Tara!

With Nick Griffin's once merry BNP men split in to a thousand pieces, the BNP itself reduced to around 2000 members, mostly inactive (and that's an optimistic estimate!), and a few tiny no-hope. mostly internet-based splinters unsuccessfully attempting to pick up the pieces, there hasn't been much we could do to them that they haven't done to themselves.

How did they get to this happy place? Well, they believed their own hype, and you couldn't persuade them that their revered Nick Griffin was a corrupt chancer who happened to win the leadership of the party (after a down and dirty campaign, of course) at a time when some Labour voters were so disillusioned by Tony Blair and "New Labour" that they were prepared to lend their votes to the BNP.

It was as well for everybody that the BNP came to be led by a man as extraordinarily incompetent as the gimmick-loving Griffin, who promptly began to behave much as he had during his tenure as leader of the National Front, engaging in purge after purge, reneging on his promises, and above all seeing the BNP and its membership as a business opportunity. Griffin proceeded to squander every electoral chance the BNP ever had, his glaring incompetence and personal greed always getting in the way of sound, grass-roots politicking.

We and our sister site Lancaster Unity consistently warned that Griffin's number one priority was Griffin himself. We also warned BNP members not to believe their (and especially not their leadership's) own hype. We detected that the BNP had peaked around 2005, mostly because the party did not address the issues that mattered to all those disillusioned Labour voters. By 2007 it was apparent to us that their vote had stalled, and by 2009 (despite the odd surprise success) it was clearly on the decline.

Nick Griffin, lucky as ever, stood for an EU seat right in the middle of the parliamentary expenses scandal. His vote barely moved at all from that he had obtained previously, but with voters boycotting the polls in droves his paltry 6% was enough to get him elected to the Euro gravy-train, where he has been dipping his considerable beak ever since.

Even so, the BNP's performance in the local elections held at the same time was lamentable, and more evidence of electoral failure stacked up. Even Griffin's tiny vote proved the extent of that failure, despite the mischance of his election. And in every election that followed between then and the 2010 general election, the evidence of continuing BNP electoral decline continued.

You couldn't tell BNP members that, though, and they believed that in the general election they'd get at least one MP - and to make sure he would be that MP, Griffin unceremoniously elbowed aside Richard Barnbrook, who was standing in Barking and Dagenham, widely believed to be the best hope for the BNP.

The rest is history, as they say. The BNP performed disastrously in the 2010 general election, not helped by a hopelessly out of tune campaign based around World War Two Spitfires and a nasty line in Islamophobia. All a bit pointless when voters at large were more concerned with jobs and incomes than they were the BNP's obsessions with Sharia law. It's always the economy, stupid!

And so the BNP imploded into acrimony and in-fighting, and, while it was nice to report on that in the early days, the multiplying woes of the extreme right quickly became a bore, and - not seeing the point of keeping the site going - we closed the main successor site to Norfolk Unity. Lancaster Unity, similarly bored watching the final twitchings of a dying enemy, also closed.

One day - and a long way off it is - the extreme right will regroup, a viable entity will slowly emerge from the ruin. But not for years to come. And even then it will exist only on the fringes unless or until the political class screws up as much as it did during the Blair years.

When or if that happens, we'll come back, but until then there are other campaigns to fight, other things we've got to get on with. In the meantime our very good friends at Searchlight and Hope Not Hate continue as they always have, keeping a watchful eye on the far right, digging the dirt, showing them up for what they are.

Take care of yourselves,

Denise and Atreus.

First Norfolk Unity podcast

As an experiment we're making public our first podcast.

We're the first to admit it's not perfect and we've got a lot to learn - but we'll get there in the end.

This first testcast contains only three items, but we've managed to keep the play quality up and the file size down - it's only about 3.5mb so it shouldn't cause much grief for most visitors, but dial-up visitors would be best advised to download.

We're not embedding webcasts into the site because we don't want Norfolk Unity turning into the same slow loading dog's dinner that characterises a lot of BNP sites. You can listen by clicking on the graphic below (which should open up your media player - you may need to point Firefox at Windows Media Player instead of Quicktime) or you can right-click and save it to your hard drive and listen later.

We're using the MP3 format, as that's pretty much cross-platform and is the best quality-file size trade off.

Got that?

BNP comes to Norfolk

Far-right politician Nick Griffin last night defended his right to visit Norfolk despite an outcry over his controversial views.

The British Nationalist Party leader, pictured, spoke at a pub in King's Lynn in the afternoon before attending a meeting at a conference centre in Stoke Holy Cross, near Norwich.

Police said they were aware of his presence in the county and were monitoring it but did not expect trouble. A spokesman added: “They are a legitimate political party.”

Mr Griffin dismissed those who objected to his visit as “a bunch of silly students and elderly University of East Anglia lecturers who do not represent Norfolk people”.

Mr Griffin was famously cleared of inciting racial hatred in a 2006 trial after attacking Islam.

Stoke Holy Cross resident Jason Wallmsley said many had been shocked at the party's decision to visit the village. He said: “Decent people live in this village and the owners of the venue should be thoroughly ashamed.”

Nobody from the Old Mill in Stoke, where Mr Griffin addressed about 70* people, was available to comment on their decision to host the meeting. The party would not identify the pub in King's Lynn but said about 50 people attended**.

Norwich Evening News

*This is, as usual, a lie. We don't have the exact figures for that meeting yet, but our source disputes that anything like 70 BNP members attended, or that all of them were from Norfolk. **Strange, then, that our very reliable source in Norfolk BNP gives a figure of 26, again, many of them NOT from Norfolk. DG

Norfolk no-show for BNP - NF's Old Tom drops out

For as long as we can remember the BNP has been promising to stand candidates in Norwich and Great Yarmouth. Always keen to tell us how fast their membership is growing, we've been told again and again that they've been out leafletting and canvassing and all the signs are good!

The fact is, Norfolk BNP is next to useless. Try as we might, we can't find evidence of public activity of any description by them. They must be taking their monthly leaflet quota and storing them in the garage next to the unsold copies of Freedom.

At close of nominations in Norwich and Great Yarmouth (the only Norfolk districts where elections are being held) it became clear that - yet again - not one BNP member had the courage of his/her convictions, since the BNP have failed to nominate candidates in either place.

Last year the BNP did stand two candidates in West Norfolk's North Lynn ward (King's Lynn). Neither candidate was well-supported by the local BNP, but one came close to being elected, and we understand there were bitter internal recriminations as a result.

Norfolk BNP, though, has always been long (and loud) on promise and short on delivery.

The National Front's chairman Tom Holmes has failed to appear on this year's ballot for Great Yarmouth Nelson ward. In 2006 Holmes scored a respectable 25.9%, which fell back to 22.85% last May. A by-election for the Nelson seat in October saw his vote take a catastrophic tumble, Caister man Holmes coming away with a paltry 6.31%.

Perhaps that rejection finished Holmes, or perhaps he's just too old to want to bother. Either way, we're pleased that Yarmouth's most vulnerable seat will again be represented by a non-racist mainstream candidate this year.

Norfolk BNP's failure to nominate isn't particularly surprising to us here at Norfolk Unity. Like most of its membership we've always recognised that it's badly led and next to useless - but what's new there?

Get stuffed Harrington!

The Great Fantasist himself, the One Big Vast Huge Onion's farcical serial failure Patrick Harrington, is attempting to get Blogger to do the dirty legal work he's too afraid to do himself.

He's complained that we used the photograph above from the One Big Vast Huge Onion's website and therefore breached his copyright.

That's good, coming from somebody who stole the BNP's moneyspinner fake "trade union" in an illegal coup - the same "trade union" which ripped off the honourable original Polish Solidarity trade union for its name and its logo.

If Harrington thinks he's got a case, then why doesn't he sue us through the English courts? We're ready and waiting - more than ready and we really can't wait!

We keep asking - why are the contents of the One Big Huge Vast Onion's website copyrighted personally to the Great Fantasist, and not to the fake "union" itself?

Has it got anything to do with making sure the Great Fantasist can ride out any future attempt by the One Big Vast Huge Onion's 211 members to dump him when they realise what a useless waste of space he is by hanging on to the assets?

We reckon it's exactly that.

Anyway, Harrington's a bit on the late side. That photo has already appeared on several other internet sites, and though we can't be sure, we have a feeling it's about to appear on many more.

We're not taking it down, and we're not removing the post.

As far as we're concerned, loser Harrington can take a running jump off the end of the Britannia Pier. We're Norfolk Unity, not Clive Potter or Tim Hawke - and we bite back.

My brain hurts - or, who's afraid of the big bad Barnes?

Warning! This post contains strong language!

Streets-ahead contender for the annual BNP loopy-fruit of the year award is Lee John Barnes, long-term benefits claimant and legal adviser to the BNP (presumably when his debilitating illness allows).

Barnes is always good copy for antifascists - he's foul-mouthed, ranting, ill-tempered, and egotistical, but let's not dwell on his good points. Bestriding the corrupt and crooked world of the BNP like a one-man Monty Python sketch, the Medway Madman writes his blog of bile with style and grace - the style and grace of a glue-sniffing gibbon.

Known to be a fan of the Jamaican Woodbines, Barnes hits out at all and sundry. Recent targets were the parents of Rachel Whitear, who died of a drug overdose. Barking Barnes called them "pathetic" in a carpet-munching raving session that made even hardcore Stormfront Nazis wince.

Now Barnes has turned his fire on the plentiful enemies he's made on Stormfront, where as Walk Towards The Light he spends a lot of time as one half of a double act with past winner of the BNP loopy-fruit of the year award, Tony Lecomber, aka Purging The Droid - another jobless BNP tax-sponge and Griffin mate, with a bucketful of convictions to his name.

As Walk Towards The Light (WTTL) the Medway Madman patrols the threads of Stormfront waiting to pounce on any signs of anti-Nick Griffin activity, but there's so much it seems to have overwhelmed the remnants of the Madman's grey matter and he's finally spontaneously combusted.

Barnes's disgusting attack on Rachel Whitear's memory and her parents was the catalyst for a series of attacks on him by long-suffering Nazi regulars. To date there are at least three very long threads devoted to the pot-puffing BNP legal advisor.

Afraid to show himself in his WTTL guise, Barnes has resorted to his old practice of fielding a supportive sock puppet - in this case a 16 year old Nationalist newbie, "Jacob Cobain", who appears on the scene from nowhere but has an apparently encyclopaedic knowledge of Nationalism and knows all about the BNP leadership.

Jacob fooled nobody. The Stormfront brownshirts are used to the Medway Madman's antics, and so are we. And, just to settle the matter, Jacob has exactly the same problems spelling exactly the same words as Barnes - we've checked.

We're not going to repeat everything said on Stormfront here, except to remark that the brownshirt brigade have well and truly got their teeth around the Medway Madman's throat and they aren't about to let go. Even those useless internet warriors, endless givers of advice and devout non-activists, the pantomime horse that is Green Bigot and Brighton Sprog, haven't waded in to say a) how important they are, and b) "Anybody who attacks the wierdo gang Nick Griffin has gathered about him is an enemy of the BNP".

So Barmy Barnes's brain began to hurt, he blew a fuse and on Wednesday posted this to his blog:

Ha ha ha loks like the stormfront maggot farm collective of reds, searchlight trolls and general morons are unhappy because the big mouthed larry whitehurst / Jack Black doesnt like it when the people he bullshits about, lies about and makes accusations about know who he really is.

Dont like it when your stone is kicked over do you cockroach.

Like all cockroaches they hate it when the light is shone on them.

Another threat of violence again is it jack, like the last tme you were pissed and acting the big internet warrior frm behind your keyboard - ooooh i am trembling.

Unlike the stormfront shit, BNP activists and officials work in the public realm and face attack every day as they dont hide behind a fake name on a US internet site.

The BNP activists that take the flak for being in public are the heroes, people like Larry Whitehurst who hide on the internet and fling shit at them from behind a fake name are cowards and filth.

You are a wanker Larry - now fuck off you big mouthed maggot back to your fifty strong stormfront maggot farm of reds and malcontents.

You'd never know Barmy Barnes hides behind a fake name (several!) on the same US internet site.

Then today he posted this:

STORMFRONT POLICY.

Over recent years the Stormfront Britain site has degenerated from a useful tool for the nationalist movement, into a swamp of red trolls, searchlight spies, scumbags and sectarian filth that use the site to smear and attack individual nationalists.

The gutless cowards on the Stormfront site hide under false names and attack brave nationalists that stand in elections and who have their names, and addresses, publicised, whilst the Stormfront cowards hide behind false names on the site.

The real heroes of British nationalism, the candidates of the BNP and activists of all parties that work in the public arena to promote British Nationalism face daily abuse and attacks not just from reds, the government, the police etc etc but also from so called 'nationalist' gutless scum and slime that hide under fake names on the Stormfront site.

From now on the policy we have adopted on Stormfront is this ;

Those who post attacks on individual BNP members and activists on the site and who hide their real names behind stupid fake names like Jack Black, Doriot etc etc will have their real names posted onto my site and their identities distributed to our people nationwide.

If you attack us - then we will respond and we will post your name on this site so that the public can see who you really are.

We already have a long list of the names of those who post on the Stormfront site and we will publish all those names if any more gutless and cowardly anonymous attacks on individual BNP candidates and activists takes place by individual stormfront posters.

Attack the policies of the party by all means - but the minute some gutless bastard attacks an individual nationalist - then we will out you.

We ask that all nationalists of all parties adopt the same approach - which is that if an individual candidate is attacked by some gutless bastard on Stormfront Britain using a fake name, that you also publish the real names of the person that has attacked them so that we can all know who these people really are.

If you want to open your big mouth and attack others on Stormfront - then expect to have your name revealed to the world in return.

Seeing as the moderators on the Stormfront Site are unwilling to prevent posts that attack individual BNP members, then the only way we can act is to ensure that those who do post attacks on the real heroes of nationalism are outed as the gutless scum they are.

Big mouthed internet Keyboard warriors have been allowed for far too long to attack the real heroes of nationalism behind the mask of anonymity - from now on if you attack one of the real heroes of British nationalism, then we will respond.

The era where the big mouths and enemies of nationalism could speard their lies and bullshit with no response or accountability is over.

From now on, one way or the other, we will hold you accountable.

Now! one way or the other?

Hello! What do people usually mean when they use that term, we ask?

And "We will hold you accountable"? We?

The Medway Madman can only be talking of the BNP leadership, which has failed to distance itself from Barnes's vile attack on Rachel Whitear's parents.

And how come the BNP will get to know the identities of Stormfront posters... unless one of the Stormfront mods - John Joy Tree is our bet - is handing over IP addresses and poking around in members' accounts and private PM's?

So here we have the leadership of the BNP threatening to publicly expose the identities of Stormfront posters.

That's very good of them! Saves us so much trouble. Lee Barnes's blog just became required reading for antifascists everywhere...

All we can say is, thank God for Lee Barnes, who has provided us with quotes to use against the BNP for years to come. And, boy, are we going to use them! In leaflets and on the doorsteps, in letters to newspapers and posts on internet forums, we're going to make good and sure that the BNP chokes on Lee Barnes's vomit. That's a copper-bottomed guarantee from Norfolk Unity!

Successful NU inaugural meeting

Norfolk Unity held a very successful and constructive first meeting in Great Yarmouth on Friday night. 21 people of all political persuasions and none attended, with several apologies from those unable to attend due to the travelling distance or prior commitments.

The meeting raised over £140 to kick our bank account off, and a further £70 in subs were paid on the night. The landlord of the pub where the meeting was held even waived his room hire and buffet fee.

It was decided that Norfolk Unity would remain an independent antifascist group until after the May local elections, when speakers from Searchlght, UAF and other organisations would be invited to address us on the benefits of affiliating to them.

Because Friday's meeting was very Yarmouth/Broadland-centric it was decided that in future meetings should rotate between Yarmouth, Norwich, King's Lynn and Thetford, with a view that each town would establish its own Unity group.

After the meeting we were joined for a lively social by pub regulars and entertained by a well known local folk artist who donated his services to the cause.

A fantastic night and a great start! Thanks to all who attended.

The date and location of the next meeting is yet to be finalised, but we'll keep you posted here.

In the meantime, as promised below is a link (click on the graphic) to the TUC/Searchlight publication "Organising against racism and fascism handbook", which was discussed at our meeting.