What is Simon Jenkins for?

Actually, I have a lot of time for him: an excellent and genuinely rounded polemicist, he writes like a dream, and has long championed decentralisation as vital to the restoration of civic life to our communities.

But he has, has always had, a blind spot when it comes to the Liberal Democrats and our predecessor parties - he just does not want us to exist, and today he takes great pleasure in elaborating on this aversion. Why he wants the Lib Dems, and our 26% of the vote, just to vanish is hard to say. After all, anyone who believes in the transformative value of competition should surely welcome a plurality of rival political parties. It’s unlikely any individual will agree wholly with what any one of them says - certainly I don’t agree with all Liberal Democrat policy.

But those of us who believe in the importance of political activism, and the need to engage with our governing institutions, choose a party closest to our views, and recognise we’ll be travelling in the same direction, even if it’s sometimes along parallel lines.

It’s a shame Simon Jenkins hasn’t used his scalpel-sharp intelligence to mount a more interesting critique of the Lib Dems - because there is one to be had, and many of us engage in it, usually behind closed doors, sometimes in public.

As someone on the socially and economically liberal wing of the party, I’d like to see the Lib Dems allow individuals the freedom to lead their own lives. This means putting more trust in the free market, which is usually better than government at reflecting the wishes and needs of individuals. And it means not legislating to outlaw behaviour which offends but does not harm others.

Many in the party will disagree with my prescription. I have no doubt that if we can avoid the temptation to mud-sling (tainting the other side as either ‘Thatcherite’ or ‘Socialist’, according to taste, is never constructive) we can reach an accommodation. That, after all, is the function and value of coming together as a political party.

If the Tories can contain both Edward Leigh and John Bercow, and the Labour Party both Dennis Skinner and David Miliband, I see no reason why the Lib Dems can’t benefit from the talents of both Simon Hughes and David Laws.

Mr Jenkins may feel this compromise results in “a susurration of platitudes”. Certainly that’s the risk, one which applies to all other parties. The alternative is to sit on the sidelines, safely pontificating from the berth of a well-upholstered desk in Faringdon Road or Wapping, and never troubling to get your hands dirty.

And of course it’s not only the Lib Dems who are quite capable of saying different things in different places - that pure-as-the-driven-snow ideologue Mr Jenkins has form.

The Flaw of Jenkins' Ire

Simon Jenkins is in good trenchant form in today's Grauniad on Trident, but see if you can spot the logical fallacy in his opening paragraph:

I can hardly believe that a majority of British MPs will tonight vote to renew the British nuclear deterrent. Almost all of them, of all parties, know in their heads that it makes no sense. They lack the guts to say so, Labour MPs because they want jobs under Gordon Brown, Conservatives because they love whizzbangs and want to embarrass Tony Blair by keeping him in power, for reasons that pass comprehension.

He cites, "of all parties", but names and shames only two. I wonder why that might be?

Not because Mr Jenkins cannot find it in himself to agree with (or even mention) the Lib Dem position, is it?

In the gutter, looking up at the Stars & Stripes

When Simon Jenkins is good, he’s very, very good. Today is not one of his better days.

He’s posted to thegrauniad’s Comment Is Free a provocatively controversial article titled, ‘Bad at war, good at democracy’, which is deliberately aimed at getting a rise from lily-livered liberals like me. So here goes.

The following passage gives the flavour of Mr Jenkins’ glib assertions argument:

“Every time I visit America at election time I am left exhilarated by the sheer, pulverising potency of its democracy. … Yet ABC news this morning could announce judgment day with the downbeat message that it was "the nastiest mid-term election in history."

“Nasty is right. Within two minutes of turning on my television I hear "Andrew Cuomo is lying", Bob Menendez is supported by kickback hoodlums, worst calumny of all, Thomas Kean "supports George Bush". Almost everyone is in favour of killing babies, rupturing stem cells and torturing Iraqis. The corridors of power are awash in corruption, adultery, mendacity and sin. The torrent of abuse is relentless and, to those used to the bland hustings of European oligarchy, gloriously refreshing.

“Above all the negativity is good. The Karl Rove strategy of identifying electoral difference rather than consensus inflames democratic choice as it should be inflamed. Voters cannot make that choice if, as increasingly in Europe, candidates are bland mirrors of each other. … I love it.”

All of which OTT rhetoric conveys a dismal view of politics, in which the only honest arguments are those which have been amped-up to the max; where simplistic, reductive binary politics rule; where cheap tribal loyalties trump genuine co-operation when common agreement exists; where personality flaws are exaggerated wildly to distract from policy issues which matter a damn; and in which intelligent civic discourse is replaced by proud-to-be-ignorant shock-jock rants which demean us all.

The campaign ads which Mr Jenkins lauds don’t set out to enlighten, inform or inspire: their job is to confuse, panic and rile. The best arguments - the most spine-tingling rhetoric - are imbued with passion, not anger; are truthful, not warped; are authentic, not contrived.

Few of us reach such dizzy heights - but we can aspire, can’t we? “A man’s reach should exceed his grasp, or what’s a heaven for?” Do we really have to settle for Mr Jenkins’ conclusion that politics is a shitty business so we should all get down and dirty in the gutter?

Simon Jenkins: writing with forked pen

As the voice of Liberal England, Jonathan Calder, noted a couple of days ago , Simon Jenkins appears charmingly content to fit his voice to his readership. On Wednesday, he biffed Blair for giving parents some say in their kids’ education:

The education white paper offers a vision of a "parent-led" state secondary-school system. Its key institution is the "self-governing school free to parents", a copy of the Tories' grant-maintained school that Labour once derided. Parents will be able to control a school's "ethos and individualism". As one parent briskly put it to me, "We can keep out the blacks."… Most parents cannot and do not want to roam the country in search of the "school of their choice", even if the transport system could stand the strain. They want the school closest to where they live to be an excellent one, period.

Of course, the best state schools already have a pretty effective racial screening process: it’s called the housing market, and it means that the poorer communities too often don’t get a look in.

And of course parents would prefer their local school “to be an excellent one, period”. Who knows, though, they might even prefer the option of two excellent local schools offering different curriculums, a different ethos, different extra-curricular activities, etc.

Perhaps Mr Jenkins doesn’t feel parents should bother their little heads with such minor concerns?

But all this then made for a bizarre experience today to read Mr Jenkins’s article for The Spectator, headlined Independence for Oxford. Here we read:

The government last week proposed what is a de facto voucher scheme for English secondary schools. They can be self-governing institutions with the freedom to determine their ethos and accept [financial] contributions from parents and others. Oxford would be no different in principle.

So let me get this straight, Mr Jenkins: you are happy to champion independence for educational institutions which are free to determine their own futures when writing for The Spectator – but equally happy to diss it as terrible idea when writing for The Guardian? It's one way of achieving balance, I guess.