Weird, discordant, strangely unsettling

So, that was a weird one.

The results were pretty much as everyone expected. The exit polls seem to have been spot on – BBC predicted a Labour majority of 66 seats and with a few results left to come the majority stands at 65 seats (remarkable, isn’t it, how exit polls perform to pinpoint accuracy…. except that one freak mistake in America on November 2nd 2004? What an unfortuinate coincidence that was) .

So, if they all knew how it was going to play - why is it that everyone seems so dejected? There’s no one – not politicians or voters – who’ve enjoyed this election. Had much stomach for it. There’s been a strange sense of of dislocation. Of having a vote, because you must - rules of a democracy you see. There were so many odd discordances this time. An election devoid of passion, where no one felt they had much to choose from - which also had the highest turnout for years. It was an election where people seemed to vote clinically. There was a weird nuancing to the voting patterns – people wanted to give Labour a bloody nose… but not so much to let the Tories in. Just enough to hurt, no more. Nuanced tactical voting. Now, that’s a first.

The Conservatives allowed themselves to get so boxed in strategically, they ended up running one of the oddest, smallest-scale, most bilious campaigns for years. Facing a desperately vulnerable PM, they were unable to strike at the festering wound on his body – Iraq – because they’d have done exactly the same thing. Already ostracized by a Republican White House – an odd and counterintuitive position for a conservative leader to be in - Michael Howard couldn’t be seen to touch on any of the substantive issues that made the war so divisive. Meanwhile, Europe was struck off the agenda – a toxic, implosive issue the Tories had to sweep under the carpet. Their other bread and butter issue –crime and punishment – was entirely neutralized by decent crime figures and a Labour government that’s swung so hard on order issues (id cards, anti-Terrorist laws etc) that they’ve been completely outflanked. So, once you refuse to attack the opponent on the issues which will really hurt him, what are you left with? Hospital cleaning and an immigration scare. Like I said, small-bore, small-vision and unpleasant at the same time. The old tie your hands behind your back and then scream flecks of spittle at your opponent strategy. Hardly an election-winning approach. At least when George Bush ran on the equally rancid message of “If you vote for the other guy, you’ll die” it had a certain visceral resonance.

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Originally uploaded by octoplex.

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Originally uploaded by octoplex.

Meanwhile the Lib Dems suffered from a similar curse: lack of vision and the negative political charisma that comes with it. Fine, they have 60 seats, best result since 1923 etc but… c’mon. You’re running against a fatally wounded Prime minister as the only party which clearly, vocally opposed his hated war. The opposition, led by an unloved mistrusted man, is running one of the worst-judged campaigns in recent memory and… 60 fucking seats? Please. Politics, is opportunity. Take it when you see it. The field was clear, people were desparate to vote for someone promising genuine change and… 60 poxy seats. Opportunity was wide-open for the Lib Dems to ravage the bases of both the Tory’s and Labour, running hard on the war, public services and trust they could have single handedly pulled down a struggling Tory party whilst laming Labour terribly. All it took was some balls, some brio. A guy to clearly, openly say what everyone out there was thinking. And they failed. I read somewhere that they were using this election as a stepping stone, cement themselves for big gains in 2009. What? The chance is now. Who knows what’ll happen in 2009. When the train leaves, you jump on it. You don’t wait for another one to come in a few hours. These guys are the political equivalnet of the A&R man who turned the Beatles down because ‘electric guitar music has no future’.

And then there was the weirdest thing of all. This was an election where nothing of import was discussed. Many things are going to happen between now and the next election. Many things. We’re heading into some choppy water and I guarantee you this: none of the things which will shape our lives over the next 4 years were so much as whispered by any party in this campaign.

No mention of the environment. No mention of energy efficiency. No mention of our positioning with Europe or the United States. No mention of terrorism. No mention of the trouble brewing in Iran.

Nothing.

And that is unconscionable.

Again, I reserve my deepest contempt for the Lib Dems. Of course, one expects Blair and Howard to not broach these issues it’s in their nature. But the Lib Dems – they could have made so much hay. The state of the two main parties, the peculiar state of the electorate - just think what a smart, populist, firebrand kind of politician could have done. Just think.

60 seats.

Weak, limpid, small-beer thinkers who allowed their greatest opportunity in the last hundred years slip straight through their hands just as we all knew they would from the very start. I knew it. I was pissed off. And you know what else..?

I voted for them anyway.

Which, somehow, just about sums up this election in a nutshell.

You see, I just couldn’t, couldn’t bring myself to vote for that war. Though I tell you this, my constuency is Labour, safe as houses – if there was even a glimmer of a chance I was letting Howard in, I’d have ticked that Labour box in heartbeat.