CraigGrannell wrote:
The tiniest flicker of a silver lining was summed up succinctly on Twitter by Jon Snow: "coalition will sustain for full parliament: after last night none of parties especially Labour(!) can afford for it not to!" And he's right. Lab's gains weren't enough and wouldn't necessarily be repeated in a general election. We'd probably still end up with a hung parliament, but this time with an even weaker junior party. Worst-case scenario is if UKIP continues to strengthen and becomes the third party in the UK—although that at least might spoiler the right.
*depressedface*
The problem, IMO, is that Labour are still tainted by the damage done by Blair and Brown, and Miliband basically isn't popular amongst the grassroots or charismatic enough to inspire a revival amongst the usually dependable Labour supporters. In some ways he was the least worst option, but still crap material for leader and obviously far out of his depth. Any competent leader would at this stage be
really rolling up his sleeves and rebuilding the party more comprehensively than Blair ever did, but there's no signs of that yet, which doesn't bode well.
UKIP the third party? Doubtful, outside of protest votes in the Euro elections, which hopefully won't be the case next time. They're just too extreme, and weird, and need PR in place to get anywhere at all.
Mr Kissyfur wrote:
You know if you get a Tory council they're going to be cocks if you need, for instance, assistance with disabled children.
Just as bad when you grow up and become an adult and still need assistance.
Depressing, my local council now has 45 Tory councillors, and only 3 LibDem and Labour apiece, all down to the collapse in the LibDem vote. Today's results were for me the Torypocalpypse, act II.
CraigGrannell wrote:
The Greens bother me. They get so much right and their policies almost all align with my political leanings, but then they chuck in shite like wanting to ban research on stem cells and to push hard for 'alternative medicine',, Gnh.
Guess that would change if there were nearer towards gaining some sort of power (as a coalition partner, etc), usually Green parties elsewhere in Europe moderate themselves along their path to mainstream respectability. Unfortunately though, some of the anti-science mindset still lingers even then, e.g. the German Greens recently winning a solidly conservative southern state by scaring everyone shitless about nuclear power.
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That nicely highlights the problem with modern politics and left/right. In a left/right axis, the Lib-Dems are mildly right, as are the Tories and even Labour (who may now move left). Economically, the Libs have always been more Tory than Lab, but with an underlying conscience (hence fighting for a 50% tax rate).
The LibDems a mixed bag, really. They, thankfully, aren't like an explicitly right-wing liberal party like the German FDP or Dutch VVD, but aren't unambiguously left-liberal either. Like all 'centre' parties, they have a mix of people nearer social-democratic positions, and at the other end economic liberals like Clegg and Cable, with the only real cohesive ideal being liberalism on social and personal issues. Personally, I wish that they would either align themselves fully on the centre-right or centre-left, without any of the ambiguity. The all-things-to-all-men approach is a major cause of their current mess.
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The real difference in the parties is apparent when placing them on a liberal/authoritarian axis where the Libs remain 'left' on that, but Lab is 'right' of even the Tories.
Wouldn't say Labour, even New Labour, are to the right of the Tories on social issues. They did after all introduce measures that at one time would be considered extremely radical, such as civil partnerships, and the often-derided Human Rights legislation genuinely benefits social minorities. The problem lies that Labour leadership are unfortunately still in New Labour mode, i.e. thinking it is still 1994, that they have to outflank Michael Howard as being 'tough', and make knee-jerk reactions to appease right-wing populist tabloids. Also, unfortunately the working class 'core' Labour supporters are often more conservative than we give them credit for, and tolerate authoritarian politics far more readily than, say, the educated middle class who the LibDems appeal to (appealled to?). Still, I agree with you generally that the authoritarian bullshit has to go pretty sharp-ish, as that alienated far more people than Labour high-ups seem to realise.