Farage & Russell Brand

Clegg - I think he lost half the liberal support overnight on student fees

I think that anyone who only voted Lib Dem because they want what was offered on the Student Fees will probably have left but why would people whose overall politics are Liberal/Social Democrat be dissuaded soontobe. I agree with granjura that we have to be a bit more grown up about how politics works if we are not going to have one party winning with a large majority.

Clegg - I think he lost half the liberal support overnight on student fees. And the voters did not return. I dont know where they went to instead.

Cameron. Because voters, myself included, dont understand what it meant, and what he is actually doing, if anything.

granjura I agree that if a party enters into a coalition with another party there will obviously be areas on which each has to compromise, even if it goes against the grain.

However, Nick Clegg made the issue of student fees a very central one and actually pledged to abolish them (no doubt inducing many younger people and their parents to vote for his party). Not only were fees not abolished (which would still be quite difficult to defend) but they were trebled. I think it is therefore quite understandable that people are reluctant to believe anything the Lib Dems now say.

I don't know, though, why David Cameron gets away so lightly with unequivocally stating that there would be no top-down NHS re-organisation, and then doing - at huge cost - just that.

I am interested in the manifestos of the parties but would really go much more on what they intrinsically stand for. All parties don't do things they say they would and do do things they didn't say they would partly because of what they find when they get into power. What I want to know is the direction they will go in when they make these changes.

As far as I can see Nigel Farage and his party are far right. This comes out so often. They seem to appeal most to those who want a return to Thatcherism which is not surprising as Farage was a Thatcherite, I understand. I would think, therefore, that whatever was said in a manifesto, they would try and bring in the far right policies we may not be presented with before and election.

Of course, this is not going to happen. The two biggest parties are polling about 66% together; they jointly got 67% of the votes in the last election. There may be some manoeuvring within the smaller parties but that is all it will be. Of course, this may have some effect if we do not have one of the big parties winning out right but it will be marginal.

rosequartz- do you honestly believe that the Lib Dems had any choice, in minority position in the alliance, to stick to their manifesto? I'd value anyone's comment on that issue- as I have been pondering the same since the elections. I've personally come to the conclusion they had little choice- and I actually truly admire Clegg for what he has done in the circumstances. He was damned if he did, and damned if he didn't- and many would have been destroyed by the situation.

I don't think either of the Eds smoke, but they are obviously scribbling their latest bits of the manifesto with stubs of pencils in little notebooks they keep in their top pockets (rather than fag packets iyswim)

Instead of after the election like the Lib Dems you mean?

If he scrapped it then, durhamjen, then that would be enough for me not to vote for him I think.

durhamjen just curious, I am proud to be a UKIP supporter. A lot of discussion on here but no one saying who they are voting for.

soontobe, I am just waiting for Farage to scrap the Ukip manifesto the month before the election, as he did with the European elections.

The residents of the New Era housing estate in Hoxton are grateful to Russell Brand.

Wallpaper is Osborne.

I thought so too when I first saw the OP!

We have to re-decorate in the New Year but perhaps I will give the Farage and Russell Brand a miss!

... or shoes

Wall paper you mean ;)

I thought Farage and Russell Brand was a posh make of paint ...

Oh, OK, soontobe. It was a general apology.

Have we established that magpie123's link is UKIP policy? It looks like it to me?

And if so, then there wouldnt be privitisation of the NHS by UKIP, going by their current policies?

I dont want privitisation of the NHS.

I hope that most of us would also disagree with the NHS privatisation which a number of UKIP politicians have advocated.

There is a huge amount of anti-Farage propaganda out there in the press and from other political parties.

I find people who swallow that propaganda hook line and sinker politically naïve.

It should be possible to disagree with a point of view without having to demonise the person holding it. Anyone would think Farage was the devil incarnate or at least Hitler! He's just a right wing politician.

I agree with Farage that immigration should be more controlled than it is now but definitely disagree that we need more grammar schools.

Apology accepted Ariadne.

Love the joke Soutra.

and

Oh, got it, bit slow tonight"!

They could pick up a lot of votes that way as a lot of them are blankety blank useless!

I am so reminded of the voter in Feckless Reckless's constituency who was quoted as saying "This time I am voting UKIP as the last bu**er was blankety blank useless"