Pushed for time, but want to keep up-to-date with how the campaign’s going? Here are today’s must-reads ….

Nick Clegg spearheads election strategy of ‘northern offence, southern defence’ (Guardian)

Highlighting the launch of the party’s campaign in Watford, where the Lib Dems’ Sal Brinton is aiming to oust Labour. (You can donate to her campaign here).

The Guardian cannot resist a journalistic stand-by cliche, though, claiming the launch was “overshadowed” by Nick and Chris Huhne appearing “to suggest they had conditions for who they would support should there be a hung parliament.” Overshadowed is journalese for: this is the story we want to write.

Nick’s message was clear – we’ll hear much of it over the next four weeks:

We have been let down for 13 years by Labour. This country, Britain, has now had Tory or Labour governments for 65 years doing the same old thing, taking it in turns to make the same old mistakes over and over again. The real choice is between more of the same or real change, something different, from the Liberal Democrats.”

Cornwall ‘may be key to Tory and Lib Dem fortunes’ (BBC)

Highlighting the fact that while the south-west was an all-Tory zone only two decades ago, today it is the area with the highest concentration of Lib Dem-Tory contests, with Labour lanuishing in sixth place in last year’s European elections:

… Tory dominance started to crumble in 1992, but disaster really struck in 1997 when St Ives and South East Cornwall both fell to the Lib Dems and Labour snapped up Falmouth & Camborne. In 2005, the Liberal Democrats made a clean sweep of it by snatching Falmouth & Camborne from Labour’s Candy Atherton.

If the Lib Dems can successfully defend the south-west, the odds of the Tories gaining a majority will lengthen significantly.

The 2010 election offers a real opportunity for change (Independent leader)
Highlighting the six issues which will determine the paper’s endorsement at this election, the Indy reserves its praise for the Lib Dems:

That cuts in public spending will be needed is taken for granted by everyone, but only the Liberal Democrats have started to spell out what are bound to be unpopular measures. … The Liberal Democrats have nailed their [political] reformist colours to the mast; we await what the other parties have to say.”

The paper short of backing the party at this stage, though.

These are the three pieces which caught my eye – seen or heard anything else in today’s media to draw LDV readers’ attention to? Let us know in the comments thread.