I agree with you. The tragedy of the Nationalist Party is that it has no idea how to present a united front, and worse still, it presents the bickering factions as some kind of virtue: how diversity of opinion is “allowed”. I think Simon Busuttil used that very word last night, if I heard correctly.

Allowed? Diversity of opinion simply is. But you have diverse opinions in private, avoid locking horns, then present a united front in public. That’s how it’s done. Nobody wants to vote for a party that looks like a sack of weasels biting each other.

As it happened, Daphne, it hasn’t been a week since this conversation and the PN has already split in two right down the middle over the already-decided gay marriage issue.

It’s pathetic to watch them bickering, uttering stupidities and tripping over their own shoelaces at this point, while the corruption and real problems go on.

Maybe it’s because you want to be free to diss me on Facebook without showing your audience that you’re desperate to engage with me directly?

I have no time for this kind of person, I’m sorry.

You’re a lawyer. You know the law. Candidates who stand for election under X party banner are candidates of X party, and nothing else.

The Courts of Justice have ruled already on this matter, not that it was necessary, since the matter was clear.

Some people may have thought they were voting for PD candidates, but they were wrong, because there was no PARTIT DEMOKRATIKU on the list. The fact that you might believe Father Christmas is coming down your chimney does not mean that he is.

When I wrote (repeatedly since 2008) that coalitions before a general election are not possible, I knew what I was saying, despite being pilloried, criticised and contradicted by AD in 2008 and brushed off this year and several times in between. But no, they are not possible.

And that is exactly why the ‘orange people’ stood as PN candidates and also why AD refused to join in.

Yes in all legal matters they are still PN candidates, but voters did not just vote for legal matters. If their intention was that they truly wanted a PN government without any doubt, they would have voted any of the other numerous PN candidates on the 10th district. There is a little bit of a statement there – the historic loyalty base of PN (and I bet also PL) has been eroded.

While there are numerous voters who chose Marlene Farrugia as a PN Candidate, there is also a number who voted for her as a PD candidate due to the poor fielding of candidates on the 10th district from both parties, however I’m betting the largest number voted simply because she is Marlene Farrugi. And yet she is still an unknown quantity among PN voters. Is she going to be another Joe Grima? Has she really found her home in PN?

What is the difference in practical matters? None. In terms of how you interpret it? There are quite a few: maybe it’s time for PN to start fielding better homegrown candidates, or maybe the situation for PN is rather dire, because on their own steam alone they might have lost by a wider margin – and ignoring it might spell even further disaster down the line unless they course correct. From the post-mortems alone they seem to be completely oblivious on why they lost, and they will never fix it if they don’t start addressing the root causes.

Not defending Musumeci, but this is a bit of an elephant in the room everyone PN is avoiding especially because PL use it to gloat.

And while ‘Nazzjonalist’ (or ‘Laburist’) is often used as shorthand for party supporters who would never dream of voting any other party than the one they are support, he is probably referring to Nationalist leaning voters who while they couldn’t get themselves to vote Labour. Voters who decided the middle road of ‘kind-of-voting-PN-but-not’ PD option because they don’t feel the party is doing a good job and who have been alienated by the refusal of the party to grow but they cannot bear to vote Labour’s corruption into government.

Is Musumeci right? We can never know for sure as this was a mind-frame taken to the ballot and probably has changed in many since the chips have fallen as they have.

People who put Malta and the Maltese first and foremost and stand up to corruption at great sacrifice. I would have given them my No. 1 hands down had they come out on my district.

The result speaks for itself Mr. Musumeci. Nationalists voted for them and they got elected, but labourites did not vote for Jeffrey Pullicino Orlando.

On which social issues is the Nationalist Party conservative? Please explain. Because I write about politics for a living, and I don’t see any issues on which the Nationalist Party is conservative. Rather the opposite.

No matter that I continued on to Nationalist candidates for strategy’s sake, now clearly in vain. I don’t feel represented by the conservative Nationalist Party and while the Farrugia/Farrugia dichotomy is neither here nor there on many issues close to my heart, they are much closer than the PN on many others.

I seriously doubt that the PN can remain so conservative on core social issues and ever again truly represent a majority in this country. They either need to quickly evolve with the times or hope against hope for a successful coalition.