I'm tempted by Nigel Farage !

Exactly rosesarered That is the way they seem to behave anyway.

The toy being a referendum on Europe.

It just might work....

As in 'give me my toy back or I will hit you and scream?'

If the "other" traditional political parties were worth anything at all then UKIP would be wasting their time wouldn't they? Nigel Farage would be a kind of Screaming Lord Sutch of 2014. But the other parties are totally rubbish and out of touch with ordinary people so UKIP is thriving. You really can't blame Nigel Farage can you?

I think perhaps if we all tried "to see politics through the eyes of a five year old" the world would be a far nicer place Tegan.

100 pages of embarrassment for him more likely

Is that what's called a supposition?

petallus - that's not the spririt is it! You can't say nothing just because it goes against the trend

I come at this from a neutral standpoint - I have nothing to gain or lose by the elections in the UK; I am happy, therefore, to call things as I see them. I also like to point out inconsistencies with reasoning ...

After all is said and done - the threads about UKIP are the longest running ones

HollyDaze I admire your efforts but trying to go against the trend of some threads (including this one) is just peeing in the wind .

I do agree with many of your posts.

100 pages of embarrassment for him more likely [and [with no manifesto means he doesn't have to be asked questions about it]. Just imagine if another party did that. It's politics seen through the eyes of a 5 year old imo .

I found it amusing that the usual 'they are a racist party' was thrown about - right up until a black man said he'd voted for UKIP and will vote for them again; a deathly silence fell over the audience lol Same thing happened last week when it was an Asian man; maybe the opposition spin machine is working well with some people ...

It also turned out that the UKIP manifesto was torn up by Farage as he referred to it as 100 pages of drivel. That's that question answered then

merlotgran

QuestionTime has got off to a hilarious start. Sexist comments from a footballer playing straight into UKIP's hands. Boos from the audience for his crass remark. Ha Ha.

UKIP bashing is so commonplace they don't even bother to find someone articulate enough to put his point across.....I don't even know what his point was.

I've only just watched it and when I saw him on the panel - my face looked like this - I wondered how well informed he was but sadly ...

Even more worrying: I found myself agreeing with Piers Morgan on some things

It's a worry that the right seem to be on the rise in Europe generally. In Germany one of the pro nazi candidates was elected, in Denmark the right were successful and so it goes. We need to remember that the right tend to rise alongside recessions.

I agree absolutely with your last paragraph Jess. The problem seems to me to be that people see politics and politicians as something apart, something they can't relate to, or get involved with.
I think Obama did reach out to the young to a certain extent, through social media. The conventional media certainly don't help by trivialising everything. It always makes me laugh that people say they don't like the way all politicians look and sound the same and then complain that Ed Miliband looks "weird".

I felt a teeny bit sorry for the footballer. He was trying to make the point that UKIP was seen as the lesser of the evils and completely messed it up. I assume he was there in the anticipation of a question about football??? (i turned off after 20 mins)
The UKIP rep was allowed to interrupt constantly - presume the voice in Dimbleby's ear was behind this, as he was just sitting there looking tired and vague and letting her interrupt both panellists and audience members. She reverted to being polite when the UKIP supporter spoke and addressed him as "sir" .
The only realistic way to keep UKIP out is for Labour to get an overall majority, which will need a bit more oomph from them. They need to mobilise the younger voters who have grown up in multi-ethnic UK and are not harking back to the golden age of the British Empire.

Nankate, you started this. Did you vote Ukip?

Thanks for that info, Jane. Hope they draw the boundary where Ukip were second. Durham and Darlington NHS is confusing enough, without joining us up for political reasons.
You do not need to start your own party. Just vote Green or NHA. They both oppose everything Ukip stand for, and will save the NHS.

QuestionTime has got off to a hilarious start. Sexist comments from a footballer playing straight into UKIP's hands. Boos from the audience for his crass remark. Ha Ha.

UKIP bashing is so commonplace they don't even bother to find someone articulate enough to put his point across.....I don't even know what his point was.

Good post Ana oh to be a few years younger!

Well, if it's that gruesome, perhaps some of the many Gransnetters who have become disillusioned with their previous parties of choice should start their own party. There's no point frantically decrying UKIP without offering a feasible alternative.

Yes UKIP holding the balance of power is a gruesome thought.

An awful lot of grass roots anti-UKIP stuff is circulating on social media including younger people that are having their political eyes opened for the first time. They have grown up in a time when politicians did not make openly racist, homophobic and misogynistic statements in public and they are shocked to the core that people are voting for those politicians.

Yet no matter how many times I make posts and give links showing that that behaviour is not peculiar to UKIP members, it seems to go unnoticed ...

I agree Jane, the rise of the far right is very worrying.

It would be more beneficial to ask why the far right is now popular - then see what can be done about it in a positive way rather than deriding those who voted for them (I'm not saying you are guilty of that, it is a suggestion in general).

^ I think the rise of the far right in Europe, of which UKIP is a part,^

Yet the chap from YouGov, on BBC news, described UKIP as centre-left of the right

No, but enough to hold the balance of power in a hung parliament.

Seats, perhaps - not an overall majority!