For a decade I was making political TV programmes or writing political columns and leaders for national newspapers. And through all that time, I nursed a guilty secret: I don't know much about politics.
But it appeared that I did. And that - in the modern age - is what seems to count.
With the advent of the net, its even easier to access those crucial nuggets. You, too, can talk like Andrew Adonis while really knowing as little as (for example) me - and all from the comfort of that chair you're in now.
One obvious error would be to monitor the UK politics discussions on the newsgroups. Don't. You'll get sucked in to a vortex of loony obsessives and conspiracy theorists.
There are plenty of places to start your blagging career. First, Hansard. It's actually a bloody good read, although unless your mouse has got a scroller which can help cut through the crap, its quite a slog. Get a good mouse. And its not just the debates you want to trawl, the written answers are a goldmine.
The parties have jumped on the bandwagon and have all got their own websites. Labour, the Tories and the Lib Dems. As you might expect, they're all dreadful, though you can pick up some handy stuff to drop into conversations - like the location of future conferences. "Are you going to Brighton this year?" always sounds better than "Will you be going to the Liberal Democrat Autumn Federal Conference?"
When Labour came to office, they were enthused by this internet thing that Tony had heard so much about from Al Gore. In 2000 Tony promised to do weekly fireside web chats, like US presidents do. After a couple of years, he packed it in - due to a lack of interest - but the old (worthy) ones are still out there in cyberspace.
The sanitised civil service version of the lobby briefings are also available from the No 10 site. Sceptics may decry the dullness of these transcripts, but having been in the lobby for a few years, I can assure you that the real thing's pretty snoozy too. They've got it spot on.
Tony enthused the MPs, too - and there is a website even for your most indolent backbencher. Best of the bunch is probably Tom Watson MP's site - which promises to get a question at PMQs if enough readers sign his anti-tuition fees petition.
The best stuff to have lying around your flat is the unedited transcripts of inquiries. OK, so printing them out uses lots of paper - but they're a real babe magnet. Wanna score tonight? Pop down to Rymans for some paper and a highlighter pen. A fistful of pages from the Saville inquiry hearings on the Bloody Sunday massacre - with a few random sentences highlighted in yellow or pink (preferably both, to confer an impression of a system) - could work wonders for your reputation. If foreign affairs is more your blag, try the Milosevic trial.
By now, you'll look just like a seasoned policy wonk. You're almost ready to embark on a glittering career in politics. The final piece of the jigsaw is policies - you'll want a few. Really rightwing ones are in vogue at the moment, so nick a few from the ultra-right thinktanks like the Adam Smith Institute or the Centre for Policy Studies. These outfits always call themselves "independent" or "centre-right" but don't be fooled.
Now you're well on the way to special adviser status. Your very own page on Red Star Research. What more could you ask for?
