Sandlander

On this day one can only hope that Britain's Lib Dems remain confident enough to resist the entreaties of the Tories whose imbecile Eurosceptic blether seems to have been noted black on white at the behest of the shadow Foreign Minister. Whatever Cameron offers Clegg it will not be progress in the direction of electoral or constitutional reform. And as for the Conservative's blinkered jingoistic policy with regard to Europe, any tacit acceptance of it would put the Lib Dems beyond the pale for a generation!

Waiting for the Düsseldorf result.

In about half an hour from now (17:23 hrs.) there will be the first projections of the North Rhine-Westphalia state election results.

By all accounts the outcome could be as close as the British election was expected to be.

In the event that the right-of-centre coalition is defeated there will be serious problems for the national government led by Angela Merkel, since the CDU/CSU/FDP coalition will then no longer have the majority in the upper house of the German parliament.

The consequence of this, we are warned, is that the Bundeskanzlerin would become a lamed duck, unable to ensure consensus for controversial legislation.

British opponents of proportional representation will rub their hands and vaunt the merits of 'first past the post' elections. But if the NRW result goes against Merkel and Co it should not be seen as a failure of coalitions as a parliamentary model, but an inevitable side effect of bi-cameral rule.

Update: (18:06 hrs.) Based on exit polls the estimation is that the incumbents no longer have a governing majority. And the headline is the amazing score of the Green Party, who have will have double the number of seats in the new state legislature!

Mia san Mia! Mia san Meister!

About an hour ago the celebrations at Marienplatz reached their climax. There are times when there is an outright victor to be honoured, to be greeted with outpourings of joy, when heroes show their human side and sentimentality is nothing to be ashamed of. But such clarity is possibly reserved for contests of sporting, rather than poltical, character. I am pretty sure that the mood in Munich, where thousands welcomed home the Bayern München champions, was a hell of a lot mire fun than in Düsseldorf or London.