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turrell 
"Ohhhh Ohhhh Ohhhh Ohhhh "
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 Posted - 07/12/2007 : 16:29:02
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quote:
Originally posted by Se�n
Candidates can't afford to neglect anywhere as every vote counts. E.g., if the GOP didn't bother campaigning in Nebraska and the Democrats did, then one could assume the Democrat vote would increase, which would increase the overall percentage of the vote the Dems got nationwide and they would end up with more representatives in parliament.
In the US candidates would spend all their time on the top 20 cities - forget about states altogether because they are just going after the largets population centers - it costs the same amount to make a visit to Tulsa or Topeka as it does to New York, but why bother because its a waste of time if it doesn't matter who wins.
The United States is not a Democracy - we are a Republic of federated states. Democracy doesn't exist in the world today (closest is astonishingly the Vatican, but I digress. In a Democracy all citizens get a vote - we have a representative system and all citizens do get to choose their congressional and senatorial representatives. The US Congress equally represents citizens because congressional districts are per rata defined. The Senate is by state so that smaller states do get a say - accordingly the 5 biggest states cannot set the legislative agenda. If we went to proportional voting you would not need the Senate by the same theory. If you only represented the majority in this country you would never have passed Civil Rights, you would leave disaster victims to fend for themselves locally (despite Bush and Brownie's mishandling of Katrina, the Federal government has done most of the recovery effort, even if too late and too little). Farmers would go out of business, salvery would exist in the South, etc, etc.
People only want to get rid of the Electoral College because Goerge Bush sucks as a President and in his first election he won the most electoral votes but did not win the popular vote. Incidentally he clearly won the popular vote in his re-election while nearly losing the electoral vote - if Kerry won Ohio, I imagine these arguments (at least among American liberals) would be muted. I simply don't like judging the system of government that has worked astonishingly well for over 200 years based on the bad execution of the construction for the past 6 years. |
Edited by - turrell on 07/12/2007 16:30:42 |
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Montgomery 
"F**k!"
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Posted - 07/12/2007 : 17:19:59
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quote:
Originally posted by turrell
quote:
Originally posted by Se�n
Candidates can't afford to neglect anywhere as every vote counts. E.g., if the GOP didn't bother campaigning in Nebraska and the Democrats did, then one could assume the Democrat vote would increase, which would increase the overall percentage of the vote the Dems got nationwide and they would end up with more representatives in parliament.
In the US candidates would spend all their time on the top 20 cities - forget about states altogether because they are just going after the largets population centers - it costs the same amount to make a visit to Tulsa or Topeka as it does to New York, but why bother because its a waste of time if it doesn't matter who wins.
The United States is not a Democracy - we are a Republic of federated states. Democracy doesn't exist in the world today (closest is astonishingly the Vatican, but I digress. In a Democracy all citizens get a vote - we have a representative system and all citizens do get to choose their congressional and senatorial representatives. The US Congress equally represents citizens because congressional districts are per rata defined. The Senate is by state so that smaller states do get a say - accordingly the 5 biggest states cannot set the legislative agenda. If we went to proportional voting you would not need the Senate by the same theory. If you only represented the majority in this country you would never have passed Civil Rights, you would leave disaster victims to fend for themselves locally (despite Bush and Brownie's mishandling of Katrina, the Federal government has done most of the recovery effort, even if too late and too little). Farmers would go out of business, salvery would exist in the South, etc, etc.
People only want to get rid of the Electoral College because Goerge Bush sucks as a President and in his first election he won the most electoral votes but did not win the popular vote. Incidentally he clearly won the popular vote in his re-election while nearly losing the electoral vote - if Kerry won Ohio, I imagine these arguments (at least among American liberals) would be muted. I simply don't like judging the system of government that has worked astonishingly well for over 200 years based on the bad execution of the construction for the past 6 years.
I don't believe George Bush won the first time (either vote). And the reason the votes were off the second time was because the GOP got swing states to put the question of gay marriage on the ballet to get their voter base to turn out. So sad!!!!
Bush will go down in history as one of the worst Presidents ever. He has left a big mess for the next President and administration to deal with. However we elect one, let's hope it's one who at least cares a little about the country he has sworn himself to lead. Because, honestly, I can't think of one thing Bush has done that even appears to be for the good of the country. Not one.
EM :)
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Sean
"Necrosphenisciform anthropophagist."
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Posted - 07/13/2007 : 04:55:33
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quote:
Originally posted by turrell
I simply don't like judging the system of government that has worked astonishingly well for over 200 years based on the bad execution of the construction for the past 6 years.
If it ain't broke don't fix it? That's a fair point, but being 'not broken' doesn't make it fair. There's a difference between 'working well' and working fairly. Any electoral system that ends up with a government could be considered to be 'working well'. Last election in the UK 65% voted against Blair and the Labour party, but that 65% still wasn't enough to remove them from office. Yet they have a government that is 'working well'. It's shockingly unfair on the majority who wanted them gone though.
This comes down to philosophy. My view is that many societies* are ultimately safer and better off with the fairest system that the society can come up with, in my view this requires segments of society to be represented according to their 'popularity' or size (proportional representation). This way the minority can never run the country for their own benefit, and radical extremists are kept on the sidelines. The last thing that radical extremists such as Bush et al want is majority rule.
*When I said 'many societies' I'm referring to largely cohesive societies such as NZ, UK, USA, most of Western Europe, Japan etc, where the majority want life to continue largely as it currently is, and grudgingly accept the result of elections even though their favoured party lost. Highly polarised societies where proportional representation (or any kind of democracy) isn't going to work because the losers will always reach for their guns include Iraq, Afghanistan and Somalia; in those cases the only system of government that's going to 'work well' is the iron fist of totalitarianism.
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ChocolateLady
"500 Chocolate Delights"
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Posted - 07/13/2007 : 08:39:16
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quote:
Originally posted by Se�n
This comes down to philosophy. My view is that many societies* are ultimately safer and better off with the fairest system that the society can come up with, in my view this requires segments of society to be represented according to their 'popularity' or size (proportional representation). This way the minority can never run the country for their own benefit, and radical extremists are kept on the sidelines. The last thing that radical extremists such as Bush et al want is majority rule.
The problem isn't the system of voting, it is the fact that there is still a huge amount of people who don't bother to vote. When close to half of the people eligible to vote don't do so, then the results will NEVER represent the true wishes of the population. And that is how your radical extremists get elected, because the voter turn-out among the radicals and extremists are consistantly very high - probably in the 85-90% range.
I've watched it happen here in Israel at many an election when the crazy religious parties end up being the tie breakers in the government and that gives them disproportionate power. But we're a different system.
In the US it means that for your Congress and House of Representatives, about 35-40% of the population decides who gets in. In your presidential elections you haven't had significantly over 55% of the population deciding who got in since 1968. So turrell is right, don't blame it on the system, blame it on voter apathy, because if more people voted, then more people would get closer to what they want. |
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Sean
"Necrosphenisciform anthropophagist."
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Posted - 07/13/2007 : 13:00:08
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quote:
Originally posted by ChocolateLady
The problem isn't the system of voting, it is the fact that there is still a huge amount of people who don't bother to vote.
Keep in mind that under some electoral systems there is no point in voting. I always vote, but if I lived in Utah I wouldn't see the point in bothering. People have a much stronger incentive to vote under a system where every vote counts. |
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I love Keith Olbermann
