Pity the poor, picked on Kippers


I didn’t watch the opposition leaders’ debate on Thursday, but I’m guessing that it didn’t go so well for head Kipper Nigel Farage. I can tell this by the number of UKIPies whining about the “Left-leaning” bias of the studio audience. Here, for instance, is Salford UKIP’s moan. They complain that

Of the 200-strong audience, about 58 were Conservative or Ukip supporters while about 102 backed left-leaning parties – Labour, the Lib Dems, SNP, Plaid Cymru or the SNP. The rest – 40 – described themselves as undecided.

The Daily UKIP (Express) put it that 2/3rds of the audience supported left (ish, in the case of Labour) political parties because, scandalously, they had been recruited to be as close as possible to the political make up of the country as a whole. It seems no-one has told Nigel that he isn’t the most popular person in the country, the second coming of Clarkson, from whose fundament the sun will never set. Despite the horrendous bunch we’ve suffered for the last five years, the country is mostly to the left of Nige.

And if the anger against reality wasn’t enough, the numbers don’t even support the complaints anyway. This was the opposition leaders’ debate. 4/5ths of those leaders were from left(ish) leaning parties yet, only 2/3rds of the audience was to the left. Farage’s constituency (the purple gang are just Tories with higher blood pressure, after all) was over represented, as far as the parties in the room went.

If UKIP can’t handle the fact that a lot of people disagree with their Dear Leader, then perhaps they’re better off not getting any power.

(Full disclosure- I’m standing for Salford council as a Green in the Langworthy ward. You should vote for me. If you’re not in Langworthy, you should vote for your own Green candidate as a proxy way of voting for me. :-P)