How cynical are you?

While the politicians have been busy trying to sort out a government what have you thought their priorities have been?  I caught a little of the TV coverage and it mostly seemed to be about party advantage for either the short or long term.  Is it possible that our politicians are thinking about what is good for our country as well?

Gordon Brown
Assuming that he believes what he was saying, then he believes that a Tory government who cut spending immediately will put the country at risk of a double dip recession - trying to stop them doing so, even at the cost of damaging the Labour Party's future prospects would be the right thing to do.  If he really believes this then standing down to facilitate a deal with the Lib Dems would also be the right thing to do (although he might find this harder if he believes that he has the skills that others don't to solve the issues).
I actually think that party advantage would suggest that he should have already resigned.  Let the Tories run the country for 6 months as a minority government and then find there needs to be another election - they then have the problem of being the incumbent in a difficult economic situation.  But he would believe that that would be bad for Britain.

David Cameron
If we want a government with any prospect of longevity then I think it has to be a Tory/Lib Dem coalition - anything else could fall apart at any moment.  The question is whether that is what we want.  I don't however think that there is any doubt that that is what the Tories want - there has been much talk about the fact that they don't like the idea of PR because it will give weak government - so again this fits into a "good for the country" decision (you might not like the solution, but I don't think you can argue that they don't sincerely believe this).

Nick Clegg
Here is where the rubber hits the road - and in some ways I feel sorry for Nick Clegg.  What is best for the country?  Is it a period of stable government with time to sort out the economy?  Can he and David Cameron agree sufficiently on the necessary economic policies?  If they can't then is it better to support the economic policies that he wants and try to do a deal with Labour?  And all that is before the cynicism about what might best get PR (which he would believe to be in the country's best interest) and whether the Lib Dem party would allow him to enter into a coalition with either of them, or how the country would see the Lib Dems "propping up" a failed Labour government.

Who would be a politician?

Time to Vote - How will you decide?

There has been much said over the past few weeks by the candidates - now is the time to make our mark.  But how are you going to do it?  (other than with a pencil and an X J)

Last Sunday I preached on "Love one another as I have loved you, so you must love one another", asking people to hold in mind "who should I vote for?" as I talked about loving one another.  This wasn't an attempt to sway them to any particular party - more a case of challenging them to ask themselves which party best does it (and there will be arguments on this for all the main parties).

I have heard people talking about engagement as one of the necessary prerequisites for love.  If we do not engage with people then we can't love them - and it is so much easier to demonise people we don't know (something that I used to minimise customer complaints in my previous job).

The one plea that I would make is that we all vote (I might let off those in the Buckingham constituency who have the speaker as a candidate!), for two reasons: firstly that if we don't vote we are refusing to take responsibility for the future of the country, particularly this election, where if it is a hung parliament the votes cast for each party may be relevant in the forming of a coalition; and secondly because there are parties which do not by any stretch of the imagination deal in love and engagement, and the way to deal with them is at the ballot box, and a large turnout is bad for them!

Having written the above I am now fuming.  I have just read that a group of Christians are promoting 192 Conservatives (and a few of other parties) on the basis that:

as UK citizens having a vote they would prefer to be governed by representatives who are committed to protecting life, marriage, conscience and fundamental freedoms
Ruth Gledhill

Now that is one view, but the Bible has rather a lot about orphans, widows and resident aliens.  This strikes me as Christians wanting what is best for them - not what is best for others - and what is potentially worse for others.  No wonder people don't like us L