Ok, so David asked me to write what I’ve been ranting on

Comment on Liberal Democrats to Win The General Election! by The son.

Ok, so David asked me to write what I’ve been ranting on at him ever since I heard about the election debates. So I get to type a huge wall of text and pretend people care about my opinion :D

Disclaimer: I’m not a political expert, I’m not with any insider political know how. This is my 2c, and I need something to do while I can’t sleep. Take it as a pinch of salt or worship it as a bible for some strange religion, I don’t care which.

As we all know, the road to this election as been rocky. Even ignoring the economic down turn, Iraq still not happy with being liberated, and bank owners rolling around in taxpayers money, there was the expenses scandal.

Anyone who has even slight contact with the rest of the world will know that earlier this year, it turned out that a large amount of MP’s had been abusing the expenses rules to steal taxpayers money for all sorts of goods, from houses to chocolate bars. Not only that, it turned out it had been going on for a very very long time. The backlash was immense; people fired, media outrage, and a public trust in parliament destroyed, since people were actually surprised when politicians were caught lying to us (again). And to think this was started by a journalist finding out about a little posh duck house. There is also the state of the two current parties.

Labour has made some mistakes in the past 4 years, and more worryingly enough if they keep going the way they are, we’ll end up with the same amount of human rights as China, AKA none at all. Throw in the fact that Gordon brown is as charismatic and interesting as watching paint dry and it isn’t looking good for them. Sure most of his policies will keep the country generally in one piece and still working, but he don’t exactly give off a ‘leader’ vibe. I’m not excited for voting for them.

And nobody likes the Conservatives. Not even the Conservatives like the Conservatives. Say the words Tories to anyone over 20 who isn’t a millionaire, and you’ll invoke memories of Thatcher doing her darn best to screw up the country as much as possible. And David Cameron. He symbolizes everything people don’t like about politics. Always has the right words, so slick he doesn’t walk to places as much as slides to them. During his speeches I’m half expecting him to tell me how to get a better deal on my car insurance. And his policies are…. vague. He’s going to lower taxes, cut the national debt, keep public spending at the same level. And he’s going to do that by buying less paperclips at Whitehall? Riiight…. And after he does all that he’ll work on finding a cure for cancer.

Nobody likes either party, evident by the possibility of a hung parliament. Sure there are other parties, but they usually are far to radical. UKIP wants to kick us out of the EU, BNP wants to kick everyone out of the UK, SNP want to kick Scotland out of the UK, Plaid Cymru want to kick Wales out of the UK, the Greens want to kick none vegetarians out of the UK, and the loony party just want to kick people in the shins for the fun of it.

The only serious third party is the Liberal Democrats. But they have (Or had :D) a stigma attached to them. A couple years back there was a poll that stated 30% of people believed that it didn’t matter what policies Lib Dems had, they would never get in. Sadly enough the people they had polled were Lib Dem supporters! There is a idea that voting for Lib Dems is a wasted vote, and even though people don’t like the other two parties, people want their vote to count. It is a never ending loop of self destruction. People don’t vote for them because people don’t vote for them, which means people don’t vote for them. What was needed was a huge have of support coming in all at once, to make the party seem like a real candidate. So in came TV.

Anyone who knows anything about history knows TV is huge in politics. The famous JFK debate is a good example, but even here in the UK it has happened before. David Cameron was a -relatively- young candidate that nobody knew, a unknown with only a 1% backing for becoming tory leader. Until during the campaign for leadership, he went on TV, and did a brilliant speech (I don’t like Conservatives, but even I agree it was a kick ass awesome speech.) All of a sudden David Cameron had 30% backing and was a real candidate.

And the same thing happened here. For 90 minutes all prejudice of all the parties was gone, it was just them, their policies, and 10 million+ voters (the estimated amount who watched the debate). And this is where the Lib Dems excel. Like a child who don’t have a enough attention, Lib Dems have a habit of creating detailed plans to over compensate. They were reasonable, had a scary amount of common sense in them, and the manifesto shows exactly where all this cash comes from, meaning he had exact answers, rather then avoiding the main intent of a question. Sure Brown did ok, but then people’s expectations were rock bottom. The only way he could been worse was to state he hated all Jews, blacks and gays. The real loser was the Tories. If I wasn’t sure before I wasn’t voting for them, I am now. Conservatives and Economy are rather like a bull and a china shop. Sure change is a good idea, but not all change is good. Setting fire to my house is ‘change’, change needs to be done with a clear reason and goals, else all you end up with is singed hairs and smoke.

Will this debate be the end of it? No. There is still everything to play for with the upcoming round 2 and 3, however I’m interested to see what gains, if any, Lib Dems have made in the official polls. 4-6 Million people saw Nick Clegg as a better leader, and if that isn’t the start of something, nothing is.