Alex Massie Alex Massie

David Cameron’s greatest strength is that he doesn’t believe in anything

You would think that spending time in America and thereby enjoying a ringside seat as the Republican party leaps off a cliff would give any British conservative cause to give thanks for the Tory party’s essential moderation. Not so with dear old Tim Montgomerie, however, who appears to have gone off his rocker and resigned from the party.

Now there is something to be said for hacks not being members of any party and in that respect Tim’s decision to abandon the Tory ship is a case of better-late-than-never. On the other hand, this is a man who once served as Iain Duncan Smith’s chief-of-staff and there is something quixotic about surviving that experience only to abandon ship when the party is actually in government and likely to remain so for the foreseeable future.

Still, we’ve all had weeks when we’ve struggled to think of a column.

Tim is, I should say, a thoroughly decent cove and he was kind enough to punt some work my way back when he was comment editor of The Times. Moreover, as the founder of ConservativeHome he has been more important to the modern Conservative party than most members of the cabinet. His latest project, The Good Right, is important and necessary and thoroughly to be recommended. He has done a lot for his party and the wider conservative movement.

Be that as it may, Tim’s reasons for resigning from the party whose cause he has advocated for nearly 30 years are an interesting reminder that all political parties forever teeter on the edge of madness. Plunging into the abyss is always an option.

Madness? Yes, really. Ordinary people – that is, people who retain their faculties and a sense of perspective and proportion – do not write or think things like ‘nothing registers more strongly on the social injustice front than recommending staying in the EU’.

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