08:30 UPDATE : Clegg is launching his “glitz-free” campaign in Sheffield today.

His website www.nickclegg.com will go live immediately afterwards. His pitch is going to be that he can reach out beyond the LibDem comfort zone. Translated : “I’ll take votes back from Cameron”.

Hardly a day passes without further rumours about the Blair’s house-hunting. But where is his office to be? A co-conspirator has directed Guido towards 33 St James’s Square, the Robert Adam designed grand eighteenth century Grade II listed former London home of the Earls of Buckinghamshire.

Guido’s revelation – despite what Blair’s people claim – won’t really add to his security risk.

Iranian MOIS intelligence agents will practically have to drive past the front door on the way to their Embassy, so they will probably notice him.

Guido suspects that the added security risk the neo-peacemaker brings to the area is going to irritate the hedge fund managers and corporate titans whose natural domain he is entering. Never mind what the denizens of the local gentleman’s clubs will make of his wife…

Neil O’Brien at Open Europe spotted that the Indy cover story this morning was lifted entirely from an FCO briefing paper.

Guido called the Indy newsroom looking for Andrew Grice, the political editor who had the accompanying story, to be told he was not available. So I asked who was responsible for cutting and pasting the press release. “Brrr…” - they slammed the phone down.

There must be terrible telecoms problems at the Indy. The Speccie gave the editor of the Indy three hours to respond to their inquiries. Silencio.

The CoffeeHouse blog broke the story. When Blair said the Indy was a viewspaper not a newspaper, you can bet he never imagined it would be the government’s views spread over three pages. Not so bloody piously independent today…

Guido has been accused of relishing the reduction in the headcount at the BBC. That is unfair and a gross misrepresentation of the true position. He feels their pain. Guido is not relishing that pain, he is too busy celebrating. Loafing Beeboids are (after the Houses of Parliament) the biggest identifiable group of readers from Guido’s server records. Do some real work you mongs…

The BBC boss Mark Thompson made a revealing comment, he said that following the announcement of staff reductions he had “one interview request from ITN, one from Sky and 37 from the BBC”. All asking the same bloody questions…

UPDATE : On the Sky News blog Jon Craig points out that the Beeb has in Brussels today; Chief Political Editor Nick Robinson, News 24 Chief Political Correspondent James Landale, Newsnight Political Correspondent David Grossman, Radio 5 Live Political Correspondent John Pienaar, Europe Editor Mark Mardell. All at the same press conference, with their production teams, running up expenses….

TEXT UPDATED 10:30 : With many potential candidates ruling themselves out yesterday the three clear front runners are Huhne (13/5), who has declared, Clegg, the odds on favourite (1/2) who will launch his campaign tomorrow. Steve Webb has withdrawn this morning and endorsed Clegg. John Hemming’s odds have dramatically come in (from 150/1 to 65/1) and he is drumming up nominations for his tilt. He is talking about Kant in his campaign.

There is apparently a “keep it clean” agreement between Clegg and Huhne. Just as there was an Orange Book cadre understanding to install Ming as a caretaker leader – before Huhne ran last time. At yesterday’s campaign launch Huhne did one of his characteristic sly jibes (remember that pious knife twisting he did to Hughes when he was outed). “Ming”, Huhne claimed, was the “victim of a Camelot obsession”. Who is the JFK of this race that he is blaming for Ming’s fall? Guido will give you a clue, it isn’t John Hemming.

08:00 UPDATE : Ashdown is the first LibDem grandee to come out and endorse Clegg.

11:25 UPDATE : Hemming has reconfirmed he is still in the race and his hat remains firmly in the ring.

UPDATE : Oops, the Beeb had it 20 minutes before Guido. See that £3.5 billion doesn’t all go to waste.

This morning’s controversial Smith Institute summit on “fair taxation” was relocated from Downing Street after Guido drew attention to it. The event featured Gordon Brown’s former adviser and architect of Brown’s pensions grab, Chris Wales. As the principal architect of Gordon Brown’s pensions tax he is responsible for devastating pension funds. Today he gave the Sith a few new ideas for “fair taxes” on property to be levied through local councils.

Eric Pickles MP, Tory local government shadow didn’t hold back, he laid into the Smith Institute today – “the public will be alarmed that Gordon Brown’s advisers and favoured think-tank are calling for a toxic cocktail of local income taxes and a new national property tax.”

The Charity Commission is still investigating the Smith Institute for engaging in illegal political activity. Obviously these new policies are just a tad politically contentious…

That is what Guido calls “a good start”. Glen Oglaza over at Boulton & Co gives an example of why:

When Chris Huhne launched his Lib Dem leadership bid, our cameraman took the trouble to count the number of BBC people present.

There were TWELVE of them. Sky and ITN had three each.

You see this all the time, BBC camera teams literally tripping over each other. Each news show has its own resources. Guido has been inside the BBC’s Millbank operation, regional reporters galore reporting on Westminster. Ridiculous. Newsnight’s production office alone is as big as whole of the Sky News operation. This profligacy only happens because they don’t have to care about the bottom line.

Not much to report this morning, Ming has hinted that the Huhnie monsters could have been behind his demise. Huhne himself is expected to launch his campaign today. The Cleggies are texting all and sundry – Shane Greer has a screenshot of the hastily hidden, soon-to-be launched Clegg campaign site.

Some are speculating that the 29 year-old Julia Goldsworthy might run as a marker for the future. So after arguing for 18 months that age (he was 66) and experience (of sprinting) trumped looks and charisma, they could switch to a photogenic reality TV show contestant as leader – Julia is 40/1 on Betfair. Excellent idea, it couldn’t be any worse…

UPDATE : A co-conspirator says she has told her local rag she definitely won’t be running. Boo.

UPDATE II : John Hemming, who has confirmed he wants to run, is a mere 180 /1 on Betfair. He tells Guido he expects to get 5 nominations already!

UPDATE III : Vince Cable has ruled himself out this morning. Telling Nick Robinson that given “the current irrational prejudice about age… an older candidate is not electable”. Rationally, the 64 year-old slaphead is almost indistinguishable from Ming to voters.

UPDATE IV : Steve Webb says he has enough nominations, but is coming over all coy and pretending he is not sure if he really wants to run.