Just whom will the Lib Dems work with, then?

Two noteworthy entries, today, in the will-they-won’t-they game of coalition government. The first from Nick Clegg in the Sunday Times:

“You can’t have Gordon Brown squatting in No 10 just because of the irrational idiosyncrasies of our electoral system.”

And the second from Paddy Ashdown speaking to the People:

“Nick Clegg cannot work with David Cameron … We could not go into a coalition with the Tories, it wouldn’t work.”

So, assuming both are true, it sounds as though Clegg would only work with a Labour party headed by someone other than Brown. But don’t count on it. I, for one, think it’s unlikely that Clegg will prop up an unpopular governing party – and, as I suggested a week or so ago, there’s enough political overlap between Clegg and the Tories to make a Lib-Con alliance a distinct possiblity. There would be difficulties, sure. But, on paper, they’re barely more insurmoutable than those between Labour and the Lib Dems.