Many Tory candidates complain about CCHQ control freakery when it comes to approving leaflets but we get occasional reminders as to why the control freakery exists.
The Guardian - via the brilliant Straight Choice website - highlights a leaflet produced by the Conservative team trying to elect Michael Law-Riding in Blackburn, currently the seat of Justice Secretary, Jack Straw. The decline in Labour's vote makes the seat a possible Tory gain.
The Tory leaflet's talk of atrocities in Afghanistan by British troops, Jack Straw's insults to the "sisters and mothers" of Islam and of Israel as an "inhuman" nation reads like the product of George Galloway, rather than the Conservative Party.
As well as being ugly in its choice of language it is not, of course, Tory policy to withdraw from Afghanistan. The leaflet - which did not go through the normal approval process - has been withdrawn.
Tim Montgomerie
