Nick Spencer highlights some differences in how we handle ‘non-belief’ today.

The truth behind Nick Clegg’s vacillation [about his atheism], Tony Blair’s silence, and the reason why both are so different from Clement Attlee’s abrasive, monosyllabic honesty, has much more to do with our broader political culture.

Growing religious illiteracy, fear of religious violence and the media pressures that have turned election campaigns into minutely choreographed tours of duty have forced a crushing blandness on our party leaders, draining them of serious personal opinions that might offend voters. As part of that trend, we are seemingly incapable of grasping the fact that public servants are driven by private motivations. Because they are there to serve the universal public good, we seem to believe that they must be driven by universally acceptable public beliefs.

But people don’t work like that. Every belief is a belief in something and not in something else.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/belief/2010/may/05/clegg-atheism-attlee