I’ve had more emails in the last few days about captioning a picture of Charles Kennedy with the word ‘Quitter’ than I have on anything else about this website. I therefore feel some need to explain myself!

Regular readers will already know that every time someone resigns from anything, I caption the picture ‘Quitter’, and always have (see here and here for prime examples). It isn’t designed to be some kind of cruel insult to the person, and nor is it designed to act as a comment on how their resignation came about. It’s supposed to act as satirical comment on the way that, in tabloids at least, no-one resigns any more: Everybody ‘Quits’. Mainly due to the fact that it makes for a punchier headline.

Similarly, the pictures I choose of people are intentionally ridiculous, again to satirise the way tabloids chose pictures with expressions that suit the story – whether or not the event at which the picture was taken is related to the story.

So, to clarify, calling Charles Kennedy a ‘quitter’ was not some kind of slur on his personality, as I hope was clear from the text. It was just one of my satirical traditions. Please do not be alarmed or insulted!