Democracy

Voting the other day was surprisingly quick. Usually there's at least a bit of a queue, but I put Do You Wanna Funk? on my ipod as I left the house, and it was just finishing as I let myself back in later. Good voting music:

I was amazed at the number of parties up for the European elections. There were loads along the lines of Libertas and UKIP. I assume they badly split the grumpy anti-Europe vote. I was impressed by the name choice of the Jury Team, who were presumably disappointed that Justice Squad is already taken; they were one of the few not to have bombarded me with leaflets covered with WWII iconography, so I don't know what they actually stand for, but I'm guessing it's an increase in costumed vigilantes. My favourite leaflet started "British MPs are badly failing the UK's animals!" which I thought was pleasantly unpredictable. That was for the Animals Count party, for which I would have voted if I had been going to choose a non-serious party. As it was I went for the Lib Dems. They're great at local politics, and put stuff through my door about tree-planting schemes and such all year round, plus although I don't care greatly about MPs' expenses I do like the fact that the Cambridge Lib Dem MP has claimed zero pounds of second-home expenses in the last three years, and just commutes to London, like a normal person. Plus the list of Lib Dem candidates for Europe included both women and people who sounded a bit foreign. Go Lib Dems!

The sad truth is that even though I'm an adult and supposed to know by now I really don't quite understand what European MPs do, let alone have an answer to the question of Europe. I envy people who have opinions on big issues at the drop of a hat, although obviously I also think slightly less of them. There are tons of really important things on which I don't yet have a proper opinion, like abortion, though I do know that I could never in a million years vote for someone who would reduce the legal ability of women to make their own minds up about this. Long may it remain not an electoral issue in the UK!