The Cleggies: The British election from Mallorca

If you live in Mallorca, do you care about the British election? You might be interested, but do you really care? You might actually exercise your vote, but why, If you don't live there, or go there only now and then? Do you care more about Zapatero and Rajoy? Because perhaps you should.

Nevertheless, it is entirely understandable that the election should generate interest and column inches in the local English media. Of course it is. It is something of the old country, something actually quite important of the old country. But, to varying degrees for individuals living in Mallorca, it is the old country, as in the former country. Not the current. Moreover, at a distance - of the miles (or kilometres) that divide Mallorca and the UK - can one really appreciate the issues of the election? Many will say they can, but many may be deluding themselves. Many will be acting on received wisdom, or lack of wisdom.

It is a curious phenomenon, that of commenting on an event that is intrinsically important - as a Briton - and yet one that one is not a part of. The heritage, the past, the growing-up; these all qualify such commenting. But somehow there is a disbarring through voluntary exile. Pity the political commentator who is an outside observer of his own country and its politics.

"The Bulletin" has been going fairly big on Nick Clegg. Many have been going big on Cleggy. The power of previously having been anonymous. There was a yes-no in the paper. Clegg as Prime Minister? As meaningful as an argument over a Saint Mick in an expat bar. And ... And oh dear. Let's get things right shall we. It was implied in this exchange that Clegg is following in a line of great Liberals, well one. Winston Churchill. Oh dear. Oh dear, oh dear.

Churchill was a member of the Liberal Party for twenty years. He was a political opportunist who left the Conservatives and then rejoined them. What he was never was a Liberal Prime Minister. He was also described in the paper as Britain's greatest Prime Minister. Oh dear, oh dear. This was meant to further big up Cleggy. But it was plain wrong, and one might recall Churchill's own argument about being over 30 and having no brains if one is not a Conservative (not one, I should add, that I agree with).

Churchill's reputation is founded on his role as a war-time leader, but he was a poor Prime Minister in his peace-time government after 1951. He treated Eden as an idiot and thus undermined him (though he may have been right to have done so). He was ill for much of this time. He was too old. He was antagonistic towards the creation of nascent European integration.

Churchill rejoined the Conservatives in the mid-1920s, following his sojourn with the Liberals. Only in his advocacy of free trade could Churchill truly be said to have been a liberal in terms of political philosophy as it is broadly now understood. Otherwise ... . He loathed Gandhi. In this regard, he proved to be as antediluvian as Thatcher was in her disrespect of Mandela. He was highly pro-American, he would never - had he been alive today - have opposed Trident. In all these things, he was the antithesis of what we imagine Clegg to be. The comparison is absurd.

Why not go back further? Clegg is the new Gladstone. It might actually make greater sense, though Gladstone would probably in fact have been an old Labour politician today (as with his support of the dockers' strike). But any comparison with the past is a nonsense. If there is to be some exiled comment on the election, it might at least be accurate. Or maybe, if you do care, leave it to the likes of "The Sun", "The Mirror" or "The Guardian". They may all talk bollocks, but it will be bollocks in which you can trust. Sort of.


QUIZ -
Yesterday: Tears For Fears, "Head Over Heels", http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EMBbJ_l0Tb4. Today: not the "cleggies", but who - as in they who appeared in "Private Eye"?

Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.