New(ish) Blog Round Up

It's been a while since I last did one of these. This isn't to say there haven't been new left blogs coming on stream. If anything loads of new (as in founded at some point this year) have come my way. So without further ado ...

Unite Against Fascism need no introduction to readers of this blog. But now someone's climbed on the bandwagon and given UAF an unofficial one of their own. If its particular brand of anti-fascism is your bag then it's the blog for you. But if you want to debate you'll have to go elsewhere as comments have not been enabled.

Andy recently noted the founding of the Tower Hamlets Respect blog. This picks up items missed by the national site and is essential reading for anyone interested in what happens in Respect's strongest area.

Time for a quick excursion into the world of Labour party tweeting. Three of Labour's most prolific grass roots twitterers, Tracy Cheetham, Cllr Tim Cheetham and Grace Fletcher-Hackwood have all embarked on blogging careers. All worth keeping an eye on (especially on Twitter) if you want a snapshot of what's exercising mainstream(ish) Labour members who've stuck it out.

The blog simply known as David offers a mix of politics and technological news. As the author puts it "in my spare time I enjoy Reading, Computer Games, Music, Watching TV, Films and partaking in activism to try and over throw the capitalist system, the usual sort of stuff." You can follow David on twitter here.

It's time to briefly nip across the pond to see Nate Uncensored, formerly of American Commie. He writes "You’ll see me commenting on politics, football, pop culture, and generally whatever I feel like bitching about. You’ll also see me writing fiction, poetry, and fratire. You’ll visit my blog one day (probably a weekday) and you’ll see a thoughtful critique of the health care reform debate. You’ll come back another day (probably a weekend) and you’ll see a story about something totally absurd I did with my friends Jack Daniels, Jose Cuervo, Captain Morgan & Co. My motto is that life’s too short to be a pretentious douchebag, so I’ll write whatever springs to mind and you’ll like it or you’ll leave." If only more bloggers followed this fine blogging ethic. You can follow Nate on Twitter here.

Reason and Revolt is also a very new blog. The author, Simon is that rarest of beasts - a blogger who's a member of the Communist Party of Britain and as he says "I would like to encourage other Party members to make the fullest possible use of the technology of the 21st century and start their own blogs (there are dozens belonging to SP cadre, we can't let them win can we?)" Bring it on comrade, there's nothing like a bit of socialist competition!

HC Leftie is one of the SWP's latest recruits in Canterbury. Presumably the party's working the comrade hard already as he hasn't posted for a couple of weeks. This is a shame as his first two posts - on (dead) French sociologist Pierre Bourdieu and Goran Therborn on Marxism and Post-Marxism - show a lot of promise. Hopefully he'll be able to fins his muse and get blogging again. You can follow HC Leftie on Twitter here.

Teaching English might not appear to lend itself to politics straight away. Think again. Sara Hannam's Critical Mass ELT is the second language teaching blog featured on the round up. She says "I sometimes wonder why it is that there isn’t more discussion of some the ways in which the industry works that don’t necessarily benefit the majority of teachers or students. And I use the word industry here to denote a multinational business entity that is primarily there to make make a lot of money for a very small number of people when you look at how many are involved in delivering the lessons or producing the materials, most of whom don’t really make much money at all". Sara helps open up this oft-overlooked sector of education to critical scrutiny. You can follow Sara on Twitter here.

This time it's off across the Irish sea to visit Socialism or Barbarism!. Clearly an unambiguously revolutionary voice, the author writes "[we are] an Irish blog dedicated to the overthrow of capitalism. We offer a rigorous analysis of news stories and political developments. Our ethos is for participation, economic democracy and solidarity". Unfortunately this is another new blog that has stalled of late (no posts for 10 days). Perhaps an influx of new readers will kickstart things again?

Luke, AKA The Plural Progressive is another new blog that's gone a bit quiet. He promises to "provide a local view from Sussex, Kent and the South East, as well as covering national and international topics. It’s not intended to be non-partisan, but positive and constructive with the wider forces of progress against the forces of reaction." Hopefully he hasn't given up after 11 posts!

Back to the Labour party now for a left wing take from Adam White, a Manchester-based Labour Representation Committee member. The Day Today promises "thoughts on the fight for the Labour party". As you might suppose posts so far go after New Labour's policies. I would expect as the election nears and the factions line up for the fight for Labour's soul, this will find its echo online. I hope more LRC comrades will be around to amplify its socialist arguments.

Andy again beat me to this one. Left Foot Forward might not be to the political tastes of most AVPS and Socialist Unity readers, it being squarely in the mainstream of Labour party opinion. But its commitment to "evidence-based blogging" marks it out from (ill-thought) Labour opinion blogs like Luke Akehurst and Tom Harris MP and could prove to be a useful weapon against the Tories in the near future. You can follow Left Foot Forward on Twitter here.

Lastly there's been a mushrooming of Socialist Party-supporting blogs of late. Some appear, live a short existence and then fall back. Others have a bit more longevity to them. Entering the arena we have And Now for Something Completely Sectarian (by Iain of Leftwing Criminologist fame), Everyone's Favourite Comrade, Grinning in Your Paradise, The Daily Panda, and Cryptnomicon.

As always if there are any new(ish) socialist, communist, feminist, trade unionist, Labour, Green/environmentalist, or anarchist blogs doing the rounds and they haven't been featured already drop me a line and they'll get a plug in the next round up.