But there is a serious point to be made about a wider political divide – that it offers us real differences in vision and ideas to go forward. And it offers us real competition. Does that mean more disenchantment with politics as MaidMarian says? I don’t agree – given that a common complaint among people today is that they don’t know what the parties stand for and they all sound the same.

El Cid also says:
But what does one mean by “social circumstances” in a rich society when not having a tv is seen as a form of poverty. Does it extend to cultural and family specifics? The absence of a father, an unwillingness to integrate, forced marriage, large families, etc. These are all social factors too. Remember that.

I agree – and this is what I was talking about. The environment has a huge impact on a person, and I’m not saying that absolves the person from their mistake, but it does mean that if you want to get to the roots of the problem or try and solve it, then simply longer sentences and bigger prisons is not going to work.

That is the key difference in how the left and the right (if you want to use generalisations as Browne does) approach the issue.

He now openly associates himself as a conservative – taking the path trod by Mad Mel Phillips et al.

I agree and disagree with you. While you are right on policy goals I think the narrative between the parties have been changing and is different on how to go about achieving those political goals. I actually did write an article on this a while ago and I think it still holds true. Have a look:here

When I mix my idioms like that my dual culture is betrayed. I, of course, meant “plughole”. You might point out that I am simply falling back on the old “I am a second generation immigrant, I went to a shit comp and had free school dinners, don’t you know” excuse. And you may well be right. So in the spirt of #22 I will stand up and declare that the buck stops with me. I am an ignoramus and I will try to do better next time.

There are many themes here but I am going to zoom in on just one. As I have grown older, I have come to question a lot of the ideas that I automatically lapped up from my circumstances, mentors, and peers.

I still identify most with the culture and weltenschauung of Labour, the working class, and the inner city. But this one idea I think is especially flawed and unhelpful:
“LEfties would quite rightly argue that most crime is usually the result of social circumstances (apart from a percentage that will always exist) in aggregate.”

This kind of wishy-washy bollocks is a recipe for policy paralysis.
“Most”, “usually”? I don’t think so.
“A lot, some” — ok, maybe.
That part of it can be “explained” by social circumstances.. yeah, ok, up to a point.
But what does one mean by “social circumstances” in a rich society when not having a tv is seen as a form of poverty. Does it extend to cultural and family specifics? The absence of a father, an unwillingness to integrate, forced marriage, large families, etc. These are all social factors too. Remember that.

Moreover, most victims are victims because they too happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong fucking time. Of what relevance is wishy-washy thinking to them?

Finally, one should not define a left-wing and right-wing state of mind according to whether one subscribes to a belief that human beings left to their own devices with no state apparatus will result in a Hobbesian life that is nasty brutish and short or one that basically sees humans as essentially good. Because the truth is really somewhere in between.

People, children included, need to take responsibility for their actions. Full fucking stop. However, unlike some uber-liberals, I also believe in redemption. That is important too.

And why would domestic violence be immune from your “social circumstances” rule?

It depends on the context. A leftie would never ever, ever excuse a man for raping or domestically abusing a woman. So this straw-man falls over for a start there.

In other contexts, the problem is how you approach the solution not the problem. The right’s answer to crime is bigger prisons and harsher sentences.

LEfties would quite rightly argue that most crime is usually the result of social circumstances (apart from a percentage that will always exist) in aggregate. For example, crime has been falling across the western world over the last decade as economic opportunities have improved and ecnomic well being has improved. It had nothing to do with harsher sentences.

So a leftie position would be that social circumstances have a bigger impact on crime stats than what the right would like to believe.

Browne is neither clever not very right on the issue. He just wants to have a go at the left, and for that reason has to erect a strawman to make an argument.

See Rumbold at #4.

You are over-personalising this, rather like American politics is overpersonalised.

Politics may be about absolutes but collective government is not. Indulgently divisive politics as your article skates close to championing ignores the real-world balances that have necessarily to be struck. From you position in the media you may well find this, ‘boring,’ but you would say that wouldn’t you? Divisive politics is a recipe for disenchantment.

Ignoring the need to strike balances and focussing only on the self-indulgent has been a Labour Party specialty since the 1930s but that doesn’t make it right. Whatever bad one could say about Tory governments they did not by and large have their own party and media baying for blood on a regular basis.

You may well pine for the absolute Sunny, but if voters are cleaving from Brown to Cameron does that not suggest that they have an outlook that is rather centrist? Enterianing or not.

I agree – but a political divide at atleast means you have two different competing visions of society to choose from. At least you have the choice, rather than having to choose between two spinmeisters desperately trying to make the other side look worse. That is the situation we have here, and look – the Americans are way more interested in their election.

Leon – regarding that point – I’m not going to deny that any politician has to appeal to a broad constituency by sometimes being centrist on certain issues.

But there are clear policy differences between Obama and McCain.

Can anyone name me clear policy differences between Cameron and Brown? and tell me why you’d accordingly vote for either?

Here you’re saying you want more division, more anger from the left yet over at LC you say:

There’s a tendency among the left to become outraged when a move to the middle is made – just look at the howls that greeted Obama when he went to the political centre. But to win elections this is what has to be done.

So you recognise the reason we don’t see any. It can look like that you either aren’t 100% sure of what you believe or worse, that you’ll say one thing to one audience and another to another one…

Most of the stories being fed to the media seem to be from the nameless. Michael White makes that point today in the Guardian.

A good example was Leon’s thread about Gordon Brown being under pressure from his own MPs. That line you may recall was fed to him by someone ‘in the know’.

It wasn’t ‘fed to me’ I asked them what they thought of the current situation with Brown and that was their reply, we then had a semi longish conversation about it, the Labour party and politics generally…

But its not working for the electorate though and like it or not that is what counts.

Decisions are made by those who show up.

This piece is the equivalent of watching the other team slip a chain of passes through your defences, and saying ‘if we did that it would be ruled offside. A bit of show-off fancy footwork doesn’t change the fact that they are cheating scum’.

You can’t be paralysed by respect for the other side, as Labour seem to be these days, but when they shoot and score, you can’t carry on pretending it didn’t happen.

Otherwise you totally lose the ability to communicate in terms anyone but a hardcore political fanboy would take seriously.

Oh but it does, or rather bloggers and journalists exist for the politicians. People disengaged a long time a go.

A good example was Leon’s thread about Gordon Brown being under pressure from his own MPs. That line you may recall was fed to him by someone ‘in the know’.

I still think the best political weapon the electorate has in our democracry, is not voting. You know the electorate will have won, when ‘the middle ground’ decides that voting should be compulsory and political parties should be funded by the taxpayer.