Vote Paddick

A famous maxim goes: when faced with a crisis of two evils, go for neither. This basically means, there aren't always binary choices in life, but third options, usually involving the creation of hybrid values, sitting on fences, sitting on sidelines, doing nothing, having the best of both worlds, the worst of neither, but in the case of the London Mayoral elections, a much better third option, in the form of a person: Brian Paddick.

Some say that is the whole reason the Lib Dems were created, as a way to siphon our hatred for the two main parties; a haven for the disillusioned; a palace for the pragmatic, a lure for the liberal, an underground for the unopinionated. What good is a party like that, some may ask. And the answer is any good you want it to be. The true opposite of conservatism is liberalism. If anyone thinks the Liberal Democrats are confused, at least they're not left wing socialist capitalist neo-conservatives, like the party that is currently ruling us (or to put it more euphemistically, the party with its finger on the nuclear bomb launching button). At least the Liberal Democrats don't pretend that they're not confused.

That is why I'm going to vote for Paddick. (Yes, I know I am yet to find my polling card, but at least I know it's somewhere in the house). When I vote for Paddick, I'm not voting for a gay former policeman, as Sky News so professionally introduced him, but for the sensible choice, and if I have doubts about this on the day, I can at least rest assured that I'm not voting for Boris (which some Arabs pronounce 'Boorish') or Ken. A politician's job is to be pliable and irregular (and if we're living in a true democracy, to be a servant to the fickle masses), but also to act like a commissioning editor and give public opinion a little nudge. Who better to make sensible policies than someone who isn't Boris or Ken, someone from a party that is not retrograde or confused?

Some Muslims tell me it's 'haram' to vote a gay man into power, but those same Muslims have no qualms about voting womanisers, buffoons, adulterers, thieves and murderers into power.
Given that homosexuality is a much lesser sin than all of the above, Paddick ought to have the religious vote, too.