Spin or spam? (From Stroud News and Journal)

Spin or spam?

ELECTIONEERING really gets my goat.

With the general election predicted for May it seems the gloves are coming off and the spin soon begins to sound like a scratched record.

The evasive double-talk and carefully couched phrases that imply promises but actually mean very little just rub me up the wrong way.

And, lucky me, newspapers, it seems, are seen as a valuable political tool to bludgeon your opponents with or promote your own greatness.

So when we check for an awaited e-mail, we now find our inbox full of political spam. I'm all for open democracy and getting your ideas out there.

But the sniping, name calling, point scoring waffle is undignified schoolyard tactics that rarely fails to come across as anything but pathetic.

A straightforward, honest and open explanation of your party's policies and why they are the best thing for the country would suffice.

And point out why an opposing policy won't work, if you like, but please keep the sneer and rhetorical kidney punch to yourself.

Of course there was a time when we knew what the parties stood for and they stuck to that.

But now it seems the fickle fellas will just tell us voters what they think we want to hear. Democratic that might be, but it does leave us wondering if they'll change tack again if the political winds start blowing in another direction.

Time was when politics was public service in its purest form and didn't have a reputation for grubbiness and a lack of trust.

So can you politicians out there please just look us in the eye, state your case, stick to your guns and leave off picking on the other guy.