Friday, May 21, 2010
What a twit!
I must confess that I laughed out loud when I read in this article in today's Daily Telegraph that Jeremy Hunt, the new Culture Minister, has been accused of attempting to rewrite history by deleting pre-election tweets critical of Nick Clegg and the Liberal Democrats. I mean it is nice of him to care, but really, there was no need.
The paper says that messages mocking the Liberal Democrat's alleged "shameless" U-turns on the euro and an immigrant amnesty were among the dozens of posts now deleted by Mr Hunt, whose Cabinet role includes responsibility for the internet. They say that in one tweet now consigned to the cyber-dustbin, he derided Mr Clegg's discussion of morality during the second leaders' debate.
They report a spokeswoman for the minister denying there was any attempt to airbrush the past. Yeah, right!
All of the South West Surrey MP's campaign tweets have now been deleted because his ministerial role represents "a new chapter and we are starting afresh", she said.
The spokeswoman added: "They were pre-government and we are now tweeting post-government. He is going to carry on tweeting, and his updates will appear on the DCMS website."
She confirmed that Mr Hunt updated his Twitter account personally, and would continue to do so. He has more than 3,000 followers.
For the record, I have no interest in what Mr. Hunt said prior to the coalition. I have no intention of trying to rewrite my own Twitter history or my blog just because we are now in coalition with the Tories.
More importantly, we now have to take decisions in government. The country is in the middle of an economic crisis and sorting that out must be the first priority. People's jobs and livelihood depend on us getting this right. We are also in coalition and that entails compromise. That means that even some of our aspirations and policies need to be put on the back-burner whilst we deal with the current situation.
Everybody understands the context in which these things were written and that things have now moved on. There is therefore no point in trying to rewrite history at all. We all say things in the heat of the moment that we would want to take back later or which might embarrass us in the future. C'est la vie.
Kudos to Jeremy Hunt though for tweeting in person. Long may he continue. I may even start reading his tweets.
The paper says that messages mocking the Liberal Democrat's alleged "shameless" U-turns on the euro and an immigrant amnesty were among the dozens of posts now deleted by Mr Hunt, whose Cabinet role includes responsibility for the internet. They say that in one tweet now consigned to the cyber-dustbin, he derided Mr Clegg's discussion of morality during the second leaders' debate.
They report a spokeswoman for the minister denying there was any attempt to airbrush the past. Yeah, right!
All of the South West Surrey MP's campaign tweets have now been deleted because his ministerial role represents "a new chapter and we are starting afresh", she said.
The spokeswoman added: "They were pre-government and we are now tweeting post-government. He is going to carry on tweeting, and his updates will appear on the DCMS website."
She confirmed that Mr Hunt updated his Twitter account personally, and would continue to do so. He has more than 3,000 followers.
For the record, I have no interest in what Mr. Hunt said prior to the coalition. I have no intention of trying to rewrite my own Twitter history or my blog just because we are now in coalition with the Tories.
More importantly, we now have to take decisions in government. The country is in the middle of an economic crisis and sorting that out must be the first priority. People's jobs and livelihood depend on us getting this right. We are also in coalition and that entails compromise. That means that even some of our aspirations and policies need to be put on the back-burner whilst we deal with the current situation.
Everybody understands the context in which these things were written and that things have now moved on. There is therefore no point in trying to rewrite history at all. We all say things in the heat of the moment that we would want to take back later or which might embarrass us in the future. C'est la vie.
Kudos to Jeremy Hunt though for tweeting in person. Long may he continue. I may even start reading his tweets.
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A new chapter.
Because every time you get to a new chapter in a book, you rip out the pages of the last one and burn them.
So it is a perfect metaphor.
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Because every time you get to a new chapter in a book, you rip out the pages of the last one and burn them.
So it is a perfect metaphor.
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