The best way to begin this blog, having been up more or less all night, is with the final sentence of my last post.
Finally there is the impact of UKIP. If tactical voting is used comprehensively it could well be that UKIP could fail to win a single seat, yet cause a political upset so unexpected as to make much that I have written above little more than hot air.
This is more or less what has happened. Votes for UKIP have prevented Labour making the gains predicted by the polls, all of which, by being just a point or two wrong predicted a hung parliament, without anyone predicting a Tory majority. But that was not all that caused the polls to be wrong, and so wrong that when the BBC/ITV exit poll was published all commentators and politicians, even Tories, doubted that it could be right. The other factor was the complete collapse of support for the Lib Dems.
The Lib Dems had made a success of being a safe haven for Tories who harked back to the pre-Thatcher era of one nation Conservatism in the south and to Labour supporters further north who felt Labour no longer looked after working class needs. Suddenly there was no need for them. The Tories extended a hand to the one nation lovers and Labour moved back towards the working class. Neither move was very significant, or even maybe sincere, but it was enough. A small party can fight on one front a bigger opponent and survive, but not on two fronts.
So all this talk of deals and a new politics of multi parties has gone poof in the night. We are back to two parties in England and more or less Wales, and that is 80% of the UK. Where things have changed ominously is that Scotland now speaks with a single united SNP voice and in Westminster that will be the voice of Alex Salmond.
Now for the bed of roses which may prove rather thorny. Cameron is set, at the time of writing, for a majority of three or four, but he has been used to governing with a majority of eighty. Yes it meant compromise in coalition, but once agreed the parliamentary position was formidable. A majority of three or so is almost certain to lead to political crisis and has always done so in the past. The problem is that while the opposition, which will be primarily Labour, the SNP and both the Unionist NI parties, backs the Tory position on the Union, it is opposed austerity and pro Europe. This will severely restrict the Tory ability to push through unpopular measures, hostility to which unites all the other parties in the Commons.