Good morning and welcome to Daily View on this, the first day of the General Election.

As if we hadn’t all been at war footing for weeks anyway.

In history on April 6th, in 1869 celluloid was first patented, paving the way for commercial photography and cinematography. Every Youtube video you watch during the campaign will be thanks to the technology and techniques first pioneered on celluloid over 100 years ago.

On this day in 1895, Oscar Wilde was arrested for attempting to book into Chris Grayling’s B&B; in 1896, the first modern Olympic Games is held. It’s the day in 1917 when the United States declared war on Germany and the day in 1930 when Ghandi began the Salt Satyagraha which ultimately led to independence for India.

Today Rory Bremner turns 49 and Mylene Klaas turns 32 – my age.

2 Big Stories

Gordon Brown triggers general election

Most helpfully, the fact that Gordon Brown was planning to head off to see her Maj today to dissolve Parliament and trigger a general election was leaked to all the papers far enough in advance that they could run stories today, and not have to play catchup tomorrow.

Here’s the Guardian, who have also been leaked enough snippets of manifesto to get their clothespeg ready:

A draft of the manifesto seen by the Guardian pledges that an unprecedented fourth-term Labour government would be “bolder about the role of state intervention in markets” and deliver sweeping constitutional change. Failing police forces could be taken over by their neighbours under one radical proposal.

You’d have thought they wouldn’t want to mention the fact that there are any failing police forces after 13 years of glorious Labour rule. Or that any further constitutional change was necessary.

Rise of Lib Dems is worry for Cameron
For The Independent John Curtice reports:

The Liberal Democrats have edged up a point too since Vince Cable was widely thought to have emerged ahead in Channel 4’s Chancellors’ debate. The party is now at the 20 per cent mark for the first time since its party conference last September. Nick Clegg’s troops now look as though they will enter the election campaign in almost as strong a position as they started the 2005 contest.

Now all we have to do is spend the next four weeks making Cameron’s worry a reality.

2 Must-Read Blog Posts

What are other Liberal Democrat bloggers saying? Here are two posts that have caught the eye from the Liberal Democrat Blogs aggregator:

• Neil Stockley reveals the Lib Dem campaign narrative

The Lib Dems are using the archetype of “stopping the rot at the top”, inviting voters to cast a plague on both their houses – “they’re just as bad as each other”. This is the same narrative that the Liberals used in the 1960s and 1970s. In the 1979 general election campaign, for instance, David Steel framed Labour and the Tories as “two Conservative parties”, one a failed government, the other a reactionary alternative.

• Campaign Digest

– From the creator of Lib Dem Voice comes this handy little website that pays attention to the general election e-campaign, so that the rest of us can concentrate on getting leaflets out.

Spotted any other great posts in the last day from blogs that aren’t on the aggregator? Do post up a comment sharing them with us all.

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