I have to agree, there is still a deplorable tendency to tribal politics where people don’t even consider the policies or the past record but “If it was good enough for my parents, it’s good enough for me!” or “We’ve always voted for X, all the way back to my great-great-grandfather” etc. Idiots. The lot of them.  They* say you get the government you deserve. What they should say is that we get the government that idiots deserve and there’s sod all we can do about it.

*Who are “They”? Send them my way. I want a word.

The disabled
The poor
Families
Education
NHS
Small businesses

Face it, you’ve been party to pretty much screwing everyone in this country but the wealthy (and politicians, obviously… increase in allowances recently?)

I walked out of the party after I was invited to stand for local elections several years ago.  I commented that I did not agree with party lines on a few matters and was told “Oh, just go to the loo when things like that come up for a vote.”  Really?  Really?  I assume that’s the way it works in Westminster as well as I see my own LibDem MP frequently listed as “non-voter” rather than completely rebelling against the party line.  Principles. What are they again?

Because I’m seeing very little besides the token bleatings of Campbell et al. who are being sidelined and ignored. Welfare ‘reforms’, the bedroom tax about to make huge numbers homeless, and cripple local authorities budgets (mainly in areas with large social housing .i.e not Tory ones. Funny that) by tying up courts with eviction processes, paying bailiffs, lawyers, court costs, etc – who will then pass these charges onto the poor who they are dragging from their houses. Bailiffs who are going to be met with significant resistance, at some risk to their own safety. Not that I consider that a terrible shame, if that’s the work they choose.

And don’t tell me the private landlords are going to be hit the same. All they’ll do is what they did last time the housing benefit levels were capped; peg their rents at a rate where they’ll get the maximum from the system and forget the rest, which they never intended to collect anyway. The slumlords will be fine.

Can I ask, as you’ve made it clear that human rights was a tough compromise that you had to let slide, so sad, what of the other bones of contention that people are up in arms about? Affordable housing, dignity for the poor, the sick, the disabled, decent medical care for everyone, libraries, playgroups, schools? What of them? Up here in Newcastle, there’s a private school recently became a state school, thus becoming part of the taxpayer’s budget as the parents could no longer afford the fees. We’re losing services left right and centre, and a failing business is effectively nationalised. What is your opinion of luxury schooling for the privileged being billed to local authorities when it goes tits-up at the expense of education for all?

The point of proportional representation is that no party can form an entrenched majority of seats with only a minority of the votes.

I expect that if we get independence, the four major parties (Labour, Lib Dem, SNP, Green) will have to cooperate and debate like grown-ups, and if any of them go off the rails, they risk losing votes to one of the quaint little fringe parties like the SSP or the Conservatives ;)

An independent Scotland is likely to end up much more like Norway than Venezuela.

Ah, so WHAT were you saying pal?………………….

Yep.

You’re proposing a permanent SNP government, and how much do you really know about the way they would run Scotland?

Strange, scaremongery statement. We could look at their stated goals and objectives as well as judging them based on their past performance.

And there are other parties in Scotland. Like the Tories and Labour and the Lib Dems. The SNP isn’t going to become the PRC. They could still be voted out even in an independent Scotland.

This is the ugly, practical side of politics now. People vote for jobs, health services, the economy, taxes, schools, benefits, and local amenities. Only tiny numbers of voters care about civil liberties. Huge numbers of people who come to sites like this care about them – but lots of those people won’t even vote! And they’re still a tiny segment of the population.

We have to deliver the kind of politics that people will vote for. We talk up the case for liberalism as much as we can, but democracy means you and me don’t get to set the agenda.

None of them want the job during this parliament, because it will taint anybody associated with it.

We’ll get back to you about your vote when this parliament’s over. Nothing’s going to happen before then. Politics does not run on the 24-hour news cycle, it runs on the 5-year electoral cycle.

It’s a long way from “almost everything” though. We’ve done all the big 4 things that Clegg was talking about in 2010, and a lot of other things too.

http://www.whatthehellhavethelibdemsdone.com/

The important thing to realise is the difference between wanting something to change and thinking that it’s a good idea to try to change it right now. You’re looking at the party from the outside, seeing that it isn’t moving in the direction you want, and assuming this indicates a lack of desire to move. It would be more accurate to say that people within the party have a fairly specific timeline in mind, we haven’t hit the right date yet, and we don’t air dirty laundry in public.