to think the Tories were deliberately rubbish and hoped to lose, in order to water down Brexit?

[nut8meg]

Their manifesto was so odd, completely the opposite of a manifesto that a party would offer if it wanted to win, with promises that nobody in their right mind would vote for such as making fox hunting legal (this would appeal to so few people but would put a greater majority off and is not exactly something which most people think is an important manifesto promise to keep).

All their other manifesto ideas were equally negative and odd, they weren't offering anything positive, just removing things from people (across the demographic spectrum) whilst promising nothing in return.

Then Theresa May's general performance during the campaign, not really behaviour that is conductive to getting votes.

Am I being unreasonable (and a bit conspiracy theorist ) to think that they ran a rubbish campaign so that they could water down Brexit and May is basically a patsy?

That's a really interesting suggestion actually. I think it's possible that Cameron/Osbornite Tory insiders allowed to hoist herself with her own rope.

Sounds possible. Something very strange happened there for sure.

Nothing seems impossible at the moment.

No, they were just incompetent. They've been this bad all along, it just hasn't been so public.

I have long hoped that the Tories would live up to their Machiavellian reputation and deliver some kind of Evil Plan about Not Brexit.

Fingers crossed that a hung parliament means a cross party alliance. It's only fair, right?

How could Brexit be any more watered down than it is? It's basically just the tantrum of a spoiled teenager trying to divorce his parents as it is (with as much consideration of consequences as that would entail)...