Danny Finkelstein’s Times column (£) today is typically smart. I doubt any leading political columnist in Britain enjoys paradox more than the Fink.
Consider this, he suggests: the flak the Lib Dems have taken for their reality-based flip-flop on tuition fees is, on the surface, a blessing for the Tories. But that masks another fact: the students and their cheerleaders aren’t upset with the Tories because, deep down, they expect them to be heartless, cut-throat bastards. Worse still, the coalition could reframe and reinforce that view: everything nice and cuddly will be due to the moderating Liberal Democrat influence; everything brutish and reactionary the proof that Tory blood still runs nasty. This may be unfair but that’s a different point entirely.
So far so easy. Then the Fink moves into provocative mode:
The latest vogue idea among party activists is for the party outside government to start working on distinctively Tory ideas that show what the party would do if it didn’t have to compromise with its partners.
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