Nick Clegg onesie question posed by Old Etonian Lib Dem intern
It was billed as an opportunity for Nick Clegg to hear the views of 'real voters'. But the only flattering question asked of the Deputy Prime Minister during his appearance on LBC radio this morning was asked by a leading party activist who has worked in Clegg's office, it can be revealed.

You write off the Lib Dems at your peril, warned Tim Farron MP. And the nation, in a collective gesture, said "ooh, I'm so scared". But it isn't just the Liberal Democrat president who thinks the party is onto a winner. Nick Clegg, in his conference speech last September, reassured the faithful that there was a future for the party, not "as the third party, but as one of three parties of government".

Is it really plausible that the Liberals will ever be in government again? At present, they are on a par with Ukip in terms of popular support. Since they didn't win the fight on proportional representation – partly because they signed up to a policy that wasn't proportional representation – this will work out badly for them in terms of seats. They may be left with no more seats in the next parliament than the wedge of Northern Irish parties that failing governments turn to when they need to win key votes.

So where is the peril in writing off the Liberals? Farron reminds us of the unique selling point of the Liberals, their being the historic party of vacillation. The Liberals, he says, "are the only party able to deliver both a strong economy and a fair society." In practice, what this means is delivering welfare cuts, while opposing the Tories demonology about "shirkers" that goes with it. Or, if you like, solving the crisis of old age care by cutting the winter fuel allowance. Above all, promising to abolish tuition fees, then tripling them while arrogantly telling students to "grow up", then apologising for having made the promise to abolish them in the first place. But even if there was a whisper of substance in the Liberal commitment to a "fair society", their complicity in austerity is destroying the niche they have attempted to occupy as "honest brokers" between two unpalatable alternatives. The middle ground is being destroyed.

The authority of the Commons Speaker Michael Martin has been further undermined when the Liberal Democrats staged an unruly walkout after he blocked calls for a referendum on Britain's EU membership.
Amid extraordinary scenes, Nick Clegg, the Liberal Democrat leader, stormed out of the chamber with his colleagues, calling the Speaker's decision a constitutional "outrage".
The breakdown of parliamentary discipline occurred seconds after the party's foreign affairs spokesman, Ed Davey, had been unceremoniously expelled from the chamber by Mr Martin's deputy, Sir Michael Lord, for angrily criticising the Speaker's ruling.

April 16.

Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg is widely reckoned to have been the clear winner of last night's debate. Ironic considering that, for all his fluency and utter self-confidence, he is easily the biggest charlatan of the lot.
Who would guess, listening to him prattling piously about MPs' expenses, that he was a maximum claimer? Or that six months ago, when it seemed to be the flavour of the hour, he was demanding 'bold and savage cuts' in public spending, a subject on which he is now silent.
Or that this is a man who is capable of arguing with equal passion for or against retaining Trident nuclear missiles?

April 18.

Clegg mania grows steadily more ludicrous. Today a poll suggesting he is the most popular party leader since Winston Churchill.
I have been acquainted with each of the past five Liberal or Lib Dem leaders and he is by far the shallowest.

A total lightweight. I do wonder what people will say about all that Cleggmania shit in 20 years' time. It's embarrassing enough looking back at it now, and it's only been two-and-a-half years.