I feel betrayed.

Regardless of what you'll say about attempting to mitigate the effects of the the tories, that is how I feel.

The libdems are sullied by their association with the tories

This is the problem though--Clegg said that if he didn't win, he'd work for the party with the most votes and the most seats.

He kept that promise. Arguably, he came close to breaking it when the Parliamentary party insisted he find out what Labour would offer.

I, genuinely, am baffled that anyone paying any attention to the campaign and him saying that didn't expect the Tories to be the party with the most votes and the most seats.

Not talking to them would've been a clear, explicit, broken promise. Not trying to govern with them would've been to throw away all hope of ever being taken seriously ever again. Not talking to them would've been a statement that a) the LDs aren't serious and there's no point in their policies at all and b) electoral reform would inevitably lock the Tories out forever and therefore they're right to oppose it,that PR would make the country less, not more, democratic.

I fundamentally disagree with the idea of that.

the shit that the tories are dumping all over us is staining the the libdems.

Overwhelmingly, "the shit" is caused by spending cuts and tax rises. All three parties were committed to both of these this Parliament. The Govt has ended up with a position closer to what the Lib Dems said they were going to do than what the Tories wanted.

Labour fucked the economy up, and were spending more money than they were taking in tax revenue even before their failure to regulate financial services or listen tot eh clear, explicit warnings blew up in their faces. The 2005 LD manifesto was committed to deficit reduction, that was under Charles Kennedy.

Most of "the shit being dumped on us" is Labour's mess. Am I happy that it's Tories making lots of the choices necessary for it to be cleared up? No.

Would I be making cuts of a similar level myself? Yes. Different cuts, hopefully, done better, but they'd still be needed. The Govt will still be spending more in2015 than it did last year, despite all the cuts.

That's scary.

I don't know what the solution is. I don't know how to best rule the country or how to best reform the voting system.

No one does. What we're getting isn't my ideal solution either.

But I do know that change is needed, and a change that crucially gives voters real power and allows for new groups and parties to emerge without electoral pacts and forced mergers is essential for changes to actually happen.

I also know I never again want a single party in Govt on its own for more than a decade.

Look back at what Brown was saying about the economy, prudence, house price bubbles, etc in the late 1990s, then look at what he actually did in the late 2000s. Power corrupted, he became blind to what he was doing.

The system is at fault with that--winner takes all creates systemic blindness. We have to move away from that.

The LDs are, currently, the only vehicle available to take us in the right direction. With AV and STV for the Lords, the Greens and even the Cooperative become viable again. That'll allow for genuine choices.

Until we've got them, the least worst option is to push for more change from within. It's just really horrible trying, hoping, that they'll stop fucking up and start getting it right.