It’s voting day tomorrow and I’m still not sure who I’m going to vote for. I’ve watched the debates, I’ve read the manifestos, I’ve tweeted. The only thing I know for sure is that I’m not voting for the Tories or for any of the single-issue parties.
In the Tory manifesto, they mention freezing public sector pay and capping public sector pensions. They’re also in favour of cutting government contributions to Universities. Basically, voting Conservative would be voting for my own redundancy. I’ve already been made redundant once recently, it’s not fun. Plus, David Cameron’s face is all waxy and he hates gays.
The Greens, UKIP, SNP, Plaid Cymru and the BNP et al all preach about having a robust platform, but seriously, how much do the Greens really care about fixing the economy? Broke people make great environmentalists because they can’t afford to be wasteful; The better off people are, the more likely they are to drive V12 Jags and turn their thermostats up to 100. A good economy means I don’t get made redundant again, see above paragraph.
UKIP want out of Europe, I don’t, The SNP and Plaid Cymru want out of Britain and I don’t want to let them go and the BNP want to kick out all the brown people. I have no desire to kick out the brown people; however, if the BNP offered that £50,000 to WHITE Britons to go back to their “countries of origin” that they say they’d offer to non-white Brits, I’d at least go “hmmm” for a second before slapping myself in the face. Fifty large will buy a lot of Kraft Dinner, and watching Hockey Night in Canada every Saturday again might be ni… *SLAP* *SLAP*. Whoa, that’s better, thanks slapping hand.
So that leaves Labour and the Lib Dems.
The environment
The Lib Dems are big on tackling climate change, but they don’t want to build nuclear power plants. This sounds great in theory, but I think we’ve already discovered how keen the British public are to make sacrifices in order to save the planet. The gas shortages Britain experienced last winter have proved that the days of “putting another sweater on” are well and truly dead. Also, you need look no further than the rooftops in your neighbourhood to see how committed we are to solar panels. Until they make Sky satellite dishes out of solar panel glass, like it or not, nuclear power plants are the only way to quickly cut carbon emissions. Labour are (bravely) pro-nuclear and have made Britain the biggest user of offshore wind generated energy in Europe. They are also committed in their manifesto to making Britain carbon-neutral by 2020. That’s good enough for me.
Labour 1 – Lib Dems 0.
Family values and Community service
Both Labour and the Lib Dems parp on incessantly about more support for “the family” and encouraging people to get more involved in their communities. I am the lazy, male half of a DINK relationship who has no intention of helping the public with anything. Unless battering littering chavs with the cans of Tennants Super they toss on the ground counts as community service, the community can (in the words of Bart Simpson) get bent.
Labour 1 – Lib Dems 0
Personality
Nick Clegg owned Cameron’s and Brown’s asses in the debates, Brown has that creepy smile and that weird eye. Clegg is prettier, however, he has that really unpleasant voice like he’s speaking through a trumpet mute and his hand gestures are annoying. Brown bitched out that horrible woman in Rochdale which was a major plus, but then he went snivelling back to her. And smiled again.
Labour 1 - Lib Dems 1
Crime
Labour are rubbish at fighting crime. House break-ins are rampant, The Asbo program is a joke, and ID cards? Fuck. Right. Off. The Lib Dems say almost nothing in their manifesto about fighting crime, but they would have to give out free hand grenades to Abu Hamsa supporters and the IRA to do a worse job at fighting crime than Labour.
Labour 1 - Lib Dems 2
The Economy
This is a toughie. Everyone loves Vince Cable, and the Lib Dems are the only party who have published where they’ll make cuts and I agree with many of them, including ditching the Trident system. Brown’s bank-love definitely contributed to the recession, but take yourself back 5 years; remember when you got that dodgy mortgage by putting no money down? I do. There are many horror stories out there, but most of us still have those houses; had it not been so easy to get a mortgage, I’d probably have been renting this whole time and would now have nothing to show for it.
Gordon Brown got me on the property ladder, and really, has the recession been that bad? Yes, I do go on a bit about being made redundant, but to be perfectly honest, I got another job fairly soon after. In fact, my life has changed very little as a result of this recession and that is because of Brown’s bailouts. Fact.
Labour 2 - Lib Dems 2
WAGs
Nick Clegg’s wife is really hot and she wants nothing to do with politics.
Labour 2 - Lib Dems 3
Branding
I hate Yellow.
Labour 3 - Lib Dems 3
The Lib Dems are exciting and new, but Labour have experience, Nick Clegg is youthful and energetic, Brown is thoughtful and pragmatic, Clegg has better hair, Brown has better suits. I could go on and on, but I cannot decide between the two. Do I plump for old faithful, or do I go for radical change?
Frankly, I wish they’d just hurry up and form that coalition, it’d be one less thing to worry myself with.
