Day 3558: Role of President to be Renamed Miss-Chief aka Rigg the Election

Tuesday:


You've still got a few hours left to nominate candidates for Party President, and I'd like you to consider making sure Auntie Jennie Rigg gets up to the starting line.

It ought to be very difficult to choose between any of the THREE brilliant candidates standing for the post of Party President following the surprise announcement that Baroness Ros will not be seeking a second term.

It OUGHT to be, and yet it's actually really easy to place my "one", "two" and "three", with the very important caveat that even my "three" is a sign of very high endorsement.

(For reference, Mr Ed Millipede should come in somewhere in the five to six billion range on this scale. Possibly even lower if humanity should encounter any space aliens!)


Auntie Jennie is a personal friend of my Daddies, and we have sponsored her diary on one or two occasions.

She is, as she herself says, a one-lady diversity campaign: in a world where the meeja are only interested in jumping on ANY sign of people doing THE RUDE at all, she should make more than a few heads turn. Or indeed spin right round and explode!

Daddy Alex often says (when he thinks I can't hear him) that the Liberal Democrats should have the slogan:

"The Party that thinks RUDE is OKAY"

And Auntie Jennie is a walking, sparkling, purple-haired neon sign that reads exactly that!

She ISN'T going to stick to the Party line, and certainly not the COALITION line, but she WILL stick it to anyone who tries to force ignorance, poverty or conformity on anyone else!

Auntie Jennie defies all expectations (and most descriptions!): she's a single mother with lots of co-daddies, who supports herself; she's a barmaid with a degree in law; she's a blogger and podcaster and can make metal detectors go PING just by looking at them funny.

An Auntie Jennie Presidency would be a free-wheeling anarchic cavalcade of whimsy. Can't you just picture her reprogramming the Dimblebots on Questionable Time or Any Questionables, and just imagine her checking Paxo's gusset anxiety on The Newsnight Show. The VERY LEAST that you can say about her is that she adds to the GAIETY of the nation, but she's so much MORE than that.

What Auntie Jennie's candidacy does is to make the MPs/former-MPs HAVE to pay attention to the REAL grass roots of the Party and be aware that they have things to say and they are NOT going to shut the BADWORD up!


But the REAL reason we are backing Auntie Jennie for President is because the Liberal Democrats are a Party where ANYONE can do ANYTHING, just so long as you are willing to just go out and DO IT.

As a fluffy toy who regularly gets to interview very senior people I have to tell you this: the SECRET of getting access to the top people is to ASK the top people, and because they are LIBERAL DEMOCRATS, and because they believe in people power and open government and you know, actually just TALKING to people, then they very often say YES.

You don't need to be BIG or CLEVER; you don't need to be MAINSTREAM or ESTABLISHMENT; you don't need to CONFORM. What you do need is passion in your blood, and democracy in your soul, and Liberalism to your fingertips, and Auntie Jennie has all of those in spades.
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