Author Archives: Simon Gilbert

#NewMembersDay Why I joined the Liberal Democrats #5

By Simon Gilbert | Wed 13th May 2015 - 6:55 pm

The weekend after the election I surveyed my generous Surrey garden that I have acquired despite my Georgist Liberal views and decided that, partly in the spirit of national austerity, and mostly as the previous gardener had given up this commission, I would mow the lawn myself.

I started in the middle and mowed longitudinal strips up and down the lawn. After the first few lengths of concentrated mowing I took a step back to admire my progress and was shocked to find the expected pleasing straight lines were in fact ugly wavy wobbles.

Of course many of you will be thinking what I was thinking, that this is an obvious allegory for the Liberal Democrats in recent years. You see there is great temptation when mowing to look down at the line of the previous pass, and to follow a path with the cut lawn directly to the left and the unmown lawn directly to the right. This feels good at the time yet is ultimately unproductive. The key to a straight lawn is to ignore what is going on to the left and right of you, but to travel towards a fixed point in the distance, a strategy that will happily lead to a lawn to be proud of!

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