Published: May 4th 2010 - at 5:18 pm

Right-wing bloggers use Nazi smear against Balls


by Sunny Hundal    

An attack ad against Ed Balls MP is being circulated by the ‘Sunlight Centre for Open Politics’, it has been uncovered today (by the Jewish Chronicle).

The ad repeatedly uses a picture that it claims was Ed Balls wearing a Nazi uniform at a party at university.

It also attacks Balls for his “privileged background”, in the style of class politics that right-wing bloggers have been criticising Labour for recently.

The Sunlight Centre is an operation set up and promoted by the Tory cheerleading blogger Paul Staines, aka Guido Fawkes.

Harry Cole, aka Tory Bear, is another Tory blogger who works with the Sunlight Centre.

We wrote about this false-flag operation here earlier.

A few years ago Harry Cole had to apologise for trying to use an anonymous online campaign to discredit the Edinburgh University Students Association.


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About the author
Sunny Hundal is editor of LC. Also: on Twitter, at Pickled Politics and Guardian CIF.
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Reader comments


If our experience of Evan Harris being smeared by pro-sufferinglife and animal rights groups here in Oxford is anything to go by, this will massively backfire.

On a point of historical order, that’s a Wehrmacht Officer’s uniform that Balls is wearing, not that of the SS or Gestapo, so it would untrue to describe it specifically as a ‘Nazi uniform’.

Wehrmacht officers were not required to be party members, unlike the SS.

i don’t remember apologising?

I also remember you losing the election because the vast majority of the student electorate thought you were a ridiculous and out of touch with… well, pretty much anything anyone cared about, so breaking campaign promises didn’t really change things.

sob

Let me refresh your memory…

“In a statement released on Saturday, Mr Cole apologised for misleading voters, admitting to “having influence on its direction” and that some may see it “as a campaign tool.” In the statement, he claimed to have worked with the people behind EUSAless “in the past,” however, after being presented with claims by The Journal, he admitted that current members of his campaign team were writing the blog.”

yeah my bad, just had to google that myself.

Those were the days. Bigger targets now though.

I love the way you jump up on your high horse, while simultaneously published the material you are complaining about to a wider audience.

I can’t work out if you’re just a few eggs short of a dozen, or this is a deliberate attempt to spread the smear wider while pretending to be against it.

Anyway – if you don’t want old photos coming back to haunt you then don’t use the same tactics against other MPs. This negative stuff is all push and shove. Take the higher ground, then maybe other people will too.

9. toryboysnevergrowup

PPERA has clear rules on registering 3rd parties undertaking political expenditure during elction campaigns with the Electoral Commission. If they haven’t I suspect Sunlight Ops may be in a lot of trouble.

I think a complaint might in order eh…?

There goes Harry Cole’s career…. down the drain, into the gutter, where it belongs and where he will forever remain. Hey Cole: try getting a job outside Tory politics. We will be there, to remind your prospective employers of all the crap you’ve done. You’ll be on benefits your whole life, thereafter.

Put up or shut up Blanco..

cheers

Oooh, handbags at dawn, Harry Cole! If you can’t stand the heat, get out of the Sunlight. You’ll see soon enough what we have planned..

15. diogenes1960

does anyone have a reason to admire ed balls?

Steve @8 said “I love the way you jump up on your high horse, while simultaneously published the material you are complaining about to a wider audience. I can’t work out if you’re just a few eggs short of a dozen, or this is a deliberate attempt to spread the smear wider while pretending to be against it.”

Are you really saying that if someone quotes something, even when from the context it is clear that they are opposed to it, they must support it?

By that argument, Craig Murray supports torturing people http://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2010/05/new_labours_com.html

17. Flash Gordon

same shit different party

Still better a Nazi uniform than a Bullingdon one, eh?

I know I should be sort of outraged that drug-addled toryboy halfwits like Staines are mounting a half-arsed Godwin’s Smear… but I really want Balls to go. He’s awful and crap, and shouldn’t be in government.

I can’t be the only one who thinks this.

20. Flowerpower

Pace Unity’s point about this being a Wehrmacht uniform rather than an SS one, in what sense is this a ‘smear’?

Balls must stay.

The Labour infighting will be so much worse / more entertaining if he does.

Vote Balls!

22. Yurrzem!

Does it matter that the other person in the picture has a false arse?

Who could it be? Why has nobody mentioned it? I suspect a cover up.

“It claims was Ed Balls wearing a Nazi uniform at a party at university”. What are you suggesting is open to question? Its Balls, its a Nazi uniform (subject to qualification above), I assume it was a party or did Balls wander round the house done up like Herr Flick? Maybe the party wasn’t technically on University property – so that’s ok then.


Reactions: Twitter, blogs
  1. Liberal Conspiracy

    Right-wing bloggers use Nazi smear against Ed Balls http://bit.ly/d03gTJ

  2. AndyG

    RT @libcon Right-wing bloggers use Nazi smear against Ed Balls http://bit.ly/d03gTJ

  3. sunny hundal

    Sunlight Cops, political group by blogger Guido Fawkes, publishes disgusting Ed Balls 'Nazi' video http://bit.ly/d03gTJ

  4. torybear.com

    RT @sunny_hundal: Sunlight Cops publishes disgusting Ed Balls 'Nazi' video http://bit.ly/d03gTJ

  5. sarah, portsmouth

    RT @torybear: RT @sunny_hundal: Sunlight Cops publishes disgusting Ed Balls 'Nazi' video http://bit.ly/d03gTJ

  6. Sarah Raphael

    RT @libcon Right-wing bloggers use Nazi smear against Ed Balls http://bit.ly/d03gTJ

  7. shintacheers

    Liberal Conspiracy » Right-wing bloggers use Nazi smear against Balls: The Sunlight Centre is an operation set up … http://bit.ly/cdA6Fn

  8. Tweets that mention Right-wing bloggers use Nazi smear against Ed Balls -- Topsy.com

    [...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Liberal Conspiracy, AndyG. AndyG said: RT @libcon Right-wing bloggers use Nazi smear against Ed Balls http://bit.ly/d03gTJ [...]

  9. Malky Muscular

    Competition – Make an entertaining sentence from "right wing bloggers", "Smear", "Nazi" and "Balls". http://tinyurl.com/2ub8plf





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