decided to lift some comments from here.
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Surely thats grounds for complaint to the PPC Phil?
This is all down to the Gazette,I always belived PM thought that there was no hate campaign agaisnt him on here, if anything its the opposite.
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It would be if my site had been named, I guess. Only person that got a mention was some controversial blogger called Harold
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Harold who?
Never heard of him, lol
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It must have been the the gazette who were drunk while reading the blog if they thought there was a hate campaign going against Paul Maynard here; if anything Phil has always been supportive. Paul has always been open about his celebral palsy and epilepsy and should receive a ton of respect for his achievements despite having these challenges.
But, what about comments about Gordon Marsden’s openly declared sexuality (no one has made comments about Paul’s sexuality, should it matter?) and comments about Penny Martin’s physical attractiveness as a woman? Or any other personal attributes. Is this the same?
What’s acceptable and what isn’t? PC or not PC?
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to be fair, harold did make at least one comment about pennys attractiveness!!!
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I certainly did!
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My problem with Penny is based purely on the system the Labour party used to select her.
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That’s one reason why I wouldn’t vote for her, but also because she struck me as just another Labour puppet on The Politics Show and she was stooping to cheap swipes at the Conservatives which I really despise; I hate negative campaigning.
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I’ve got Penny Martin’s latest personally addressed leaflet here and all it contains is negative campagining.
She slags off Paul Maynard for not wanting to participate in the Labour stitch up debate that they have been trying to organise.
It says, “As you may have read in the Gazette, the Tory candidate has refused to take part in a public election hustings. We expect a candidate to stand up in the House of Commons to speak out for Blackpool and Cleveleys, yet Paul seems afraid to debate in a church hall.”
I think this is scandalous of her to suggest that Paul is afraid of speaking in public, particularly given the hate campaign stuff.
She goes on to say, “We need a strong local voice in Westminster (like Jovanka Humble.. oh wait.. she’s a Yorkshire Serb) and with your support I will be just that fighting on our issues instead of placating multi-millionaires and fox hunters”.
It’s all pretty cheap stuff but not really surprising. Martin seems the in-yer-face militant ice queen that would put the boot into even the most defenceless.
I also have another Labour leaflet from Blackpool North that’s come in within the last few days. It’s just national bollocks and more negative campaigning against the Tories, trying to scare people into voting Labour by feeding them complete lies such as that the Tories will cut free prescriptions, eye tests, bus passes and so on.
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I got that one, yes I only took notice of her picture lol, still it was good for something lol……………….
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Not surprising at all, this leaflet sounds evenmore negative than Marsden’s leaflet which much to my amusement had a picture of a Conservative-supporting student causing Marsden much embarassment in yesterday’s Gasjet. It proves like I have said all along, she is not this ‘dedicated’ and ‘popular’ local councillor I have heard people describe her, she is just another Labour sheep who wants to lie and scaremonger her way into Parliament. I hope the count on May 6/7 wipes the smug grin off her face MAYNARD FOR BLACKPOOL NORTH 2010.
On another note though here in Blackpool South; I have still had no leaflets from Integrity, Lib Dems or BNP with 2 days to go, not a very good advertisement for the named parties. I mean this from an unbiased point of view but from what I have seen here th Conservatives have definitely tried the hardest. I have had 3 leaflets and a personal correspondence from Ron Bell, there are Conservative billboards all over Blackpool and I saw the Conservatives campaigning in Blackpool the other weekend. We have also had a surprise visit from David Cameron yesterday which I didn’t even know about. Labour haven’t tried at all, Marsden has been in Blackpool as often as ever (or never!)
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I’ve had several “personal” letters from Ron Bell, but I have also had one from Gordon Marsden as well.
I’ve had Lib Dem, Integrity and about 6 Tory ones. I’m still not voting for Bell though because he is a disgrace. Got a BNP one today as well, but its identical to the Blackpool North one.
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I don’t think it is quite the same although you make a good point.
The comments about Paul were not about physical attractiveness, they went beyond that and questioned his credibility as an MP because they were unaware of the condition he was born with. The suggestion was after all that he had consumed tons of booze before appearing on TV.
All I’ve said about Martin is that her hair is a frizzy mop, which it is. In future posts I might refer to her as a toilet brush or a poodle. The difference is, she could change it any time she wanted and I am not suggesting that her hair style could affect her role as an MP.
Even non-Labour supporters on here have said Martin has done a great job at council level.
Nobody has suggested that Gordon Marsden’s orientation is or has affected his role as an MP either. Sure some playground comments have been made, but none have suggested the fact he’s gay compromises him as an MP.
He is a good politician and undoubtedly highly intelligent, but sadly lacks compassion for his constituency.
Looking forward to reading what others think about this one.
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Putting all the political correctness to one side, a candidates ability to communicate will affect his/her vote. Questions have been asked about Mr Maynard and answered in double quick time – absolutely no sign or suggestion of a hate campaign. Comments have also been made about the attractiveness of Mrs Martin, again, absolutely no sign or suggestion of a hate campaign. Quite the contrary on both counts!
It would be nonsense to suggest that attractiveness plays no part in picking a candidate. In some cases, Michael Foot being a good example, it is turned on it’s head.
As for Gordon Marsden, it is a reflection of how cosmopolitain Blackpool is that he is relaxed about making his sexual preferences public. There are plenty of other constituencies in Britain where the MP’s and candidates don’t feel they could do so without fear of recriminations.
It should be about wether or not you can do the job well but the electorate will vote how they want to!
Lord Ashcrofts money has more than helped Paul get his message accross and I don’t think that he is complaining about a hate campaign, it is simply the Gazette and their lazy journalism that is fault.
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Three cheers for Lord Ashcroft!
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Why shouldn’t Lord Ashcroft pay for it if he wants. Labour have the unions – who are doing their own political campaign for Labour as well in the national press and on at least one billboard in Birmingham near the M6. If the Lib Dems can’t attract money I’m sorry. But I’m very against compulsory donations via taxes to pay for all this spin we don’t want. Before we start banning people from donating I’d like to see a ban on actors/comedians and large organisations such as unions publically endorsing politicians. Talk about dumbing down campaigns to appeal to the thick little electorate. They obviously have complete and utter contempt for voters in this country.
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Very well said Frustrated. It is utter hypocrisy by Liebour how they want to introduce rules to stop donors like Lord Ashcroft but trade unions are (unsurprisingly) exempt from these rules. I also agree about the celebrities; it gets on my nerves when I see people who I like backing Labour and then embarassingly the Conservatives have Jim Davidson backing them (something I would rather they kept quiet).
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Theres no PC, FUCK PC!
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To be honest I didn’t know there was anything wrong with Paul Maynard until I saw him on the Politics show. And then to me he looked like he had a motor neurone problem as his intellect was clearly very sharp as were his answers to the questions asked whilst his head and neck movements were abnormal. However not everyone has enjoyed the good (private) education I have and whilst I understand him not wanting to play a disability card or make a fuss about something he just copes with all his life, without the public knowing of his disorder in his constituency there will always be people who conclude he must be drunk. If anyone knows about struggling in everyday life it’s Paul Maynard and for that reason together with his obvious intellect I can see him making a compassionate and passionate MP who would do an excellent job for his constituents regardless of their political leaning.
Shame the Gazette got it so obviously wrong that there is a hate campaign against him. They really aren’t too hot on proper research, are they!
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Thats the Gazette all over, a shite paper!
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