I like Nick Clegg

Well that got you reading, at least. I feel that I should qualify that a little, however.

I think Nick Clegg is a great speaker, a really personable talker, and someone who could be a wonderful politician. Unfortunately, the world has not been nice to him.

The leaders debate, before the last election, he won hands down. He was clearly the most reasonable and sane of them all, which is why he attracted a lot of attention.

However, he believes in coalition, because that is at the core of their politics. He entered into a coalition with a firm belief that he could make it work.

He failed, probably due to naivety more than anything else. He ended up dealing with David Cameron, who was in no mood to compromise, and he has not been able to use his coalition position to do anything at all really. He has been outmaneuvered by Cameron, and has ended up supporting a minority government who have policies that his party opposes. What is more, he has ended up being the blame takers for everything, which is exactly what the Tories wanted.

His apology this week has been rather dismissed, because he apologised for making a commitment that he couldn't keep. He should have apologised for not keeping the commitment, but he didn't, and he should know that in coalition he will not be able to keep all of his promises. Or, in fact, any of them.

But despite this, I like Nick Clegg.The problem is, we lack any decent politicians at the moment. Cameron is an arrogant prat, who has shown that he is in power to help the rich and squeeze the poor. If he were to do the two things he should - taxing the rich, and regulating the banks - he would be able to reverse all of the cuts he has made. Of course he won't because he does not believe in supporting the poor, just the rich. For this, I hold him as contemptible.

Ed Milliband is completely unbelieveable as a leader of the country. In fact, I struggle to remember his name, he is so forgettable. The problem is that there are no others senior members in the party who could lead, and this is the core problem with Labour at the moment. I know that others will not agree, but I think that Gordon Brown was the only person who could have lead this country out of recession. Doing that was not going to be popular, but necessary.

So against the opposition, I think Nick Clegg is the most likeable of the main party leaders. And this is why, many years ago, I went a different way - I support and am a member of the Green Party. One major reason is that I do not think that economics should be the core decider in politics. I believe that we need to get away from the Left/Right division and follow something different.

Politics - especially party and national politics - should be about making things better for everyone. It should be about using the power that you have to make the country the best one for everyone. Exactly what that means is a case for argument. But it seems that the last 10 years or so we have had very partisan politics, and we have damaged our country in doing so.

I believe - and this summer of sport has encouraged this - that we can be a great country. What we need is politicians who can make this happen, not line their own pockets.