There has been a fair bit of chat in recent weeks about the prospect of a televised leaders’ debate in the run-up to the next general election. This sort of chat always comes up in the run-up to any election, but there appears to be an extra momentum this time round.

It seems as though the promise by Sky News to televise a debate come what may — even if the debate was between tubs of lard — has forced everyone’s hand, broadcasters and political parties alike. It seems as though now it is going to happen, with the involvement of all the major broadcasters. It also appears as though the three main party leaders are on board (albeit with varying degrees of enthusiasm).

The end of the issue? Of course not. This is just the beginning of the matter. More details will need to be fleshed out. What format should such a debate take? Will there be a number of separate debates? And what about the role of smaller parties?

I am normally fairly ambivalent about calls for televised political debates. Those politicians who call for such a debate usually do so because they perceive that it would advantage them.

Someone like David Cameron will go for it because he is a confident performer, the momentum is behind him and the media appears to have declared him the winner already. Someone like Gordon Brown will reject it because he does not come across so well on television. This time he has been forced into it, partly because of Sky News’ promise to “empty chair” him if he didn’t, but also because refusing to appear would further the idea that Brown is a coward with poor leadership qualities.

The prospect of a televised political debate fills me with dread rather than excitement. I doubt it does much for democratic accountability. Part of me suspects that vain politicians just crave appearances on the television.

No doubt we will be served up a rather unedifying spectacle, like PMQs on steroids. I predict Punch and Judy politics a-plenty. Most likely, as with Question Time, it will be a platform for the most appalling demagoguery, complete with an audience that will clap like seals at any old nonsense.

Most of all, I think the idea of a leaders’ debate just misses the point. While it is useful to know what the major party leaders think, focusing on leaders too much is damaging to the health of our parliamentary democracy. Once again, there is a clamour to bring to Britain a feature of US politics which is a square peg in a round hole.

Televised debates are highly popular in the USA. But that is because the format is practically ready-made for the US political system. For one, the US system is a Presidential system, meaning that voters actually do elect the country’s leader. The US system is also a truly two-party system, with two Leviathans totally overshadowing any minority candidates. This makes it easy to adopt a one-on-one, head-to-head debating format.

Even though the televised debate is more-or-less a perfect fit for a US Presidential election, the format’s success is a matter for debate. In years gone by it may have provided some election-defining moments. But as I recall, the debates involving Barack Obama and John McCain, and Joe Biden and Sarah Palin, hardly set the world alight.

So what on earth makes anyone think that this gimmick will suit British politics? It seems like just another outcome of politicos’ obsession with America. It seems like the idea of someone who has mistaken his DVD box set of The West Wing for real pornography.

Our Parliamentary system doesn’t — or at least shouldn’t — place so much focus on party leaders. Very few voters will actually have any sort of say on who the Prime Minister is. I will have the option to vote for or against Gordon Brown, but only because I happen to live in his constituency of Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath. I will have no say whatsoever on David Cameron or Nick Clegg.

And what of the smaller parties? In the UK, broadcasters are required to be impartial in the run-up to an election, meaning that legally broadcasters will find it difficult to lock out the small parties. Even if these other parties have little or no chance of forming the government. Even if most viewers will not be as interested in hearing from these parties.

The most noise is being made by the SNP. They are threatening legal action if an SNP representative is unable to play a part in a televised leaders’ debate.

The SNP may have a point. Even though they have only a handful of MPs, and are only contesting seats in a portion of the UK, they have a lot of support in that portion. They are not a loony fringe party. They are in fact in government in the UK. Viewers north of the border will certainly be interested to hear what the SNP have to say in the run-up to the election.

At the same time, their presence may be a distraction from the real purpose of the debate, which is basically to watch the potential future Prime Ministers partake in a spot of verbal mud-wrestling. It is, after all, a “leaders’ debate”. Despite all his ambition, Alex Salmond is highly unlikely to be the next Prime Minister, as is Angus Robertson.

Yet, what if there is the prospect of a hung Parliament? The collapse in Labour support has not been met with a real surge in support for the Conservatives. With so many parties having moderate levels of support, it is conceivable that a party like the SNP could play a king-maker role.

There is no easy answer. This is the core problem with the idea of a televised debate. It might be good for a simple, true two party system such as the USA’s. But for the UK’s more subtle and diverse politics, it won’t fit quite so well.

I know that all politicos have a major boner for American politics and that this year is just one non-stop wet dream. But do our lot have to make their affection quite so blatant?

As Alex Massie noted a last week, at the Labour Party conference, Gordon Brown was setting himself up as the experienced man who can lead the country through these choppy waters. As he said, “This is no time for a novice. Zing!”

He is betting that, come the election, voters will choose “experience” over “change”. Does that sound familiar?

Today, David Cameron appeared to deliberately counter Gordon Brown’s line. He is “a man with a plan (on a canal in Panama)”. (Sorry to James Graham for stealing his joke.)

He continued by saying, “it’s not experience we need; it’s character and judgement.” He then did his best Bowie impression and used the word ‘change’ 20 times during his speech.

Do these guys really need to copy everything that happens in America? I mean, Gordon Brown’s wife was brought out in front of the Labour Conference as though she is a First Lady. David Cameron spent a minute or two talking about his wife (with a bit of cringe worthy Carry On-lite humour packaged with it), as though I give a monkey’s who his wife is.

Now correct me if I’m wrong, but I always had the impression that the job of a First Lady is to provide a kind of ceremonial role, waving at the crowds and the like, because the USA (and France, and wherever) doesn’t have a royal family to do all that sort of stuff. Well the UK does have a royal family to do all that sort of stuff! Besides, Carla Bruni they are not (despite what The Daily Mail tries to tell you.)

Meanwhile, David Cameron was doing that awful thing where he looked as though he was facing the wrong direction. At least this time the people over his shoulder were recognisable faces rather than unknown greasy pole climbers-in-waiting. Unfortunately, George Osborne looked like he was constantly giving David Cameron an evil laser death stare. Watch him in the videos and you’ll see what I mean.

Another amusing aside to the conferences is the BBC’s word clouds. I couldn’t help but notice that Gordon Brown — leader of the Labour Party which distrusts people so much that it wants to issue you with a biometric ID card if you want to so much as scratch your arse — mentioned the word “people” more than any other word.

David Cameron — leader of the Conservative Party that is supposed to hate big government — used the word, er, “government” more than any other word.

Meanwhile, Nick Clegg, leader of the Lib Dems — the party that is said to sit on the fence on every matter — used both words an equally high number of times. At least one of the parties is true to form.

I’m quite glad that the Lib Dems have been told off for their cold calling stunt. It’s difficult to imagine quite what was going through their minds when they came up with that one.

I am no fan of telephones at the best of times. In fact, I come close to detesting the things. Mike Smith had a brilliant rant about it a few months back that pretty much sums up my feelings.

As if it’s not bad enough that someone expects you to drop everything, some people have the audacity to do this with the aim of extracting pounds from your wallet. I will never forget the time I answered the phone only to be greeted with this almighty rude salutation, delivered in a gruff, hectoring manner: “This is just a survey, I am not trying to sell you anything. How many windows do you need double-glazed: two, three, four or the whole house?” I just love the fact that zero and even one were not options.

Others try getting you to spend half an hour answering tedious market research questions. Some despicable people even try to get you to vote for them!

I am quite disappointed in the Lib Dems. It has become a bit of a theme of this blog that I am disappointed in all of the parties and am considering not voting. As things stand, the Lib Dems are the only party that I would even consider voting. But their odd decision to interrupt people’s lives with a robotic version of Nick Clegg just makes me wonder what is going on with them.

What makes it all the worse is that you normally expect the Lib Dems to be dead against this sort of thing. They have pretty sound views on privacy and have campaigned in the past against cold callers. I think a lot of people who are members of the Lib Dems normally take a dim view of this sort of thing. It’s good to see that, for instance, Stephen Glenn has criticised the tactic and the people at Lib Dem Voice seem fairly unhappy about it as well.

These calls do invade your privacy, they are intrusive and annoying. Nowadays I do not answer the phone if the number is withheld unless I am expecting a phone call. If I have been at the receiving end of this phone call by a recorded Nick Clegg, I would probably decide not to vote for him.

In my previous post I wondered if Nick Clegg would do much to enthuse me. Well, in my view he’s got off to a good start.

He revealed on the radio that he doesn’t believe in God. What’s more, he seems to have a thoroughly sensible, tolerant approach to the whole religion issue.

What a refreshing thing to hear from a politician. It does often seem as though atheism or even agnosticism is one of the worst things a politician can be associated with among some circles. Tony Blair even seemed to think it was a liability to be the wrong type of Christian. C of E while PM, since resigning he has mysteriously become a Roman Catholic.

Paul Linford, for instance has said that Clegg’s non-belief is “certainly concerning for me as a Christian” (via Bob Piper). Never mind the millions of non-Christians in this country who have never seen a non-Christian PM! I wonder if he ever found Margaret Thatcher’s sex as concerning for him as a male.

In this supposedly tolerant society, I sometimes think we’d sooner see a three-legged Prime Minister than a non-church-goer — never mind a black or openly gay PM. I wonder how many leaders of the major parties historically have publicly stated that they don’t believe in God. I assume Nick Clegg must be among the first. Full credit to him for speaking the truth.

The second thing that has impressed me is the fact that he has enlisted Brian Eno to “reach out beyond the London beltway”. In particular, Eno is to advise the Lib Dems on how to appeal to young people.

This is good in two senses. Firstly, appealing to young people is good. One of the biggest crimes in the country today is to be a yoof, as you can see with the vilification of the hoodie, a convenient item of clothing.

Appealing to young people is a typical politician’s cliché. But this comes across to me as quite a serious attempt. Brian Eno is not some greasy pole-climbing politician looking to get good headlines in the Daily Mail.

The second sense in which is this good is… Brian Eno, man!

Brian Eno is 59, which has led some people to wonder if he is really the right person to appeal to youth. I’m 21, which is pretty young, although I guess I am not like most yoofs. But I think Brian Eno is great. The person who (as legend has it) invented ambient music has got to be awesome, right?

He has created some of the greatest pieces of music of the past thirty or forty years. A lot of young people respect this. I know I certainly do. Okay, there are various U2-related crimes, but that’s a tough gig. I mean, talk about polishing a turd!

Brian Eno should be respected for actually engaging his brain (one). He is the only pop musician I can think of who doesn’t just dribble out ignorance every time he opines about a topic other than music. In a world teeming with preening pricks like Bob Geldof and Bono, Brian Eno is a real breath of fresh air.

And, unlike Bob Geldof’s sojourn with the Conservatives (presumably David Cameron has some really nice biscuits and a good belly-rubbing technique), Eno’s association with the Lib Dems is principled. Remember Eno’s website from a couple of years back, Lib Dem This Time (rather broken-looking now)? Eno is also a long-standing supporter of electoral reform.

One other thing, and it’s related to what I said yesterday. It looks as though Nick Clegg has raised a few eyebrows by saying that he hasn’t heard of ‘Fairytale of New York’ and by citing a non-existent album (‘Changes’ by David Bowie) as his favourite.

It does seem a bit odd. But what if the poor guy just doesn’t like pop music? I have written before that I don’t understand why we expect politicians to know these things. Sure, most people keep tabs on pop music. But we are all different, and we all have different interests. Maybe Clegg’s “gaffes” are just down to the fact that he doesn’t waste time on trivia.

I’m glad I have ruled out becoming a politician in the future. If I did, I would no doubt be asked what my favourite film was. I’d have to answer, “I dunno, I don’t really watch films,” because I don’t really watch films. Then I’d be crucified by a media (and society?) that wants mine to be a mirror image of the median voter’s leisure tastes.

The Liberal Democrats are pretty much the only political party I would consider voting for (well, I voted for everyone by Labour in the local elections in May because I was feeling particularly anti-Labour at the time, but you know what I mean). So the change in leadership is of interest to me.

In years gone by I would have described myself as a supporter of the Lib Dems. I guess I still am. But I’ve not been quite as enthused over the past year or so.

I’m not exactly sure what this is down to. Menzies Campbell’s time as leader of the federal party? Nicol Stephen’s rather rudderless leadership of the Scottish Lib Dems? My increasingly apathetic stance towards party politics? A bit of all three I guess. It will be interesting to see if Nick Clegg can get me to sit up.

The leadership campaign has yet again highlighted the dire nature of political discourse at the moment.

I have already seen two people interpreting the close result as evidence that the Lib Dems are deeply divided. The result was indeed impressively close, but I don’t see what that has to do with anything. Any leadership election that doesn’t see one candidate getting 100% of the votes is evidence of a divided party. It doesn’t mean anything.

All of the parties have well known divisions anyway. Blairites and Brownites in Labour, Eurosceptics in the Conservatives, gradualists and fundamentalists in the SNP. You wouldn’t expect anything else. No doubt a truly undivided party would soon enough find itself being criticised for being filled with flip-flopping robotic career politicians.

The alternative to having a leadership election is to have a coronation. In that case, everyone would throw stones at the Lib Dems for not having a leadership election. Plus, from what I gather, Nick Clegg and Chris Huhne are actually rather similar ideologically. On this basis, you’d expect a close election.

Also, the bad side of the media is never too far away when it comes to the Lib Dems. There is an interesting post at The Yorksher Gob (via MatGB) on why it was a mistake to elect Nick Clegg. He was the media’s favourite, which means they can’t wait to crucify him.

It wouldn’t surprise me if some of those predictions come to fruition. The media has an agenda against the Liberal Democrats for some reason — probably because having a third party just makes issues so damn difficult to simplify everything into their favoured ‘he says’, ’she says’ format.

They spent years disseminating innuendos and speculations about Charles Kennedy’s drink problem. Then when the Lib Dems finally got rid of him? All of a sudden Charles Kennedy was the best leader since sliced bread, his colleagues knifed him in the back, the Lib Dems were the nasty party.

Before he became Lib Dem leader, Menzies Campbell was a well-respected ‘elder statesman’ figure. When he became leader? He was a dithering old pensioner who was practically unable to string a sentence together. Oh, and when they got rid of him on the back of relentless media criticism, once again the Lib Dems were the nasty party, unfaithful and disloyal.

It makes me despair. Tony Blair can dangerously erode our civil liberties and engage in an illegal, unjustified war that kills tens of thousands. Yet how is he presented by the media? Magical untouchable Teflon Tony! Meanwhile, Menzies Campbell was hounded out for being old.