Political engagement

I've just been watching Question Time - one of the television highlights of the week. Amazed to hear the level of congratulation from some members of the audience, and self congratulation from Douglas Alexander, the Labour politician in attendance, about the G8 discussing the world food crisis.

Why should they deserve even the slightest bit of praise for that? They are politicians of the world’s richest countries; it is their job to discuss these issues. If they solved them they would deserve some credit. Talk about setting the benchmark low for political achievements.

It strikes me as being as damning about the level of engagement and expectation of the public with politics and its puppets as typical election turnouts. The former certainly helps explain the latter: if you are only voting for which face is going to turn up to a conference and talk about something (without making any progress towards actually doing anything useful, you understand) then why bother taking the time out of your day?

It isn’t quite as simple as that, of course. Either that or I am more optimistic than many. I am enormously frustrated by politics and the inability of politicians to resolve the problems that face them. But it doesn’t stop me being interested in it.