If the Mailometer is any guide (and I think it is) then Nicola Sturgeon has excited hitherto untroubled corners of the UK electorate's political libido. The more the Daily Mail gets annoyed at any even vaguely leftish politician, the more effective that person must surely be. By crikey, the paper has been letting the SNP leader have it with both barrels. "Is this the most dangerous woman in Britain?" it has asked. It has suggested a "SNP-Labour pact would spark the biggest constitutional crisis since the abdication of Edward VIII". There was much worse. On April 25th, it reproduced a "dominatrix painting" of Sturgeon that was "said to hang in her home".
At this point we will ask sensitive readers to turn the page lest they experience an attack of the vapours. All right? Have all the children been dispatched? It seems the painting – showing Ms Sturgeon brandishing a whip – hangs "where her husband cooks and cleans" (my italics). Dear Lord! Many awful things were said about Denis Thatcher, but nobody dared suggest he fried the sausages or wielded the Toilet Duck. The whole situation is positively perverted.
Last weekend, as Andrew Lloyd Webber rose to fret about the supposed impact of the coverage, the Mail printed a crude photo-montage of Ed Miliband as the Phantom of the Opera and Sturgeon as his compliant lover. (The fact that Christina is actually the victim in Lloyd Webber's musical seems to have passed the editors by.)
Much of this antagonism has been triggered by cold arithmetic. Despite appointing a personable new Scottish leader in Jim Murphy, the Labour party knows it is about to suffer hitherto unimaginable losses north of the border. Last week, a poll for STV suggested the SNP could win every seat in the country. That seems most unlikely, but there is every possibility the nationalists could poll more than 50 per cent of Scottish votes. To put this in perspective, no party has managed that feat across the whole United Kingdom since Stanley Baldwin’s Conservatives in 1931. The carefully constructed political fictions of Kim Jong-un are rarely so extreme.
Ms Sturgeon is riding the wave of history. The SNP lost the independence referendum vote in September, but it looks to have won the campaign. The mathematics don’t lie. A significant portion of the 55 per cent who voted against independence believes the nationalist party is likely to best defend Scottish interests within the union.
It would, however, be wrong to suggest that any old SNP journeyperson could have registered so strongly on the Mailometer. Polls conducted in the wake of the TV debates found Sturgeon scoring highly with voters throughout the UK. There is something about the SNP leader’s manner that sets her apart from the identikit blue-suited Oxbrigians on either side.
Fraser Nelson, editor of the rightwards-leaning Spectator magazine, put it well in an article titled (more than a little archly) "Has no one bothered to explain the basic rules of politics to Nicola Sturgeon?" He points out that she still attends political rallies. She pays attention to grass-roots members. She refuses to focus all attention on the tiny portion of swing voters who supposedly decide elections.
Nelson might also have added that she maintains reasonable degrees of civility when engaging with her political opponents. One is tempted to suggest that she is a new sort of politician. In fact, quite the reverse is the case. As the Spectator article rams home, Nicola Sturgeon has allowed herself to be a very old-fashioned sort of politician. Neither of the two largest UK parties has had a leader so in tune with town-hall politics since the early comb-over incarnation of Neil Kinnock.
At this point in the conversation, it is customary to remind listeners of the sad business that was Cleggmania. Following the debates in the last UK election, Nick Clegg found himself the most popular leader since Churchill. Ho-hum returns on election night and perceived breaking of manifesto promises soon propelled the Liberal Democrat leader into a political ditch from which he has yet to emerge.
Sturgeon is unlikely to suffer such a decline. A significant increase in seats looks inevitable. Moreover, as Mr Milliband seems serious in assertions that no formal coalition will take place between Labour and the SNP, the taint that so often poisons junior partners in such relationships will almost certainly be avoided. Of course, the Tories may rally and make such debates irrelevant. Either way, Sturgeon looks set to bother the Mailometer for years to come. Twitter: @DonaldClarke63