Madam Miaow commended in blog round-up: leftie love-in

The left notoriously is often a rats-in-a-sack scenario, all sectarian spats and spite-fuelled hacks sucking up precious bodily fluids that would be better spent on challenging the system. It is therefore always cheering to receive support from fellow socialists.

Andy at Socialist Unity, one of the big beasts of the left blogosphere, has written up his end of year blog round-up and given Madam Miaow Says a big thumbs-up.

Anna’s blog “Madam Miaow Says” in particular is always both edgy and concise: her articles about Julian Assange have been very good. Anna’s strength is in never accepting the moral superiority of the West, while avoiding the trap of cheerleading for the West’s opponents.

Yay!. That’s one for the hard-of-comprehension who write me those charming stalker notes on why my foreign-looking boat-race is inferior to aryan blondes, and demanding to know how often I pop over to the PRC for tea with Uncle Mao. (Not since I was a kid, as it happens. Visited China, that is, not hob-nobbed with world leaders. No-one’s going to be bringing no fifty-carat dirty pebbles to my door at “what time d’ya call this?” o’clock in the small hours. Sadly.)

I’ll second Andy’s endorsement of Harpy Marx in particular, a principled comrade from whom I’ve learnt much about parliamentary politics. Elsewhere, Gauche has caught my eye, I’m waiting for the brilliant Dolphinarium to get into her stride, Laurie Penny is striding away in seven-league boots, and Jack Of Kent alternately delights and exasperates with his come-hither slappety-slapdowns of US-offending maverick males every time you think he’s on the side of the angels.

2010 sees the end of Tory blogger Ian Dale (now moved to Total Politics) and Labourite Tom Harris, and I hope that the current hiatus over at Splintered Sunrise is only a temporary one.

Remember, guys, it’s a dirty job but someone’s gotta do it, so it might as well be us.

Reminder: it’s time for bloggers to get their submission in for the Orwell Prize 2011. Ten links to your favourite blogposts by the 11th January deadline.