I don't mind the manifesto pledge stuff, manifestos are a list of stuff they want to do, a way to judge a party based on its ambitions and useful as such. I think it's wrong to think of them as firm promises.

What bothers me is that many LibDem MPs signed personal pledges that they'd never vote for a tuition fee increase. They put their own name and signature on a firm personal promise. And then did the opposite.

And they turned my (well, not mine, mine didn't count due to our fucked electoral system) LibDem vote into a Tory vote. Which for me, and I think many LibDem voters, is the absolute diametrical opposite of what I wanted.

And they accepted a free vote on election reform. That was so cowardly it made me feel sick.

So yeah. I'll never vote LibDem ever again. Fuck the Lib Dems. The Tories may be cunts but at least they stick to what they believe in. At least they have beliefs.

If I vote, and I probably won't, it'll be Labour.

That's not why we throw vitriol. People understand compromise. What I don't understand is, as I said above, turning my vote into its opposite.

There were numbers to make a 'left wing' (as far as that still means anything) coalition. More people (about 60% to 40%) who voted voted for a left wing party (Labour, LibDems, Green etc.). But they allied with the Tories.

I think it's more that they didn't do anything at all.

They, unnecessarily, sided with the (from the point of view of a leftie voter) most evil party with the intention of making them slightly less evil. Rather than siding with a good party and getting some good done.

And then they singularly failed to make them less evil. Because the Tories are very fucking good at politicking. They know how to play the media and make sure that the LibDems lose even the small amount of influence they should've had.

 

I voted for Lib Dems, but I'm not totally sure of that.  I want Lib Dems without Clegg and with a promise of never getting into bed with the Tories again.

You'd believe that promise? (cheer)

There would have to be tears of regret or something.

Looks like a choice between tory vermin (this includes Labour) or other parties that have no hope of doing anything. And the lib dems (giggle)

I don't think spoiling my ballot will be enough. I might need to shit in the ballot box.

As the only real choice is between Tories or Labour (+/- coalition) I'm certainly glad Ed has started to make some noises on policy. Taken his fucking time about it and completely undermined his supporters, but then what else do you expect from politicians.

I'm in Canada, so can't vote, but I follow UK politics very closely (for work and just personal interest), and I would definitely vote Lib Dem. The other two parties are too high up on the authoritarian scale for me - I'm old skool small-"l" liberal, quite centrist, so the Lib Dems are the only real option for me. I really admire Clegg and what he's done going into coalition with the Tories - it's always so much harder on the smaller party. And I totally LOVE the idea of coalition government - Canadian political parties are too immature to even consider the idea.

Although in fairness, I have to say that I don't dislike David Cameron. Not the Tories as a whole - too many nutters - but Cameron I actually kind of like. I'd rather have him as PM any day over the Conservative turd we currently have in power here in Canada. Want to trade?

>>I'm in Canada,

>> I really admire Clegg and what he's done going into coalition with the Tories 

Your second statement totally renders the first redundant.

>>but Cameron I actually kind of like.

What is it exactly you like about Cameron? Personality or policies? Because personally I find him lacking in both.

I agree. Hate the Tories, can't vote for Lib Dems again after they jumped into bed with the Tories, went against their own manifesto and refused to apologise for it. Even though I'm not an Ed Milliband fan, he's simply the best of a bad bunch.

The biggest thing I have against them was that their manifesto called for the scrapping of student fees. As soon as they'd hopped into bed with the Tories, they supported the increase in fees from £3,000 to £9,000 (despite receiving a lot of their votes and support from students), then Nick Clegg bluntly refused to apologise to them for this. Heck if he'd come out, said "sorry, but the financial crap we're in means we have to go back on this, I apologise" then I'd at least have had some sympathy.

Instead, he bunged one major pledge into his manifesto, did/supported utterly the opposite as soon as he was in government with the Tories and effectively said "fuck you" to hundreds of thousands of his voters. To me, that stank to high heaven and meant that I just cannot bring myself to trust a thing he says. And I've been in full-time employment since 2004 and am not a student!

Hey, he apologised!

I mostly compare him to our Tory PM and compared our PM, Cameron has... a personality, is well-spoken and is 99% less loony than most in his party. Plus he respects parliament while our idiot has been found in contempt of parliament twice, has misused prorogation to avoid confidence votes and other scandals and just generally abuses the parliamentary process every single way he can (not to mention his party regularly violates our election laws). Cameron is just classy next to our scumbag. I also really like Boris and would love to have him as mayor of Toronto rather than the crack addict idiot we currently have (Rob Ford - just google him. You'll see.)

The somethingawful forums have a :clegg: emoticon:

Whichever party knows how to use the subjunctive "were" properly.

Well, that's annoying - I edited the title and it reset the vote count :(

It does that.  I think it's because you could change it to a question that makes voters look silly.

Hrmph.

True, although it'd probably be useful if it gave you a clear warning first! (assuming that it didn't do this of course)