To think Tim Farron has awful timing?

[Flumpernickel]

Seriously? He chose today to publicly resign and have his little televised pity party?

Christ, I was relatively ok about the guy before this , but today was not the day!

2bees, he's resigning because he feels his faith has distracted from the important issues of the campaign - thanks to those who think they're more important. He doesn't think they're incompatible but any leader who becomes more newsworthy than the party should consider their position.

Noeuf.

I am done communicating with you, you are just goading deliberately now.

But I do think saying, very publicly, as a leader of a political party, that gay sex is a sin is reasonably incompatible with liberal values

I agree that his timing sucks, but didn't he repeatedly say during the election that he didn't believe gay sex was a 'sin'?

Any announcement or indeed any political act today will be seen as bad timing, given the way that it can be seen to bury bad news.

Tim Farron's departure as Liberal Democrat leader gives the party an opportunity to choose a better campaigner, which is needed as the Lib Dems are the most likely to be elected instead of Tories in some parts of the country. Personally either Jo Swinson or Norman Lamb would be my choice.

As for Brian Paddick, the man who was soft on drugs in Brixton when a policeman, and who knows police work on a day such as this, his timing was worse.

I wouldn't have used the word grasping, but it would be interesting to hear OP whether you now acknowledge that once Paddick had acted, Farron had no real choice other than going today. The content of the speech, fair enough, that was awful and his own fault. And he could hardly get away with not doing one at all. The timing, though, that's a different issue.

I think the two things are completely unrelated and therefore I don't think it's insensitive

2bees there's nothing in the statement about sexuality. As a pp has said look at his voting record.

I think the reality of rolling news is that more than one thing happens each day. I feel this is less awful than people obsessing about the love lives of celebrities when, say, sixty children are shot dead in Syria, or one child gets cholera every minute in Yemen, or a bomb goes off killing scores in Kabul.

Bad timing? The sooner he was gone the better. He lost the party's credibility and loads of votes too.

I dont know to be honest the dog. On reflection I can see it was the catalyst for the speedy resignation, but it still could and should have waited Imho, It's called taking the moral high ground, and at this point I cant really see what Farron had to lose by waiting until tomorrow.
His speech was dreadfully inappropriate and insensitive regardless of all the above.

Scribbles during the campaign he said they were totally compatible , now he admits they are not so . So when was he actually telling the truth? and whilst the majority of us expect politicians to lie the majority of the time , in my naivity I thought that lying was also supposed to be a sin. Perhaps in his religion only some lies are sins . .... ?

I agree that just because Paddick resigned didn't mean he needed to resign immediately.

Still confused about gay sex thing as he said he had no problem with it repeatedly. What have I missed?

If you think it should've waited OP, what you're saying is that he should've hung on while people accused him of using the tragedy to try and stay in post. Because that's absolutely what would have happened. Surely you can see that be couldn't possibly have countenanced that? It would have been awful.

Seriously, what do people think would be happening now if Farron hadn't resigned? What sort of questions would he be getting asked?

2bees The difficulty is that Tim Farron is an old-fashioned Lib Dem, for whom being a Lib Dim simply means that you don't force other people to live their life according to your beliefs. So FOR HIM there was no conflict between his political and personal beliefs because it didn't matter whether or not he personally believed gay marriage was sinful - he wouldn't inflict that belief on anyone else. That's not really good enough for the public nowadays - we expect the Lib Dem leader to be openly left-wing and progressive. So that's what's changed, I think - he's realised that although there's no conflict for HIM, there IS conflict for his party members - his beliefs clash with what people expect from his politics.

I think he was right to resign - unfortunately for him, the comments he made in the past will always come back to haunt him and he's not able to lead a party with such skeletons in his closet.

2bees my interpretation of what he said is that he doesn't think faith/leadership are incompatible by themselves but if you add in how the media portray the two, they become so. So not lying just admitting that the third part of that equation makes the whole thing untenable.

No, I really dont think that would have happened Dog, as the attention quite rightly would have remained on the Grenfell victims for today (hence why I hadnt heard about Paddick) . Tomorrow morning would have been an acceptable option.

Goo riddance. he should have left earlier. HI reason is twattish. couldn't he just have gone quietly?

I believe he was offered a church career.

And as for the "faithful to christ" bullshit. Well, dont get me started on that.

"Goo riddance. he should have left earlier. HI reason is twattish. couldn't he just have gone quietly? "

^this ^

The thought of it being used politicially when it's so raw is most upsetting.

But it IS political, unless you think it might have been a natural disaster? Lots of the residents are making the same political points.

I completely agree that the timing was dreadful but I very much suspect the whole thing was deliberately buried behind today's news.

It was only a matter of time before people noticed the similarity between Tim Farron's views on gay marriage, abortion etc and those of the DUP, who have been roundly and rightly condemned. I don't think it would suit the Lib Dems to have their leader trotting after the DUP on any controversial votes that come up as a consequence of a coalition/arrangement between the Tories/DUP.

He made the mistake of being a Christian.

Genuine question:

Does it help the victims of this awful thing that they are the only news that is reported today?

I'm surprised he said it today. He must have known that people would say he was trying to 'bury it'.

He's allowed his view. I would hope though that he would support gay marriage as it doesn't affect him personally and no one is 'forcing him to be gay and get married' IYSWIM.

Fast coming to the conclusion that I don't want to vote for any of these fucking people.