it was a curiously English affair — the hubub becoming hysteria, the polite insistence that everyone has a right to say what they want to say. the only thing i really found distasteful — far more distasteful than griffin himself — was the booing and jeering and points-scoring. making him look like a victim only helped his cause.

there’s a well known polling boost to any party that dominates the day’s headlines — one only needs to look at the recent conference polling on politicalbetting.com to know that even if the news is disastrous, just getting your name heard gets you more votes. Griffin has undoubtedly shored up his ‘core vote’ with his appearance. i don’t think he was changing a lot of minds.

the hysteria gets to me, though. this all comes on the same week as the ONS releases a report saying that Britain will expand by an enormous 10m over the next 20 years, almost all of that expansion coming from immigration or children of immigrants. i for one am tired of being unable to debate the immigration issue without the race card being played. it’s a diversionary tactic of the left to avoid debating the very real issue about the changing structure of the country — as well as the bare-faced lies that have been told to us in the name of the social engineering project that Labour have indulged in over the last decade.

I’ve found this essential reading for any libertarian-leaning readers, should there be any on this blog:

Telegraph — Labour’s mass immigration social engineering project

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/politics/lawandorder/6418456/Labour-wanted-mass-immigration-to-make-UK-more-multicultural-says-former-adviser.html

Sean Gabb — Libertarian Alliance — The Conservative Challenge

http://libertarianalliance.wordpress.com/2009/10/20/the-conservative-challenge-by-sean-gabb/

The Times — Influx of migrants will cripple public spending according to MPs (including Labour ones)

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article6879636.ece

There needs to be a sensible debate on immigration in the UK. alas, so long as the BNP media circus continues, there ain’t gonna be one.