The Man Who Would Be King (18/01/13)

 In which I take on the man who's now in charge of public affairs for Facebook and seems to have come out of the whole thing quite well.

I stand by every word of this. This is about the moment that politics in this country became a much cheaper thing. This leads us to where we are now.

Tipping point.

So, as promised.

One man bears more responsibility for the morass of financial destruction that the country finds itself in than any other. I may have ruined the suspense on this one with the end of yesterday's blog (and don't you hate it when the best bits are in the trailer?) but....

That man's name is.......

Drum roll.......

Nick Clegg.

Think back to the build up to the last election. The decision to Americanize our voting system with televised debates. Handily ignoring the fact that the principle of British politics has always been that you vote for your local candidate, the individual that will represent your individual needs in the mother of all Parliaments, this was going to help us decide our fate for the next five years with a presidential debate between the party leaders. Politics had effectively entered the X Factor age, becoming a personality contest.

And of those personalities? Gordon Brown had long been easily defined in the media as the stereotypical, cliched dour Scotsman; not easy to warm to in public, unappointed by the public, leading a party fading rapidly in popularity during a financial storm with a discredited war to its name. David Cameron was unknown, the country unclear on his ideology. He displayed the easy, oily, slightly sinister charm that comes so naturally to the privileged.

The clear winner of the personality contest was Nick Clegg. As leader of the party that was always destined to finish third he was in a position to promise anything he wanted; it didn't matter, his party was unelectable. He came across as trustworthy, an apparent sincerity and charm best displayed in his ability when summarising to remember the names of those in the audience that had asked questions earlier. That he had no policies was of no concern, British politics had a new golden boy.

This sudden stardom appears to have gone to his head. When the election resulted in a hung Parliament, the Tories with 307 of the 650 seats - not enough for a working majority, the populace tired of Labour but not convinced by Conservatives who had won the election but not in the way they needed to - Nick Clegg appointed himself kingmaker.

Despite the fact that Clegg's impressive performance as leader had actually cost his party seats in the election, despite the fact that (although not written in legislation) the accepted practice is that in a hung Parliament the incumbent is given first opportunity to attempt to form a working cabinet, Nick spent days in talks over where he should apply his newly appointed balance of power. He saw a chance for a party that had no effect on politics to enter Government; it may well be that his ego saw a chance for he himself to have a position of power. His appointment as deputy Prime Minister and his opening day double act with his new ally strongly support this view.

And in this Nick Clegg has achieved much;

He has allowed the Conservative party's systematic dismantling of the British economy. He has legitimised their eradication of the country's workforce and he has entrusted them with the care of the National Health service; a care that can only lead to longer waiting times for necessary operations, less public health care and the selling off of large swathes of the greatest creation in the history of British social politics to the private sector.

In balance to this he has, in gaining power for a party that was not destined for power, ensured that he has wiped his party from the face of politics. At the next election the Coalition will be ousted (the country has realised its mistake of 2010, knows what it appointed in David Cameron and will not tolerate a second term) and the Liberal party will cease to be, voted into 4th or 5th place by an electorate that know that they were sold a lie, a vacuum, a nothingness by one man.

And when the economic climate worsens, when there are more spending cuts, more job losses, when the temperatures soar next August and civil unrest fills the streets once more, when the protests transform to criminalisation and the looting starts, remember how this started and the impact each individual's actions can have on all of society.

Remember that politics is not a popularity contest, it is an informed decision made on principle and ideology. Don't get fooled again.

Well. I was right about the decimation of the Liberal party. And horribly wrong about the country's attitude to Cameron and his cronies.