Unlucky For Some

But not, it transpires, for me.

I have never felt so proud, having been voted the thirteenth-worst political blogger in Britain.

A poll of his readers, of whom he does have a lot, as these things go; he is one of the big fish in this small pond. I was a new entry this year, but I still made thirteenth place.

The man who maintains the winning entry has just been selected as a Labour parliamentary candidate, albeit in a hopeless seat. His archenemies on the third-placed site are incandescent. It's all good, clean, family fun in the political blogosphere.

This is certainly one in the eye of the merely twenty-third James Delingpole and the merely forty-first Eoin Clarke. I am ahead of Old Holborn, "Britain nastiest troll" and what have you. I am ahead of Glenn Greenwald, whom American and Israeli intelligence consider to be one of the most dangerous men in the world.

I am ahead of Nick Cohen, who is published by The Observer in order to annoy its liberal readers, and who is published by The Spectator in order to annoy its conservative readers. I am even ahead of the Muslim Public Affairs Committee.

I cannot remember ever having felt so chuffed.

Alas, although I am more annoying than ConservativeHome, I am still less of an irritant than Douglas Murray, or Spiked, or The Commentator, or Comment is Free, or Harry's Place, or Guido. But I cannot quibble with any of that.

And I am way ahead of previously legendary sources of tiresomeness such as Liberal Conspiracy, Lib Dem Voice, Labour Uncut, Tim Worstall,  Lenin's Tomb, Left Futures and others.

Others again did not chart at all. Oliver Kamm, Damian Thompson, Toby Young, Dan Hodges, John Rentoul, Labour List, Left Foot Forward, and many more yeast infections to the nation besides.

Perhaps they just do not matter anymore? Or perhaps no one notices them these days, having become so used to them that they seem normal? That amounts to the same thing.

My ambition is now to be recognised as the thirteenth-worst political blogger in the world.