Twitter’s brilliant. This General Election has been made extraordinarily fun by being able to share what’s going on with the old Hive Mind, getting news within seconds from people in the heart of the action and generally mucking about being as silly as possible. Yesterday’s cries of, “Activate the Queen!” and this morning’s fantastic gag from @armyofdave says it all:

“Vince, could you just check these Budget figures for me, please?”
“George, this is a picture of a pony.”

Then there’s the more serious stuff, like spreading the word about the hideous failure of justice in Paul Chamber’s case, and Guardian editors quickly responded, using Twitter to get in touch with and extract a blog post from the man himself.

The Political Blogosphere is, like it or not, divided up along factional lines, into party political ‘swarms’. It’s rare to jump from one ‘swarm’ to another, with only a tiny minority joining up these swarms together by linking to each other. The BNP ‘swarm’ is almost entirely isolated from the rest of the political blogosphere, and curiously there are much more connections between Liberal and Conservative blogs than Liberal and Labour blogs. Curious that, isn’t it?

So the best thing about Twitter? There’s no such factional boundaries. Even if you don’t follow people who disagree with you, someone you DO follow will echo something they’ve said and you begin to build a picture of wide spectrum of opinion. For me, as a blogger, being able to hear people’s reactions and keep up to date with current events means I’m constantly refreshed and full of new ideas of topics to write about – at least for now. It’s not just me, either. Steve Bell, the Guardian’s cartoonist, has obviously been paying attention too.

I do hope I’ve not driven people mad with my abuse of Twitter over the last 5 days. I’m sure things will be returning to normal soon. You can find my Twitter stream here at http://twitter.com/charlottegore, and if you fancied joining the 1,229 people that seem perfectly content to tolerate my crap then, well, I can’t actually stop you.

Finally, if you’re already following me and you actually like it (what’s WRONG WITH YOU?) then do feel free to vote for @charlottegore at the House of Twits. They’re trying to create a chart of political twitterers. It’s pure willy waggling, of course, but being squeezed between Guido Fawkes and Iain Dale has brought out my competitive streak. I throw myself at your mercy!

As Labour disappear off into opposition ready to tear themselves apart, they’ve found themselves in agreement about one thing:

The Coalition isn’t the fault of all those people who voted Tory, giving them the 306 seats.

It’s not their own fault for running up a budget deficit of £175 billion and running a Government based on spin and celebrity, pandering to the The Sun and the Daily Mail on law and order and immigration, waging George Bush’s War on Terror here in the UK and, most unforgivably of all, treating Civil Liberties as something a ‘modern’ society doesn’t need. Nope, it’s not their own fault.

Who’s fault is the Coalition? That’s right: It’s the Liberal Democrats fault, you traitors! You liars! Obviously the Labour Party would never have compromised their principled objection to economic sanity by doing a deal with the Lib Dems, so that left the Lib Dems with the one option they were supposed to take: Don’t do the deal and help bring down the minority Tory Government within a few months. Then there’d be another election, Labour would be returned to power with a new leader and we’d all go back to living in a Progressive Paradise(tm)

You know, I’m looking at this narrative and wondering just how out of touch and crazy Labour really are likely to become. For all the trite talk of a “New Politics” this Coalition is exactly that. Partisan, tribal politics has been ditched in favour of compromise, negotiation and attempts at harmony.

Do Labour seriously think that the real people, the normal ordinary voters that don’t get quite so involved, will see more virtue in Labour’s principled objection to co-operation, or will they reward the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats for doing something no-one really believed possible?

The Lib Dems have played their hand extremely well. They’ve taken an opportunity to get a lot of their manifesto turned into real living Government policy, and in return they just had to avoid their instincts to become partisan bores about it.

I think history will show Labour to have been on the wrong side of this particular movement, no matter how confident they feel that others will share their tribalist dogma.

Okay so the deal is done, that’s it, we have a Coalition Government, David Cameron is Prime Minister and Nick Frickin’ Clegg is Deputy Prime Minister. Yes, really.

The manifesto, based on what the Guardian has revealed, is looking much, much tastier than I imagined we’d get from a Government of Britain. The Civil Liberties section looks especially good, including a ‘Freedom Bill’ or ‘Repeal Act’ (as we’d hoped). Looking forward to seeing the full detail about what that includes.

Bed now. Brain completely frazzled after these last 5 days. Trying to lower my own expectations, but the idea that this is going to be a pretty radical, reforming Government is back with a vengeance.

I note with some amusement that despite leaving the Lib Dems and trying to be an independent, non-partial blogger I’ve found myself accidentally becoming a Pro Government blogger – or perhaps the first Coalition blogger (Neither Tory nor Lib Dem, but supportive of the two working together). I’m not sure I like that. My objectivity is being compromised again, I can feel it.

Still, more on this tomorrow after I’ve slept, seen the proper details and begun forming a more rational opinion on the good and the bad.

Ultimately Labour has gone. I got my wish. I’m surprisingly happy.

Brown resigning as Prime Minister any minute. No ‘Plan B’ for the Lib Dems, so they’re going to take it or they’re the world’s stupidest politicians on the planet. Let’s assume that they’re not, that the coalition deal is just too damn tasty for them to throw away their toys and go sulk with Labour on the opposition benches.

ID Cards? Doomed. Digital Economy Bill? Doomed.

I said on Twitter that I’d have been a bit deflated if the Tories had won outright on Friday morning… but now? Now I’m quite excited. I’m actually… well… happy. What is this curious emotion? Happiness? It’s uncomfortable and odd and I don’t think I like it.

More later as and when we get some actual bloody facts out of anyone at all.

UPDATE: Brown has resigned. Shown the world his young boys, too, which was a surprise. An emotional ending for him. Sarah looked crushed and choked, Brown looked like the weight of the world was finally of his shoulders. Barnacle Brown joke can now be retired. All told I think Brown’s character arc for this series of Government has had a great finale, but lacked variety during the bulk of the show.

Back to business then… Lib Dem MPs and the Federal Executive now have a choice. They can join the Government, with cabinet posts and the £10k allowance and if we’re really really lucky there’ll be some kind of Freedom Bill or Great Repeal Act. Or they can throw it all away and bring about another General Election in a few months time, which they can’t afford.

Excruciating that it’s not a done deal yet.

A quick one this: It’s pretty obvious that this next Government needs to do some pretty brutal things in order to get the public books back into some semblance of sanity. The Tories, of course, needed to ‘decontaminate’ their brand because of the hatred they inspired in so many the last time they engaged in a similar exercise with the public finances. Do they really want to come back into power after 13 years away to deliver the sort of ‘savage’ cuts necessary?

I suspect they don’t. A Coalition Government gives the impression that they’re acting in the national interest, not party interest. “If it’s okay by the Lib Dems, it can’t be that bad, can it? It must be necessary, right?”

We’ll see if the Lib Dems make a big enough crowd for the Tories to hide safely in.