Thursday began with my latest disappearance from the Twitter timeline for the BBC Radio 4 Today programme. It doesn't stop the ranting, but it reduces the audience.
We heard from the real A-team! Was Nigel Farage going to try for the eighth time to become an MP, to add to his may other little projects - raking in money, influence and dodgy friends in the EU parliament, working with various broadcasters and the well-appointed depths of US right wing politics? He asked for two days but had decided not to bother by the teatime news deadlines.
Since it still seems that MEPs will get a more "meaningful" vote on the separation deal than MPs in the Commons, that's where the action is. As a party group leader in the EU Parliament Farage will also get periodic updates on the progress of negotiations. I'm hoping to see less twisted reports back than his will be, and I'll keep an eye on Michel Barnier's website. I seem to have mislaid the link to the site where the UK government will keep the country up to date.
Linked to this was Douglas Carswell's decision later on not to stand again for Clacton, and to support the Conservatives there (echoes of Mark Reckless in Cardiff Bay, sitting next to the Tories as yet another of UKIP's involuntary cast-offs). And that meant Arron Banks lost his own motivation to stand in Clacton and he took his money bags home to look for other victims. Pity. It would have been great fun watching Banks and Carswell taking chunks out of each other while the Tory romped home.
What seemed like hundreds of tweets sailed past, complaining that Farage and UKIP were getting any exposure at all, so I wrote one of my occasional arguments that we've taken the EU parliament so unseriously that the kippers have ended up the dominant UK party in Brussels and Strasbourg.
The big event of the day was to be Jeremy Corbyn's campaign launch, so we heard from... Emily Thornberry, who really didn't impress. She told us to expect "Jeremy" to be true to his beliefs (whether or not they had anything to do with Labour policy, presumably).
When Corbyn spoke. he was impressive, rather old fashioned but impassioned, pledging to fight the establishment in terms which prompted comparison with the Trump approach (Labour hates this).
"It is the establishment that complains I don’t play the rules," he told us, "by which they mean their rules. We can’t win, they say, because we don’t play their game.
"We don’t fit in their cosy club. We're not obsessed with the tittle-tattle of Westminster or Brussels. We don’t accept that it is natural for Britain to be governed by a ruling elite, the City and the tax-dodgers, and we don’t accept that the British people just have to take what they’re given, that they don’t deserve better.
"And in a sense, the establishment and their followers in the media are quite right. I don’t play by their rules. And if a Labour Government is elected on 8 June, then we won’t play by their rules either."
Corbyn spoke well, better than I can remember him managing at PMQs, and answered questions with self-deprecatory humour. When it finished I thought we might actually have a fight on our hands. Then Jack Dromey came out to take the launch further at lunch time, and Dawn Butler appeared to do the same at tea time, and they both crashed and burned. Dromey in particular is experienced enough to have a general line prepared and to close demands for detail down quickly with a "Wait for the manifesto".
One thing Corbyn avoided as far as possible was Brexit, which of course is what Theresa May thinks is the whole point of this election (apart from Theresa May herself, and her strong leadship that is). In response to a question about a "second" referendum on the final Brexit deal he didn't find an answer. The Tories jumped in to slate him for failing to reject the idea and therefore being in favour of it.
A couple of hours later Labour told us there would be no such vote (but see the bottom of this post).
Jeremy Corbyn: Labour will not back a second EU referendumhttps://t.co/o9hkn0ebbz pic.twitter.com/Qfc9Ii2Y63— PoliticsHome (@politicshome) April 20, 2017
We now had two pro-Brexit parties, each with many members who would rebel against that position. Was that sustainable? Could anything interesting spring from that conflict before the vote itself? Whatever happened to the position agreed at last September's Labour conference?
Wednesday evening had seen May make a campaigning visit to a "northern town". She didn't take questions, which meant that Corbyn had the press on his side (much more than expected?) in the morning just by talking to them.
Theresa May's visit to "Bolton".— Judith Knott (@judithmknott) April 20, 2017
Landed by helicopter on Turton golf club (by Last Drop spa village).
Spoke to supporters in leafy Egerton. https://t.co/T6Ne482iRR
She chose Enfield for a court visit on Thursday and moved on to East Anglia, and this time she played the Trump card by dodging most of the press.
This is the kind of undemocratic, scrutiny-avoiding behaviour that Cameron perfected during the 2015 election campaign. https://t.co/T3YO9Z9PdN— Jim Pickard (@PickardJE) April 20, 2017
The mark of Crosby is on her campaign from the start - control the message, keep the number of messages to a minimum, control access, be ruthless. Oh this is going to be fun. Isn't it?
May also took a bit of time off on Thursday morning to receive the new president of the EU parliament, one Antonio Tajani, and he did a few interviews afterwards. Channel 4 News asked him about the moving of two EU agencies out of London which was a medium-sized thing yesterday. His message was as expected: EU agencies have to be in an EU country, and the matter is not part of the Article 50 (or any other) negotiations. I wonder whether David Davis has admitted that to himself yet.
Tajani also told us that Article 50 is reversible, and that we'd be welcomed back with open arms if voters changed their minds about Brexit on 8 June. There's no turning back, according to May, and Corbyn doesn't propose a second referendum, so it's all in our hands.
