You also have to wonder what the LibDems think they're doing, because there's really no way this could ever reflect well on them...
I'm not sure that the Lib Dems collectively think anything at the moment...
The Lib Dem leadership is, I think, doing this because most of them actually agree with what Lansley wanted to do. They seem to have a bizarre desire to turn the Lib Dems into our very own FDP, which might suggest that they haven't looked at many German opinion polls recently. (And I suspect most German FDP supporters would be Tories in the UK anyway.)
A large part of the Lib Dem rank and file is clearly opposed to the bill and has twice produced conference votes against it. One thing this has exposed is that the Lib Dems' claim to have more democratic decision making processes than the other parties is dubious.
That leaves the parliamentarians. Some of them will be in the leadership's camp anyway, but certainly not all of them, so the mystery for me is why the rebellions have been so small. I suppose the likes of Farron and Hughes, who are supposedly standard bearers for the left, have positions which make it hard for them to rebel, but in that case they ought to have considered resigning them.
