Nick Clegg has admitted he wanted to slap David Cameron on more than 20 occasions during their time in coalition.
In a lively interview on an anarchic late-night chat show, the Deputy Prime Minister also said Boris Johnson was more of a "twat" than a statesman.
During the appearance on The Last Leg, he was asked how many times in the last five years he had wanted to give the Prime Minister a slap.
"A few times, yes, and, I think, likewise," he replied.
Pressed on whether it was more than 10 or 20 times, he said: "Oh, more than that."
During a "showdown" with presenter Alex Brooker, who deployed a "bullshit buzzer" when he was unhappy with the quality of the Liberal Democrat leader's answers, Mr Clegg faced a barrage of tricky questions.
Asked if the London mayor was a statesman or a twat, he replied: "A bit more of the latter."
Mr Clegg repeatedly refused to choose whether he preferred Mr Cameron or Chancellor George Osborne.
Labour's Douglas Alexander, the shadow foreign secretary, talks "a lot of sense on Europe", he said.
But asked if he ever looked over at Labour and wished he had gone into coalition with it instead, Mr Clegg said: "No, not very much".
"I just think they have both got it a bit wrong at the moment, actually. I think they are both lurching left and right."
After repeated prodding, Mr Clegg admitted that, on a scale of one to 10, his angst over the decision to ditch his promise on tuition fees was a nine and a half.
Brooker turned the screw on the Lib Dem leader right from the start of the live show, warning him: "This ain't going to help your poll ratings."
When Mr Clegg grabbed hold of the presenter's pocket handkerchief, Brooker, who has a disability, told him: "You've done enough bad things to the disabled."
In making a pitch to get the sceptical interviewer to cast a vote at the upcoming general election, the party leader said not voting would be like going into high street food chain Nando's, not putting in an order and then complaining if you were unhappy with what you were served.
Brooker later told the Deputy Prime Minister he had been a "good sport".
"I think I was kippered," Mr Clegg said.
The television appearance was soon trending on Twitter.
Anglican priest Kate Bottley wrote: "#isitok that I'm a bit worried that @TheLastLeg might make me like Nick Clegg #cleggleg."
Historian Greg Jenner said: "I applaud Clegg's courage, he was ambushed but fought back - I'd happily have this as a regular feature #thelastleg #CleggLeg."
Rob Eaton, who describes himself as an "average 17 year old from Surrey" wrote: "Credit to nick clegg for not only presenting a good argument to vote but also being genuinely funny #cleggleg #thelastleg."
During a convoluted game, Mr Clegg threw a melon at Brooker, who had a blade taped to his foot to despatch the oncoming fruit.
Kerri Shimell, a textiles graduate, tweeted: "What am I watching? Nick Clegg throwing a melon at a disabled man? Lucky he had that big blade on his foot to protect himself. #cleggleg."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article