Beauty and the beast (but which is which?)

C. Gee

Cameron put himself in an impossible position. His contortions fit him only for a Houdini act in the Idol Talent Show. The line-up:

Escapologist Cameron.
Gordo the Talking Boa Constrictor.
Clegg the Ventriloquist and his puppet Dave.

Archie

Well, quite so Miss Phillips, and please look at what straws some - evidently desperate - Tory columnists are clutching at here: http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/janetdaley/100035668/ukip-should-withdraw-from-the-election/comment-page-2/#comment-100266929. Perhaps the most preposterous suggestion of this election?

David Lindsay

The Tories are terrified that Nick Clegg is going to use tomorrow's Leaders' Debate to revive his party's commitment to an In/Out referendum on EU membership. He should do no such thing.

Instead, he should promise that a predominantly Lib Dem Parliament would enact an amendment or a one-clause Bill restoring the supremacy of British over EU law wherever the two conflict, and, to get the ball rolling, declaring that this shall be the case with regard to the United Kingdom's historic, and internationally lawful, fishing rights: 200 miles or to the median line.

This would require neither referendum (a foreign and deeply flawed device) nor renegotiation. And it would go down very well in the Lib Dem fishing strongholds from every seat in Cornwall, round North Norfolk, Berwick-upon-Tweed and North East Fife, to the Highlands and Islands of Scotland.

But he won't do it.

zsa zsa

Here in America the genius Anne Applebaum of the Washington Post wrote this article: 'From Britain's Tories,lessons for the Gop'
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/03/24/AR2010032401939.html?nav=rss_opinion%2Fcolumns

I had to laugh, this woman obviously wants conservatism in the US to go the way of the dinosaurs.

WB

As Nick's great-uncle probably or someone or other like that famously observed "in the EU and regret it, out the EU and regret it, in or out the EU and regret it" which is just so fantastically deep and existentional the sort of thing a genius like the curiously boyishly good looking Michael Gove could also probably come up with given his head which he probably will be quite soon my guess hah hah and sums it all up pretty neatly as a three-way thing we can all relate to.

All the same Nick gets my vote def if he promises a referendum on the EU prinicipled or no.

Good old Nick eh and yes modern politics *is* wonderful.

Roger K

Internationally there is something strange happening to the traditional conservative, or if you like, centre-right political parties, they are collapsing through lack of conviction or commitment to their identities.

Whether in opposition or in power these parties have only one aim, one object, to collect votes and be in power for its own sake. Look at the American, the Australian examples for their disarray when opposition and look at John Key and the National Party, here in New Zealand, when in power.

John Key stands to the left of Helen Clark, who finally sickened the country with her far left rabid Socilaism and was kicked out after nine years. John Key promises different things to different people depending upon whose company he is in and panders to the minority parties to get their support. He has signed up to things that even Helen Clark wouldn't. Since coming to power October 2009 some of his achievements are as follows.

Downgrading and dumbing down the armed services.
Ignored a refrendum that showed 80% of the population wanted an anti-smacking act kicked out and he retained it.
Little New Zealand, the o0nly country in the world, is going full steam ahead with an Emissions Trading Scheme that will cripple us but give huge amounts of money to self interested groups, especially Moari.
Seabed and Foreshore Act that changes that again hand over the resources and control of our seabed and coastline to Maori groups.
Healthcare and social welfare control and operation to Maori groups.
And to cap it off this week New Zealand in a surprise announcement at the U.N. broke ranks with Australia, U.S.A. and Canada and signed up with the U.N. Indegenous People's Rights which gives them the complete sovereignty over all land and resources.
The man has torn asunder a country that had a good reputation in these areas.

Be warned Gordon Brown might be sickening but what you get in his place could very well be some kind of malign transformer creation.

Neil Craig

Same party that had a manifesto promise last time round that we would have a European referendum on the Lisbon treaty & once the election was over cynically broke it. Whereas Gordon is promising a referendum on PR (OK only the least proportional type) which reminds us that they made the exact same promise in 2 of their last 3 manifestos. I suspect that if Cameron hadn't broken his "cast iron promise" he would be winning. As it is the surprisng thing about the level of political cynicism is that it isn't higher.

Kiwi

Roger K 3.19am
Couldn’t agree more, your comments should provide an insight as to what is in store for Britain, should the voters be hoodwinked yet again by the two, or is it three now, main political parties. Here in NZ, John Key and the so-called conservative National Party, in order to gain power from Helen Clarke’s Labour (Socialist) Party, were forced to reposition themselves on the left as blue Labour-lite to a politically backward electorate. They were successful. Now, some eighteen months later, nothing much has changed. None of the previous socialist government’s legislation has been repealed; it’s business as usual. There was a truly conservative party alternative to vote for, the ACT party (think UKIP), however, under MMP (proportional representation) they barely scraped home with the required 5% vote to be represented in our parliament. They currently languish at 3% support.
Britons, if you don’t believe it possible, take a look at:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hxwBzgO7YsM&feature=player_embedded

Gary

The desperation of the Tory press is really very, very funny. The Daily Mail, the paper that eagerly supported Hitler and Mussolini ("Hurrah for the Blackshirts") talks about "Nazi slurs", something it would be well advised to keep quiet about, given its treasonous history.
Obviously Murdoch is frightened he won't be getting his Corporate Welfare kickbacks if the Tories lose.

The Tories display breathtaking arrogance by threatening the voters that they must vote Tory or else, and their banker friends seem to be under the deranged delusion that anybody would listen to a word they say after they crippled our economy.

John.

Why does it not occur to the conservatives that we could have our cake and eat it if only we left the EU and remained in the EEC like, for instance, Norway? People are desperate to have EU directives repealed, regain the power to have and to exercize our own laws without EU interference, and to stop paying unimaginably large sums in tribute to the EU.

Augustus

Clegg is no more straight-talking than any other party leader, and is just as economical with the truth. Forget Clegg. Unless of course you really do fancy a future
'new era' of permanent, wishy-
washy, left-wing coalition Euro-
style government for Britain.

just Louise

Is Nadhmi Auchi's Anglo-Arab Organisation shaping Clegg's Middle East policies?

http://www.thejc.com/news/uk-news/30841/anti-israel-iraqi-billionaires-d...

http://www.thejc.com/blogpost/libdem-policy-against-israel

http://modernityblog.wordpress.com/2010/04/25/lib-dems-dont-upset-the-mo...

Could Cleggy come clean and tell us?