Polly Toynbee says...

It's probably unrealistic to expect politicians/leaders to be able to make radical changes very quickly but I don't think it's unreasonable to expect them to stand by pledges that they've made before being elected.

Nick Clegg, for instance, pledged to abolish tuition fees. Whether you agree with tuition fees or not, I believe it was totally unprincipled of him to support substantially raising them.

President Obama said he would close Guantanamo and there is still no sign of this happening.

I am also disgusted at the widespread and increased use of drones during Obama's term of office. For me he has been a massive disappointment.

Is it possible to know too many American liberals?

Silly question. Scrub that.

I agree, eloethan. My disappointment lies in the same things with those two. I think I'm getting very cynical about politicians, but some of them seemed to actually have principles at one time. There seems to be less and less evidence of that now.

Nonu, I don't see it is possible to deny that Obama's racial heritage doesn't play an unpleasant part in some of the antagonism towards him. I agree with your point that we are all equal, but sadly not everyone shares that view, and denial of that takes us nowhere. I agree with others about drones etc, and he did promise to abolish Guantanamo didn't he. The US right wingers are as scary to me as the people they rage about.
Back to Polly's article - I don't accept the last government bankrupted the country. The money was invested in the country and that's what we need more of. I'm no economist but even I've noticed that all of Europe and the US have been hit by recession for which I don't see the last government to be totally responsible. We need to find a way forward that doesn't demonise chunks of our own society. I don't support folks who have a sense of entitlement that the country owes them a lifestyle they don't work for - and that includes multi nationals and the very rich, who avoid paying tax, as well as the much smaller problem of benefit fraud.

There is a very good John Lanchester article in the LRB this month of the extent of the banks' culpability in the financial crisis, with some interesting stuff about PPI.
www.lrb.co.uk/v35/n13/john-lanchester/are-we-having-fun-yet
I find it amazing that the ConDems and the press have managed to pin the blame for the global financial crisis on the last government and that Labour have not managed to get the truth across. Of course, they should have been tougher on the banking industry, but I don't think the other parties would have behaved differently.