"Linda" Obtains Labour Party Membership List Again

It's been seven and a half years since "Linda" last obtained a Labour Party membership list and put it to improper use (in the London mayoral campaign), though it only seems like yesterday.

I say "Linda" in quotes, of course, because back in 1999 a certain person pursuing a parliamentary political career could not afford to be caught with his hands on Claude Moraes' London Labour Party membership list, so he let his (then) girlfriend carry the can for him. Know what I mean, nudge nudge wink wink? Oh, how the memories flood back.

Of course neither of us knew then that obtaining and using such a membership list was potentially a criminal offence, as well as a serious breach of Labour Party rules. Just as yesterday we were blissfully unaware that the fact that we had inadvertently received a list of Labour Councillors from a certain alliterative Deputy Leadership candidate did not grant us the lawful right to use the list without potential breach of copyright laws and/or the Data Protection Act. After all, we're just Hackney Councillors. What the hell would we know about the law?

Still, as on that previous occasion, I thought it wise to allow my (now) wife to carry the can, by penning an email to all Labour Councillors and sending it out under her name, using the address list we had obtained.

I thought I was really clever to obfuscate the issue by clacking on about Blind Carbon Copy, even though I don't really understand it. Apparently a drunk mangled whelk with the computer skills of a flatulent red kidney bean can work out that inspection of an SMTP email transfer record at any mail server on its route will reveal all blind copied addresses - something that was news to me.

I don't regret my little Blears promotion stunt for a minute. Spam emailing large numbers of Labour Party members via unauthorised address lists is just the sort of activity that Luke the Nuke enjoys. But I must confess that I do wish that I'd taken the advice so frequently given to me, namely to learn to spell the English language properly and get to grips with its rules of grammar and syntax. After all, I might get away with casting "tea leaf" aspersions at my beloved, but I'm never likely to fool anyone into believing that my literate pumpkin wrote any of this:

"As Harriet Harman's campaign... have allowed us" [has allowed us], "I believe that both these candidates" [both of these candidates, or both candidates], "not postured to the left or tried" [neither postured to the left nor tried], "distance themselves from the government that they have been part of and that has won us three general elections" [distance themselves from the government that has won three general elections and of which they have been a part], "the policies which will appeal" [that will appeal], "are not necessarily those" [ineffective litotes; remove "necessarily"], "the letters page of the Guardian" [the Letters Page of the Guardian], "I am particularly supporting Hazel because" [In particular, I am supporting Hazel because], "a real commitment to rejuvenating our party" [to the rejuvenation of our Party], "a Deputy Leader who you can imagine" [whom one can imagine], "not someone who's election strategy" [not someone whose election strategy], "the Labour government they were part of" [Government of which they were a part], "Yours sincerely" [not really].