Suddenly we were transported to fantasy land this month; to a country where Nigel Farage won a quarter of the vote in protest elections and it was said that David Cameron should ditch gay marriage and pull out of the EU without bothering with a referendum because, "as everyone knows", the Conservatives failed to win last time because "they weren't right-wing enough". How people believe as they want to…

Trying to work out what the public doesn't like about the European Union is hard

Our chief politicical commentator casts his eye over this week's Independent

The main story this week for journalists has been the Conservative decision to stage a case study in disunity - but is that what most interests the public?

The death of Margaret Thatcher prompted a final run-through of her contributions to the dictionary of quotations, or Wikiquote, as it is known. 'The New York Times' got her most famous words wrong (see no 7), but there was one saying that featured, in slightly different form, in several commentaries: that she regarded New Labour or Tony Blair as her greatest achievement. She never said it; nor did their supposed authors say any of these ...

The next election may be a contest to see who is more determined to lose

The New Zealand parliament broke into a traditional Maori love song after voting this month for same-sex marriage. My friend Tom Doran asked on Twitter what the House of Commons could sing when the Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Bill is passed. One person suggested, "All You Need is Love", which Tom rejected on the grounds that it is the Beatles' second-worst song. At which point, I started to compile this list…

The Tories will be also-rans in next year's European elections, but once reality dawns in 2015, it is Labour who will have most to worry about

Slum roots of the best PM we never had

As The Master said, the deficit is not about right versus left but right versus wrong