"Liberal Democrats freed from rocks"

From the BBC:

Political engineers in Glasgow say they have succeeded in lifting the Liberal Democrat party free of rocks, 20 months after it slumped in the opinion polls.

Efforts to right the party, one of the largest and most daunting salvage operations ever undertaken, are expected to last up to 12 months. The Liberal Democrats have now been detached from their core policies and principles and moved on to a vague platform constructed on platitudes, officials said.

Thirty-two Liberal Democrat MPs lost their seats when the party ran aground in the 2010 General Election. The bodies of two of those have never been found. There are hopes that they may be located during the party's annual conference, although officials said on Monday there was no sign of them so far.

Engineers have never tried to salvage such a huge party so close to a General Election. Experts said the economic and political conditions had mostly been right for the attempt, but the operation had to be delayed by three hours because of an overnight storm between Nick Clegg and Vince Cable.