Nick Hogan, the publican who let his drinkers smoke, is a free man tonight, back behind the bar rather than behind bars, thanks to blog readers and libertarians who raised the £8,664.50 to spring him from jail.

Anna Raccoon has the full story, Old Holborn organised the fund raising and Guido was more than happy to publicise it.  Within hours co-conspirators had raised thousands to spring him from jail.

Nick Hogan is once more in the bosom of his family, able to support his wife Denise and their children, instead of being locked up with violent criminals.

A happy ending thanks to the generosity of blog readers…

UPDATE : Guy News was there and has footage of the cash being delivered to the jail by Old Holborn.  (Contact Emily.Nomates@GuyNews.TV for syndication rights).

Gordon told us at his first Labour Party conference as leader in 2007:

So this is my pledge to the British people:

I will not let you down.

And I will always stand up for you.

He also said

it is because of the strength of the British economy that we are able to steer a path of low inflation, low interest rates and stable growth… with the longest uninterrupted period of economic growth in the history of our country.

Then the economy collapsed…

Social mobility down.  Youth unemployment up.  One in five state-school leavers functionally illiterate. Prudence, abandoned. Deficit at disastrous levels.  Last major country out of recession. Credit rating downgraded.  The country is broke.  No ending of boom and bust.  The lies, the bullying, the dithering, the politics of destruction.

Too late…

Never say that Guido is not willing to correct mistakes:

SWINSON, Jo to guido.fawkes
10:03 PM

In answer to the question you posed yesterday on the Guido Fawkes blog at 3:25pm: No.

I only claimed for one item on that receipt, for which as you report the Fees Office declined to reimburse me, a decision which I fully accepted.

As is perfectly clear from the claim form which is available for public view online, I did not claim for any of the other items on that receipt.

To be clear, I did not claim for, indeed have never even considered claiming for, any make-up on my expenses.

In light of these facts, I hope you will agree it would be appropriate for you to correct this posting on your blog.

Regards,

Jo Swinson

Guy Fawkes to Jo
8:47 AM
What was the item for which you claimed?

Will clarify.

SWINSON, Jo to Guy
9:12 AM

The tooth-flosser.

Nice to know that Jo thinks the taxpayer should take care of her gnashers…

Given what a shining New Statesman’s James Macintyre took to top freelance totty Rowenna Davis, it was only going to be a matter of time before she ended up writing for the struggling magazine. Last month she wrote a piece slamming parliamentarian’s use of unpaid interns suggesting that “MPs’ dependence on unpaid interns gives those from richer backgrounds a headstart on breaking into politics.” A fair point perhaps, so what’s this Guido reads? “The New Statesman Brand and Project Department is looking for an intern…” Paid? Yeah right…

The Guardian have tried doing a hatchet job on right-wing kiddy trainers the Young Britons’ Foundation.  Apparently YBF acolytes visited a firing range while in the U.S. to shoot off some AK-47s, so this means Dave is going to repeal the handgun ban. Well that was the line pumped by one Mrs Bob Marshall-Andrews, the wife of the stalwart Labour MP, who happens to work for the anti-firearms lobby. No mention of the relationship in the article though.

In Guido’s student days we went to actual war zones, not firing ranges, to shoot off Ak47s. Given that Eric Pickles just last Wednesday gave a speech to YBF, praising them and getting them fired up for the coming ground war, it seems somewhat pathetic for him to be trying to distance himself.  Guido was wondering what exactly is wrong with shooting off a few rounds?  After all a right-wing gun nut was Britain’s finest Prime Minister.  The Guardian make it sound like they are being trained for a military coup. They shouldn’t worry too much though, as Guido told the YBF audience just after Pickles had addressed them – they aren’t nearly extreme enough.

They should spend more time on the firing range and less time trying to climb the greasy pole.

Ashcroft’s commercial links to ConservativeHome, PoliticsHome and Iain Dale are getting a lot of coverage, not least in the Guardian this morning.  People should not forget that Charlie Whelan’s Unite union funds LabourList and LeftFootForward is also union funded.

For the avoidance of doubt, Guido’s blog is an editorially independent, for profit enterprise.  If James Murdoch, the Barclay Brothers, Charlie Whelan or Michael Ashcroft want to buy Guido’s blog, he is open to offers.

Until that day the editorial line of this blog is determined by Guido alone…

So Lord Swraj Paul has fallen into line with Ashcroft.  However Lakshmi Mittal has given even more – some £4 million pounds to the Labour Party tax free – shouldn’t he or the Labour Party pay tax on that sum?

Guido has identified £10,596,751 in non-dom donations to the Labour Party from donors who have avoided paying UK taxes, that is an average of £16,403 per constituency.  There are, as Lord Paul himself says, more donations and donors not yet identified.  If donors had to pay taxes at the higher rate of 40% like ordinary voters the exchequer would have not been cheated of £7,064,500.

Labour’s 1997 manifesto promised to put a stop to all this…

There is growing resentment in some quarters with Michael Ashcroft, the feeling is that his Lordship has unnecessarily made difficulties for the Tories by waiting till this late moment to come clean.

There is also a concern that in deciding to sue, at this time, the Indy (over allegations of corruption) he is guaranteeing more bad headlines during the campaign.  He is being cut loose already, the Tories are ruthless about these things, CCHQ is briefing that

“Michael Ashcroft has said that he is standing down as deputy chairman of the Conservative party after the election to concentrate on his media and business interests. Under the ministerial code this would exclude him from holding a government post.”

In the words of Douglas Adams, the Cameroons are saying: So long and thanks for all the cash…