Last year’s election may have felt like it settled a great deal, but the coming year may be dramatic with the rumbling tensions in British political life finally coming to resolution.
The European question will whip up the exotic menagerie that is the parliamentary Conservative Party and it remains to be seen whether David Cameron can tame their wild passions and avoid any fallout.
Referenda are not a moderate’s friend of course. Yes/No answers never capture nuance, especially when the arguments are uncertain and facts disputed. The campaigns are naturally polarising and too often fly in the face how we ought to try to conduct politics. Those who stand in the middle of the road have to work hard not to be run over.
The ongoing pantomime on the Labour front bench will decide if that party will remain in the main stream or become more of a protest movement. I won’t predict if Corbyn will stay or go, but the Labour Party have had quite a run on leadership selections: Brown in 2007; the wrong Miliband won in 2010, and 2015 gave us the Rt Hon Jeremy Corbyn Esq. Maybe the great survivor Ken Livingstone will be next.
Labour dramas may well be outdone by the US Election though. Donald Trump is starring in the contest the United States holds every four years to see who can embarrass the most powerful nation in the world in the shortest amount of time and with the largest amount of money. It is possible that the Republicans might see sense and pick someone like Marco Rubio to lose to Hillary Clinton. The young Senator is telegenic, eloquent, knowledgeable and only 40 years behind the times.
The only thing that’s certain this year is uncertainty. Let’s hope that events are benign.