Twilight of the old party system?

Belmont Club » That’s the Way You Do It

The situation in which Britain finds itself is so dire that the Governor of the Bank of England told an American economist that whichever party won the current general election it would be “out of power for a whole generation because of how tough the fiscal austerity will have to be.” David Cameron may find, immediately after taking control of the ship of state that he has been promoted to the captaincy of the Titanic.

That makes me feel a bit better about watching the UK election results tomorrow.

In the meantime, you might be interested in Adam K's analysis of how, in an America where the political center has all but been abandoned, politics is becoming a fight in which each of the two major parties seeks to destroy its rival in order to institute some new kind of political center and debate on new terms. However, the more a party is expressly aware of and publicly vocal about its desire to destroy the other party, the less successful it can be. Adam thus looks for the political issues that, if fought seriously, may nonetheless have the pragmatic effect of destroying the "criminal cult" that is today's Democratic Party.

Some Good News from Britain, Finally.

Never mind that England is going to the dogs in a big way thanks to multi-culti lunatics in the Labour Party indulging themselves in an acid flash-back as national political vision. No, that's fine, it seems, with the average English, but what steams them is a Labour tax fiddle. Let's be thankful it's turning out this way regardless of why. The Tories look to take England and Wales. Maybe Red Ken can continue to spout his Trots rants for a while yet but his time is coming too. This isn't great news but it's better than anything to have come out of Britain in many a year.

[L]abour suffered one of its worst electoral humiliations, with its national share of the vote dropping to 24 or 25 per cent. The Tory share was projected at 43 or 44 per cent, better than its most optimistic predictions.

The margin was similar to the drubbing handed out to John Major in 1995 two years before Tony Blair entered Downing Street.

[....].

The Tories were heading for total gains of more than 200 seats and Labour's losses were of a similar order.

The results will put further pressure on Mr Brown's leadership after a dismal few months. His decision to abolish the 10p starting rate of tax was a substantial factor in Labour's reverses.

The only possible consolation for Mr Brown was that Ken Livingstone seemed to have fared better than the polls had suggested. The main parties refused to call the London mayoral result after indications of a high turnout in the inner boroughs, which were expected to be more favourable to Mr Livingstone.

[....]

The result added up to Labour's worst electoral drubbing for 40 years ....

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article3858882.ece

Thanks to Mark Alexander for the photo of Red Ken.