I've always considered myself to be centre-left-wing if that makes any sense.
For many years I've held the belief that extreme left-wing and extreme right-wing are no different from one another.
My dad came from a country that suffered under fascists and then under people who called themselves communists. The communists at least provided free health care (to an extent) and universal education.
However, the brutality was there under both - though the communists made more of an effort to hide it - and in both cases, those at the top expended their efforts on staying at the top, building a personality cult and using that to control people.
I'm blethering on in this way to underline that I don't support Reform in any way and I think that Anne Widdecombe was misguided in allying herself with them - and I can't recall agreeing with her political views when she was a Conservative.
But - my God - she didn't deserve what happened to her and I find her death upsetting. Part of it is probably because I can relate to her, being an older woman living on my own now.
Those thugs calling themselves 'left-wing' and claiming to defend the weak are no bloody different from the blackshirts.
I don't know what we do about it and I'm hesitating even to post on here since I'm aware of how inarticulate I'm being.
I'll confess that I'm one of those who laughed when Farage had milkshake thrown over him. I was wrong.
I cannot stand the man - I really cannot. The problem is that the liquid could have been anything and if we justify doing that to Farage, we're justifying the ill treatment of and violence towards politicians in general.
I remember the furore when Prescott punched the arsehole who threw the egg at him. I recall watching the footage with my parents and my mum saying "When he felt the egg trickling down his face, he must have thought it was blood," and I'm convinced that she was right.
When Blair made his "Oh, it was just John..." comment, he was being a coward. Prescott had every right to defend himself from assault.
Right. I'm going to shut up now. I'm just very upset about what happened to Anne Widdecombe and now to the Australian lady.