So, this morning Cif posted an open thread inviting you, Guardian readers and users, to share your views with us about who or what the Guardian should support in the election editorial that will be published sometime before Thursday 6 May. The purpose of this "have your say" was to open up, as far as we could, an important bit of Guardian tradition: the editor's meeting at which all Guardian journalists can air their views of what the leader line should be, before the leader writers retire to some hallowed inner sanctum to compose whatever oracular statement the Guardian finally makes on the subject.

Your response was spectacular. Between 7.30am and the start of the meeting at 1.15pm, in excess of 1,200 comments were posted. At the time of writing, the total stands at more than 1,500. Even a cursory skim through the thread will tell you two things. While this is no scientific sample (and no opinion poll), an overwhelming majority of commenters urged the Guardian to back the Liberal Democrats. But just as significantly, the key reason why most of those who posted wish to see that is – necessarily summarising and simplifying hundreds of fascinating contributions – because you want to see real political change, vitally including electoral reform. And to most of you, Nick Clegg's Liberal Democrats look like that change or the best bet for it.

That was the message we Ciffers took into the meeting – in the Guardian's Scott Room, whose walls were lined with sheets displaying a selection of your comments from the thread. With at least 200 people in the room, one issue at least was immediately clear: the air conditioning wasn't up to the job. As is also traditional at such gatherings, the Guardian's instinct for democracy and egalitarianism wars with an obscure combination of deference to the senior editors and columnists and an "I'll-sit-at-the-back-of-the-class" rebelliousness. This tension gets resolved in a delicate hierarchical compromise, with inner circle chairs occupied by the big beasts, with some secondary ranks behind, and then a standing crowd of silent spectators and occasionally noisy dissenters.

The editor, Alan Rusbridger, kicked off proceedings by reminding us why we were there – to honour the unique institution in Fleet Street of a news media organisation, independent and not beholden to proprietor or shareholders, holding such a consultative, "sounding-board" meeting with staff about such a central question of editorial policy. He then laid out seven areas of policy and principle to guide discussion: the economy, constitutional reform, foreign policy, public services, social justice, the environment and civil liberties. From here, I'm observing Chatham House rules and not attributing remarks, but will try to summarise and give you a flavour of the debate.

On the economy, the discussion focused on Labour's record: on the one hand, its management of the recession has been creditable and things could have been so much worse; on the other hand, the responsibility for the regulatory failures during the previous decade's boom is largely Labour's too. The bottom line, though, is that Labour is still the most redistributive party – for all its failures and timidity on that score. As one said (you might guess who): "Labour always remembers the poorest," whereas, historically, the Liberal Democrats are a party of the centre that looks out for the middle strata of society and tackling poverty is not in their DNA, as it is for Labour.

It was then that Michael White (no comment attributed, so I'm going to tell you) diverted everyone by starting to tear up a copy of the Financial Times as someone was speaking. It wasn't that he was bored and resorting to origami; he just wanted to clip an article for the editor that showed that more Guardian readers intend to vote Tory than vote Green.

Jumping to foreign policy, a consensus soon emerged that the Guardian's editorial positions are most closely aligned, of all the three parties, with the Liberal Democrats' prospectus. On Europe, especially, Cameron's Conservatives are a cause for concern, in contrast to a more realist Liberal Democrat attitude than in past times. Clegg's scepticism on replacing Trident suited many, too; and on Britain's role in the world, a less fetishistic attitude towards the "special relationship" with the US, and human rights, the Lib Dems tick Guardian boxes that Labour leaves blank. Brown's attack on Clegg in the leaders' debate for being "anti-American" seemed clumsy and ill-judged, it was said; after all, it was only the Liberal Democrats, of the main parties, who had shared the Guardian's opposition to the Iraq war.

Moving to public services, the debate was wide open. There is doubt about Labour's centralised mode of delivery and its target-driven record. Have people had enough of the big state, and are both the Tories and Lib Dems more in tune with the public mood by promising more devolved services and local control? As one said: "Labour has real achievements, but there are big questions to answer." On the other hand, the older hands at the Guardian – and among the electorate – still have the memory of past recessions under Conservative governments when cuts in public spending were harsh and not "humane". A voice from the standing contingent also observed crisply that, whatever Clegg and Cable might say about public spending, there is plenty of evidence of Liberal Democrats in local government being anything but liberal in their approach to services and cuts.

Constitutional reform energised discussion. A senior web editor observed that not just in today's open thread, but throughout our election coverage, there has been an incredibly high level of engagement from users and the dominant theme has been the desire for change and reform – for a new politics. Labour did push through devolution a decade ago, and has done plenty of constitutional tinkering since, but the party is a late and lukewarm convert to voting reform. Where the Guardian has long been on political reform (in some areas, for more than a century), there also, by and large, are the Liberal Democrats. And on civil liberties, which the Guardian has championed, most recently through liberty central, the Lib Dems score a home run, it was agreed.

On the environment, the verdict is that Labour has come late to the party, but have finally started to get things done – slowly building a new green economy, with jobs and growth in the renewable energy industry, for instance. There was a feeling, too, that however strongly Cameron had run on the environmental message in the early days of his leadership, he has not ultimately succeeded in selling that message to substantial portions of his party base and hierarchy. Again, the Liberal Democrats have long been on the right ground on the environment – although, as a senior editor observed, their opposition to nuclear power is hard to square with Britain's commitment to cutting carbon emissions.

At that point, discussion of the big policy areas came to a close – although not before the point had been raised that we had barely discussed the issue that has, for the public, dominated the election campaign coverage, galvanised by the leaders' debates: the personalities of the three leaders themselves and their relative merits.

The editor moved the debate on to the decisive questions of how to translate the Guardian's values and principles into a succinct editorial message – as he put it, separating the matters of principle from the pragmatic issue of how to reconcile them with the First Past the Post system we have.

Opening, one said there was "a consensus in favour of some form of 'Lib-Lab-ery'"; as another then chimed, "If there were a box [on the ballot paper] you could tick, it would be for a hung parliament – but you can't vote for that." So immediately, we were into the mechanics of how to get the reform we all want (no one was mounting a defence of First Past the Past, for instance). But how to address the question of "progressive alliances" and tactical voting in the most unpredictable, poised and unstable general election in decades?

There was a strong feeling from several quarters that the Guardian should not necessarily plump for one party over another, but instead, in tune with what feels like the public mood, "vote with our values" – say that we want change and reform, and leave it to voters to decide the rest. And this is where your Cif representatives in the room spoke up to convey a sense of what you had been telling us, reading from the thread: strong support for the Liberal Democrats, not necessarily to see them in government and Nick Clegg as prime minister, but with a powerful current of desire for a new politics – the resurgent great theme of the last year.

Some election veterans and harder-headed realists wanted to see a firmer message in favour of Labour, on the grounds that there is a real risk that a collapse in Labour's vote, even with a big turnout for the Liberal Democrats, would be most likely to deliver a minority Conservative government or even a majority for Cameron.

What is certain, though, is that creating at least some kind of window for the world to this internal Guardian exercise brought an even greater sense of energy and engagement to an already unexpectedly exciting election. Thank you for sharing your views with us. The Guardian's election leader will be written and published in the newspaper and here on Comment is free later next week.

But if, in the meantime, you have any bright ideas about how to manage the electoral mechanics to ensure the optimal outcome for the reform we all want – and then how to express that with clarity and conviction in an editorial – please post below. All ideas welcome.

• More Guardian election comment from Cif at the polls