I heard she accidentally bought a Starbucks coffee, and per her own opinions was thus no longer able to participate in politics.

I have spent the last few years watching her get shot down on Twitter – not by trolls or insulters, though lord knows she dealt with many of those – but by anyone in possession of the facts and figures.

…at which point she picks out any offensive comments from some random on Twitter and appeals to the entire feminist movement to come to her rescue, with some journos only too willing to oblige…

The really surprising thing is that she’s leaving the Commons now rather than just not standing for re-election 2015.

“I will never dispute the right of any woman to call herself a “feminist” ”

This is a problematic statement even without the gender requirement. If no set of opinions, beliefs or ideological positions disqualifies someone from being a feminist (if female) then the term is meaningless. It would sound more honest if you did say outright that she wasn’t a feminist instead of strongly implying while covering yourself with the first statement.

I hate her politics, but so long as there are Tories I’d prefer her as a 3 dimensional character who doesn’t sound like she’s always reading a script from the PR people at party headquarters (like Sayeeda Warsi).

She’s a self promoting hack and she’ll enjoy a well paid retirement from politics at whichever Murdoch media outlet commissions her to write regular comment for them as a reward for her subverting a select committee on Cameron’s say so.

Even the leaving because she is missing out on family life sets her up to take the role of socially conservative housewife’s favourite when she slags off Labour’s more capable female MPs in her columns.

I can’t agree with the OP because there is too much spite in it. I strongly dislike Louise Mensch but nothing to inspire 1,000 words.

Louise Mensch made a fantastic mistake — believing that it is possible to become an MP, to look after her children AND climb the political ladder — whilst hubby was living in New York. It isn’t difficult to appreciate why that isn’t going to work. I don’t like the idea, but I suspect that we’ll read a lot more about Louise Mensch once she moves across the Atlantic.

I have a sneaking suspicion that there is more to the decision than spending time with the family. Normally that’s the excuse used when there has been some scandal about to break. Worse of all David Cameron said in his response to her resignation that he was about to promote her. That’s damning considering what Cameron’s judgement on people is like (see Andy Coulson, Jeremy Hunt etc).

The best part is that this is a very winnable seat for Labour. Mensch won the seat by 2000 votes at the GE despite UKIP not running. If UKIP run this time you would expect them to pick up at least a few thousand votes. The Lib Dems will surely lose some of their 7800 votes.There are plenty of votes up for grabs.

As much as I believe her reasons for moving on, and i’m sure you don’t choose who you fall in love with, etc, it’s still quite the punch in the balls to her constituents. Regardless of why they decided to vote conservative this election, i’m sure that they would have preferred someone, anyone, who would spend their time representing their interests over someone as self-aggrandising as Ms Mensch was. Many more people knew who she was, rather than what she had achieved in her time.

TBH, I don’t really know how she managed to find the time to have such the presence on Twitter, and then set up her own social network. And i’m sure that she’s been a life long supporter of the party, but I’m reasonably certain that there are many others within the party who were likely better candidates for the role, but were passed over for whatever reasons Cameron et al had for putting her forward for candidacy in 2010.

But on the plus side, one less conservative face in parliament come the bi-election.

Rachel,

“I have spent the last few years watching her get shot down on Twitter – not by trolls or insulters, though lord knows she dealt with many of those – but by anyone in possession of the facts and figures. It has made me despair.”

Oh get a life.
Spending years watching people on Twitter is hardly something to brag about, even on Liberal Conspiracy.

“The Conservative party has – I’ve no doubt – some superb women in it, but seems less inclined to appoint women to positions on merit, where “merit” means “have checked that they are good at their job”, as opposed to “are female and prepared to take a kicking for the team”.

Please tell us which party did the first British female PM belonged to?

@8. Kojak: “Please tell us which party did the first British female PM belonged to?”

It may have been possible for a woman who made different choices, with a supportive husband — believing that it is possible to become an MP, to look after her children AND climb the political ladder — whilst hubby was looking after the”business”.

Thatcher did it, but she and Denis were weird.

Actually, Dobby was never fawningly loyal to Lucious Malfoy.

In the second book, he broke the magic which bound him to the malfoy family to warn harry about the plots (although neither we nor Harry realised it), and he got harry to cause Malfoy to free him at the end of that book.

@5
How do other MPs manage it then? How do Yvette Cooper and Ed Balls manage, as BOTH of them are not only MPs, but also shadow cabinet members, with all the extra work that involves?

I’m not saying its easy – just that it wasnt as easy as she obviously thought it was. Which is like a lot of things that Louise Mensch gets involved in.

Wouldnt it have been better for her to stay an MP and start working towards making the place somewhere that a mother COULD work, and not feel that she is failing her children, as she obviously feels she is?

@10. John Ruddy: “How do other MPs manage it then? How do Yvette Cooper and Ed Balls manage, as BOTH of them are not only MPs, but also shadow cabinet members, with all the extra work that involves?”

I wish the Cooper/Balls family all the best. With equal sincerity, I hope that the Mensch family cope with the transatlantic journey out of parliament.

It’s a shame Metallica weren’t willing to relocate to Corby.

@11. Charlieman

I’d be with you on the Balls family too!

From what i’ve heard and read in the local paper online, many people in Corby are glad to see the back of her. Corby deserves an MP who is commited to Corby. Not someone who is only interested in herself.

I would imagine Baroness Warsi and Paddy Backdown are already thinking here we go again ,the mid term election and we were squeezed in the middle excuses will be trotted out yet again.

If this was America she’d be the “go to” person for Fux News (oops, typo!!) and a potential Vice President candidate… do we know any American Women who match the bill #coughPalincough#

I suppose we can be sad that the Tories have lost a complete liability.

Mensch is not terribly bright…

You presumably got a first at Oxford then?

Theresa May – a solid politician whether you like her or not – was hung out alone to dry at this year’s Police Conference

She’s the Home Secretary – who the hell do you think should have been holding her hand? That’s a remarkably patronising attitude. And arguing that Michael Gove is uniquely unsuitable to be secretary of state education is almost as fatuous as the rest of this article. I mean honestly, attacking a Tory MP for being a cheerleader for the Tory Prime Minister – oh no! The scandal!

This entire piece could be summarised by “reasons to be glad Louise Mensch has gone: she’s a Tory and I don’t like Tories”. That at least would have had the virtue of brevity.

Resignation and an almost inevitable by election loss is hardly something that would be predicted from someone who has devoted so much energy to licking Cameron’s arse, so either a scandal was imminent or she had been told there was no hope of advancement when the reshuffle occurs and Cameron finally dumps Bellend Hunt.

Down side? Diminishing chances of another mauling of HIGNFY

I’m sure a job with Fox News awaits after her calling Rancid Rupert one of the greatest newspaper men the world has ever seen

Louise Mensch declined nomination for the 2012 ‘Rear of the Year’ award – citing her wishes not to upset the views of her constituents.

http://www.northantstelegraph.co.uk/community/local-information/mp-turns-back-on-rear-of-the-year-contest-1-3448389

I suggest this is the real reason why she is leaving the House of Commons – an glaring conflict of interests.

For the record, I’m having a party when Thatcher dies.

For the record, I’m having a party when Thatcher dies.

Theres about a 1 in 365 chance of me doing the same

Keith and Dave re comments 21 + 22:

It always amuses me to read the spite shown towards Margaret Thatcher and contrast the reverence of Tony Benn.

Yet it was Benn who did his upmost to split the Labour Party and hasten the flood of support to the SDP. Whereas Margaret Thatcher merely capitalised on the situation and was able to get her government reelected twice because of it.

However you never here of Conservatives boasting about having Thank You memorial ceremonies when Tonny Benn finally lays his diary down for the last time. Perhaps they are more gracious.

A Labour victory in the forthcoming Corby and East Northamptonshire by-election is guaranteed. The selection of the Labour candidate is therefore the test of the Labour Party’s seriousness in having become the party that alone now represents the Union as a first principle, any concept of English identity, a universal postal service bound up with the monarchy, the Queen’s Highways rather than toll roads owned by faraway and unstable petrostates, the renationalisation of the railways promised in the 1997 Labour Manifesto, Her Majesty’s Constabulary rather than the British KGB that is the impending “National Crime Agency”, the National Health Service rather than piecemeal privatised provision by the American healthcare companies that pay Andrew Lansley, the restoration both of energy independence and of the economic basis of paternal authority by the reopening of the mines promised by Ed Miliband to one hundred thousand people and the television cameras at the Durham Miners’ Gala, keeping Sunday special, the historic regimental system, aircraft carriers with aircraft on them, no Falkland Islands oil to Argentina, a referendum on continued membership of the EU, a free vote on the redefinition of marriage, the State action necessary in order to maintain the work of charities and of churches, and the State action necessary in order to maintain a large and thriving middle class.

In other words, it is the test of the depth and stability of Ed Miliband’s reversion of Labour to its historic norm as the voice and vehicle of a many-rooted social democratic patriotism inclusive of social and cultural conservatives as well as of social and cultural liberals, inclusive of rural as well as of urban and suburban voices, inclusive of provincial as well as of metropolitan contributions, and inclusive of religious as well as of secular insights. The 2010 intake is very largely “classic Labour”, the boys in their dads’ suits having decided to sit out the hard work of Opposition. As a result, Labour has long enjoyed a commanding lead both in the opinion polls and at the actual polls.

But we all know that these things cannot be taken for granted. To this day, I have never had an answer from the Labour Party to the question of whether or not Louise Mensch has ever actually ceased to be a member of that party, which she only joined out of devotion to Tony Blair, known in the circle around David Cameron as “our real Leader”. He may be theirs, but he is no longer Labour’s. Is he?

Ed Miliband, over to you.