Political parties are the most ungrateful entities in the known world—with the salient exception of children. Thus the coalition passed its 100 days with high public ratings and a chorus of disapproval from within the two parties. The more the public settles into a life with the ying-yang government, the more insistent the sniping at Westminster.

Some Lib Dem activists are planning to use their conference to urge members not to send their children to one of Michael Gove’s promised new free schools. So we will have a boycott preceding the arrival of the thing being boycotted.

Meanwhile unquiet Tory souls, like the renegade David Davis, sneer at the Brokeback Mountain-style coupling of Clegg and Cameron, with the sinuous inference that it is an unnatural alliance and not good for the wholesome Tory community.

How strong are the detractors’ arguments? Underlying the Lib Dem disagreements is the unresolved question of