In that poll thing CRSP linked, I scored 50% Conservative, 25% Labour and 25% LibDem.
I think that says more about the ANMCP(All New Morphing Conservative Party) than it does about my voting affinities.
I took that test. Very interesting, I always thought I was a Liberal, but I got 50% Conservative, 25% Lib Dem and 25% BNP.
Apparently I agree with the Conservatives on immigration and education, the Lib Dems on health and the BNP on the environment, which seems a little odd, but at least I didn’t agree with them on immigration.
Wow - despite thinking I was adhering to the LibDems’ policies, I got 44% Labour, 33% Green and 22% Conservatives. Not a splash of yellow in sight.
Even more surprisingly, I went for the Tories on the Economy and Environment and Labour for Democracy, areas which in practice I have tended to oppose them by a wide margin. It just goes to show…something, I don’t know what.
That maybe that test is flawed?
I’m watching the debate now. Can someone please send a tape to those in charge of the US “debates” so they can see what an actual debate looks like?
How do they differ? The feeling here is that this was very much a US style ‘debate’ and nothing close to the bun fight that these guys regularly engage in across the floor of the House of Commons.
The bun fights are what I pay my taxes for, I’ll have you know!
They directly speak to each other really often, asking questions of each other and responding. It is at a much faster pace as well, meaning the politicians cannot depend so much on pre.prepared statements.
They are US-style in concept but not really in application.
Two days left to register to vote if you haven’t yet 
http://www.aboutmyvote.co.uk/ you can go here for details.
And I’d like to point out that the Lib Dems raised £120,000 in donations in the 24hrs after the debate and that Nick Clegg is now the most followed UK politician on twitter
How is it flawed? It’s just you picking blindly which aspects of the respective party’s manifestos you prefer on issues you mark as mattering the most to you.
I looked at that voteforpolicies survey, and I was just astonished by some of the policies listed. They range from asinine to dangerous.
Who in hell would vote for a guaranteed income to allow people to make ‘meaningful choices’ about their lifestyle? Who’s supposed to pay for that? Extending ‘workers rights’ to the self-employed? Can I sue myself?
Presumably people who have already made ‘meaningful choices’ for themselves, and their success is rewarded by making them pay for someone else who has screwed up so far.
I’m an Brit extremist libertarian and I believe in a guaranteed income. If we accept any notion of a welfare state, and I do, then it is by far the fairest way of encouraging productive activity while at the same time ensuring no one starves to death. It has to be very carefully set to essentially provide an acceptable living - and no more - but done correctly it is a great concept.;
No, it’s really not. And if you believe that providing an income for doing nothing will promote productive work, well… I’m not sure what to say to you. And you can’t be a libertarian and support a guaranteed income. The two concepts are fundamentally contradictory.
An ‘extremist libertarian’ would not accept the notion of a welfare state, either. It sounds like your politics are a little confused.
You misspelled there: where you put “libertarian”, it should go “s…o…c…i…a…l…i…s…t”.
Seriously, I cannot comprehend how you can view yourself as a libertarian and also believe that taxpayers should provide welfare to everyone unable or unwilling to earn their own living.
You realise that if you accept that people should be kept from starving, living on the streets and guaranteed an education - as most people in the UK do - then you are essentially guaranteeing an income.
It doesn’t really matter if that’s split up into housing support, unemployment benefits etc. it’s all the same.
And I’m not so sure why ‘the someone successful will pay for someone who messed’ argument works more here than with any other government policy.
Anyway you realise one of the party’s contesting the election is the Socialist Union and Labour party which is likely where that policy came from. Don’t worry, they won’t get in 
The guaranteed minimum income is a bit of a derail, but I’ve got to ask the people questioning it: really? If you accept the existence of a welfare state–as anyone must unless they are utterly unconcerned with practical politics and are more interested in political statements as a way of expressing identity and feeling special–then a guaranteed minimum income is by far the most “libertarian” way of implementing the welfare state. See: any libertarian argument in the past decade about how food stamps are inefficient and should be replaced by direct cash transfers.
Anyhow, more importantly, looks like the LibDems have surged ahead into a(n insignificant) lead. Can they keep their momentum going? And I’m pretty shocked by these figures I’ve been seeing though about seat distributions after the election–check out the Beeb’s seat predictor at BBC News - Election seat calculator .
Actually Milton Friedman supported replacing existing welfare schemes with a negative income tax which is a guaranteed income. The idea being that if you wanted to help the poor this is the least intrusive way of doing it.
Anyway I have been fiddling with this electoral calculator and it appears that a hung parliament is quite likely. The problem for the Tories is that because a lot of their votes tend to be wasted in their safe constituencies they need a substantially bigger percentage than Labour to win a majority. Around 40-41% which is not looking likely at the moment. Labour only needs around 35% for a majority but given the weak economy and the disillusionment with Brown that may be too hard.
The biggest problem for the Lib-Dems has been the perception that a vote for them is a wasted vote because they can never win a majority. A prospect of a hung parliament changes that and gives them the prospect of serious power. Add to that the momentum from the debate and general frustration with the status quo and they are looking good.
If there is a hung parliament and the price that the Lib-Dems extract is a shift towards proportional representation, you would have a profound shift in British politics towards something like the German system where the FDP have been kingmakers for most of the post-war period. This in turn would have a major impact on British foreign policy among other things. The Lib-Dems are the most pro-European of the three parties and have been the most critical of the Iraq war.
Because, hard though it may be to believe, the Americas do not have an exclusiv eright to define libertarianism. Just because libertarianism here is associated with the political right and the enshrinement of porperty rights above all else, doesn’t mean it is so everywhere, or always has been so.
It is perfectly consistent to believe that one of the few, necessary functions of the state (at least in a transition period, sort of a withering away of the state if you will) is to provide for a minimum income level.
“Libertarian” isn’t an American definition. It’s the definition of a very specific set of philosophical principles. Calling yourself a welfare libertarian is like calling yourself a free market Communist.
These terms aren’t relative. They mean very specific things.