Is this the dirtiest electoral campaign yet?

[HappydaysArehere]

Is this the dirtiest electoral campaign yet? I feel it is and I've seen a few. What do you think?

Happy days. Well election are always dirty in the papers because they ruthlessly back the side they support.

This one may be dirtier than most because 5 parties have serious chance of influence. (it used to be just 2)

if it follows usual patterns 1 in 4 potential voters will ignore polling day.
I am suprised it is that high. But people have lost trust

I am trying to rise above those headlines and carefully placed photos in order to sway our perceptions. For the first time I am really concerned about the SNP who appears to being brought to the notice on a day to day basis by the Tory press. Had to laugh last night on Newsnight Michael Gove was asked if that was their tactic. He leans forward earnestly to deny this but immediately states that Nichola Sturgeon shone in the leaders debate. Do they really believe we are idiots?

Why are you 'concerned' about the snp?

Their not fascist lunatics like UKIP the Tories!

I feel that the SNP do not care about the UK. For that reason I do not trust their input into UK politics.

I think it's been a ruthlessly negative campaign from the Tories in particular. Their main message is that a labour government would create "chaos" and they are relentlessly sticking to it. It means that no real debate about policies has really got going. They haven't even engaged in defending their policy on non-doms today. They just released and edited video of Ed Balls and went "look, chaos!". It's getting right on my wick now. If they think it's a bad policy they should say why.

I'm finding the Tory tactic of trying to scare us with the snp 'menace' really, really annoying.
I'm finding the actual, real threat of the stuff the Tories will do if they get back in actually, properly horrifying. So when the Tory press try and frighten me with stories of what might happen if the snp gain leverage just utterly, totally irritating.

It got much dirtier today (Thurs 9) I suppose wanting to win is a drug.
Commonsense and decency gets left behind

I fear we are going down the negative campaigning of the American election. Desperate and unedifying assault on Ed M by the Tories, saying that he can't be trusted (with Defense) because he challenged his brother 5 years ago for labour leadership.

Haven't they got some real policies to campaign on, that's what it would be good to hear about ...

I agree... We are getting a presidential style campaign (and a dirty, negative one at that) despite the fact that this isn't a presidential race and leaders don't "win" elections here. The prime minister isn't what we vote for- we vote for our MPs, the Prime Minister is just the person who can gain the confidence of a majority of the MPs we elect. For a long time the two main parties have dominated meaning that one usually "wins" outright, this has led to the impression that the honour of being Prime Minister by rights belongs to the leader of the largest of those two parties after an election. This isn't the case if the leader of the largest party can't convince over half of the elected MPs to support them in a confidence vote.

Hear what you are saying Fuzzy. It is correct but most people vote for the party and not the candidate. Our area is a truly safe seat and the local mp didn't even respond to a problem that a family member presented. Most voters know very little about their MP and the government whips are there to support the party line. Of course marginal seats are probably another thing as are long serving MPs who have gained a good reputation.

Happy fyi Scotland is part of the UK and therefore the SNP would be a bit daft not to care about it.

Voting for parties rather than candidates is fine... I'll be voting for a party rather than the individual candidate. What you have to accept though is that you are voting for that party to represent your constituency not to run the country. It doesn't matter if the party you vote for wins the most votes or the most seats if they don't have the confidence of a parliamentary majority. Now that we are moving towards a multi-party system we have to accept that coalition or minority governments are likely here to stay. I think that's good for democracy too, it means the government has to negotiate policies and gain consensus rather than just issuing a three-line whip and knowing they'll get their way. The two main parties want us to believe that minority/coalition governments are bad for democracy or result in poor government. Just glancing around at the rest of the world will tell you that's bollocks.

Where's the start point for comparison?

It seems very tame and polite compared to the 1970s

If it is dirty its because its presumed to be close. It may not even be that close.

Have a look at this poster put out there by the Conservatives comparing Miliband to a stroke victim.
voxpoliticalonline.com/2015/04/30/sick-conservative-poster-compares-miliband-to-stroke-victim-mirror-online/
Pretty low even for them.

All top politics is dirty and devious. And not just at election time. You have to accept that the public are only being told a spun part of what really goes on Be sceptical and you may dig up some reality

Here's a link to a picture showing the Tory BBC QT plant and 'Business letter' supporter:

tinypic.com/view.php?pic=21ljt6v&s=8

The Tories have a history of dirty campaigns though - I remember the Tony Blair devil eyes one (1997?) And this one is very personal too - fair enough if they want to claim they have a better economic record than Labour, but the attacks on Ed Miliband stabbing his brother in the back just really pisses me off. Like most Tory politicians wouldn't sell their own grannies up the river if it meant them securing power!

I think it's desperation.

I wish politics was less 'look at how awful the other people are, vote for us because they are dreadful' and more 'this is what we are going to do, this is how we are going to do it, this is how we feel it will benefit the country'

It's like they think we are all so stupid that we couldn't listen to their policies, judge them and make a decision based on what we feel is likely to be best. We have to pick a camp to stand in and hurl our shit at the other camp.