No tactical voting this time round, please!

Apologies to non-UK readers - this is a bit of a domestic topic. We've had a couple of days to ponder the leaders' debate, which by general acclaim was 'won' by Nick Clegg for the Liberal Democrats. He certainly came across better than either of the others, especially in his acceptance that we need to do more than fiddle around with imaginary efficiency savings to get out of the financial mess we're in. He also, I think, came across as more genuine - which shouldn't matter, but does in this media-driven world.

As a result of this, a number of people may be thinking of voting Liberal Democrat - and if you are, please do. I think it's an excellent idea. But if you mention this, you will immediately get supporters of other parties muttering about a wasted vote, and how you should vote tactically to keep the worse of the other two parties out, rather than support the Lib Dems who can't possibly win.

This is rubbish. Not that they can't possibly win - I accept that - but that tactical voting is a good idea. If enough people vote Lib Dem a) we are likely to get a balanced parliament (sounds nicer than hung), and so the Lib Dem voice will be heard. And b) if the percentage of the vote for the Lib Dems reaches the high 20s then there's a stronger mandate for electoral reform, so that a sizeable proportion of the vote doesn't result in pitiful representation. If you feel the urge to vote Liberal Democrat, please do. Don't let those miseryguts tell you otherwise.

Affiliation Note: Some of you may have noticed a certain similarity between my surname and Nick Clegg's. As it's quite an unusual surname, we may well be distantly related, but I'm not aware of any connection. What's more, I was born within 3 miles of the spiritual home of the Clegg name, just east of Rochdale, where Mr Clegg is a bit of a softy southerner. However, I still feel he is an all round good egg, whether or not he is my fifth cousin, six times removed.

Comments

Why I hate opera

If I'm honest, the title of this post is an exaggeration to make a point. I don't really hate opera. There are a couple of operas - notably Monteverdi's Incoranazione di Poppea and Purcell's Dido & Aeneas - that I quite like. But what I do find truly sickening is the reverence with which opera is treated, as if it were some particularly great art form. Nowhere was this more obvious than in ITV's 2010 gut-wrenchingly awful series Pop Star to Opera Star , where the likes of Alan Tichmarsh treated the real opera singers as if they were fragile pieces on Antiques Roadshow, and the music as if it were a gift of the gods. In my opinion - and I know not everyone agrees - opera is: Mediocre music Melodramatic plots Amateurishly hammy acting A forced and unpleasant singing style Ridiculously over-supported by public funds I won't even bother to go into any detail on the plots and the acting - this is just self-evident. But the other aspects need some exp...

Murder by Candlelight - Ed. Cecily Gayford ***

Nothing seems to suit Christmas reading better than either ghost stories or Christmas-set novels. For some this means a fluffy romance in the snow, but for those of us with darker preferences, it's hard to beat a good Christmas murder. An annual event for me over the last few years has been getting the excellent series of classic murderous Christmas short stories pulled together by Cecily Gayford, starting with the 2016 Murder under the Christmas Tree . This featured seasonal output from the likes of Margery Allingham, Arthur Conan Doyle, Ellis Peters and Dorothy L. Sayers, laced with a few more modern authors such as Ian Rankin and Val McDermid, in some shiny Christmassy twisty tales. I actually thought while purchasing this year's addition 'Surely she is going to run out of classic stories soon' - and sadly, to a degree, Gayford has. The first half of Murder by Candlelight is up to the usual standard with some good seasonal tales from the likes of Catherine Aird, Car...

Is 5x3 the same as 3x5?

The Internet has gone mildly bonkers over a child in America who was marked down in a test because when asked to work out 5x3 by repeated addition he/she used 5+5+5 instead of 3+3+3+3+3. Those who support the teacher say that 5x3 means 'five lots of 3' where the complainants say that 'times' is commutative (reversible) so the distinction is meaningless as 5x3 and 3x5 are indistinguishable. It's certainly true that not all mathematical operations are commutative. I think we are all comfortable that 5-3 is not the same as 3-5. However. This not true of multiplication (of numbers). And so if there is to be any distinction, it has to be in the use of English to interpret the 'x' sign. Unfortunately, even here there is no logical way of coming up with a definitive answer. I suspect most primary school teachers would expands 'times' as 'lots of' as mentioned above. So we get 5 x 3 as '5 lots of 3'. Unfortunately that only wor...

Search This Blog