By John Rentoul

As some of you noticed, Open House is being wound down. The new site, Independent Minds, is over here. Change your bookmarks. Edit your RSS thingy (I use Bloglines). Get with the, er, thing.

It's all very exciting. There is something here about the "cult of the individual", which sounds contrary to the New Age of Old Labour, but it also means that you too can blog under the Independent Minds banner.

Forward. Definitely not back.

By John Rentoul

Bit of a problem for George Osborne tomorrow. Kenneth Clarke, in his interview with The Times yesterday, supported Labour's mini-Budget even before the main policy was briefed to the Sunday newspapers.

As Alice Thomson and Rachel Sylvester point out,

After Osborne and David Cameron have made strenuous attempts to get Conservative former chancellors on board before the pre-Budget report (Nigel Lawson, John Major and Norman Lamont have all been out and about, laying into the Government), they must be specially grateful for this intervention.

Only adds to Osborne's difficulty, about which I write for The Independent on Sunday today.

By John Rentoul

Encouraging sign of life in Victoria Street. The Labour Party, once a fearsome campaigning organisation, has put out an attack on David Cameron that is simple, effective, web-literate and funny.

Now, that's not something you see every day.

Thanks, Tom Watson.

By John Rentoul

Not only is there a Christmas tree in Euston station; not only has Matthew d'Ancona already written his review of the political year; not only has Barack Obama won the election; but now this ...

Coldplay are to break up next year.

At The New Yorker, Sasha Frere-Jones celebrates. (Via Clive Davis.)

By John Rentoul

I know this is two weeks old, but it is good. And it's Friday.

Jeremy Hunt is one of the 2005 Conservative intake, already in the shadow cabinet (as culture spokesman), and I am told that David Cameron thinks highly of him.

After reading this excerpt from a speech he delivered to Islington Tories before a firework display in Highbury, so do I:

By John Rentoul

One thing I got wrong in trying to answer The Big Question in The Independent this morning, was to say that "one of the most surprising" names on the leaked BNP membership list was that of someone who stood as a Green Party candidate in the 2001 and 2005 elections.

What I meant was "one of the names that was not surprising at all", because there has been a philosophical overlap between the "deep" green movement and fascism from the early years of both.

Yesterday, the Green Party admitted that two of its former activists had been exposed as members of the BNP: Keith Bessant, its parliamentary candidate at Cheltenham in 2001 and 2005, and a Rev Stanton. 

By John Rentoul

Hard to decode what Hillary Clinton was doing, seeing President-Elect Barack Obama in Chicago last week. So here is Dick Morris's take:

Move One: Obama Makes An Offer

Move Two: Clinton Leaks the “Offer”

Move Three: Obama Puts Out Mikva To Throw Cold Water on Appointment

Move Four: Bill Offers to Come Clean, Partially

Move Five: Hillary Has Her Aides Talk Up the Appointment

Move Six: Obama Gets Kennedy to Give Hillary an Out

Seems to make sense, except for one crucial thing. Surely Obama would not have had Clinton come to Chicago, which was bound to become public knowledge, if he weren't prepared to offer her Secretary of State? So what is all the toing and froing about?

By John Rentoul

An inconclusive engagement at Prime Minister's Questions, as the main party leaders get used to their new clothes for the Great Cross-Dressing Election of 2010. Gordon Brown redefined spending the money he intends to borrow from future taxes as "helping people", and David Cameron posed as the guardian of Prudence.

But Cameron's best line was borrowed from the Old Master, Tony Blair. He said it wasn't surprising that the Prime Minister did not agree with various quotations from other ministers and from Derek Scott, the former prime minister's economic adviser, but he quoted from the old prudent Brown and asked, "Does he agree with himself?"

That is from NOW (That's What I Call Leading the Opposition) Vol. 48, a compilation of Blair's greatest hits against John Major (1 March 1995, on the subject of Europe):

I find it odd that he cannot agree with his Chancellor, I find it strange that he cannot agree with his Secretary of State for Employment and I find it unbelievable that he cannot agree with himself.

By John Rentoul

I was going to comment on reports of the speech that Lord Bingham delivered on Monday, in which he described the invasion of Iraq as a "serious violation of international law". I thought he dressed up "I didn't agree with it" in the full ermine robes of a former Lord Chief Justice, rather than gave a legal argument. But I discover that Oliver Kamm has just expressed my views better than I could, so I shall simply quote him:

I find it unconvincing, because it represents as a disinterested legal judgement an assessment of evidence concerning the conduct of Saddam Hussein's regime. I do not believe Lord Bingham advances that issue in any respect, and certainly not beyond the judgement proferred by Michael O'Hanlon of the Brookings Institution in 2004:

By John Rentoul

In the ComRes poll in tomorrow's Independent on Sunday the Conservative lead stretches to 11 percentage points. This is up from eight points in the last ComRes poll for the daily Independent on 28 October, and up from nine points from last month's IoS poll (19 October).

Conservative 43% (+4)

Labour 32% (+1)

Lib Dem 12% (-4)

Other 13% (-1)

(Change since last ComRes for Independent in brackets.)