Second guessing who is riding up (and who is slipping down) in politics is a subtler and trickier game than it sometimes looks. With elections this May, and not least the five-yearly ones for the European Parliament, speculation is already building. And the European elections operate of course on a 'proportional representation' system of voting, thus making it much easier than usual for smaller parties to take seats...
Far off on the right-hand side of the track, the Ukip horses are off, belting round the bend to whoops of delight from converts who love a good race to beat up the favourites. Few in the short term will stop them. Farage and his leather-backs can't get into Europe fast enough to get us out of Europe. Or so his backers believe.
But what's this? Another storm on the horizon, other deluge, another flood, and then another drought most probably. Food and raw materials prices unstable and challenging. Fossil fuels running out and carbon emissions going up giving us a headache. This is where and this is why the Green Party is gaining credibility and support. It is being seen increasingly as the party which understands the importance of the enviroment, and sees the way things will be, regardless of all attempts at business-as-usual.
Ukip is, metaphorically one for the road, a 'down-the-hatch' vote in memory of better times. Nothing wrong, one might think, in a bit of nostalgia? Truth is, though, there is little future in it, either. For the future is green, or it is nothing but a wasteland of squandered resources, and destructive competition between nation-states and peoples. Against such folly, including the ultimate folly of climate-denial, the Earth would surely be unforgiving.
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