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Another stolen election?
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 Another stolen election?The Australian Electoral Commission is unlike the American versions. They are an independent and permanent part of the Public Service, completely separate from any input by a political master. They operate by rigid protocols set by legislation and published procedures, and any decision or action they make can be challenged in court. They automatically carry out recounts if a decision is close, or if any candidate can show good cause. (I recall one such 'good cause' was when some ballots were deemed 'informal' because there was no indication of a number '1' against any candidate - we have preferential voting, here, where candidates are ranked in order of preference. One candidate pointed out that the poll clerk had simply mistaken a continental-style '1' as a '7'.) Taking a count to the High Court is very rarely done. But the Conservatives are doing it now, to contest an election they lost by less than 30 votes. What REALLY got up their nose was that the declared winner was a 'Teal'; this is a term used to describe a bunch of like-minded Independents who are economically conservative and environmentally progressive. (They are called 'Teal' because over here conservatives are 'blue' but these independents have a 'green' hue mixed in.) The Conservatives really hate losing 'their' safest seats, usually in the best-educated and most socially/economically privileged areas. But that's what they get for chasing the far-right, redneck, racist/populist vote just like the conservative Republicans have in America. The difference is that over here, with preferential voting, the voters can vote for an Independent, and then if that independent misses they can vote for a conservative as second choice. Sorta like having a 'primary', but with ALL voters involved rather than just the official supporters. As a result, the candidate who commands the support of both sides of the aisle has a chance. It's a good way of keeping the extremists out of power. A further cause for conservative anger is that they were SLAUGHTERED in the election. Most of the urban seats in the country went to Labor, and most of those that didn't went to the Teals. The conservatives are now largely rural or semi-rural hicks; a bit like the Republicans in the bayous of Louisiana or the potato fields of Idaho, but without the cities in those states. For the formerly smooth, urbane, polished Creme de la creme of the Big Smoke, that's an unendurable cause for shame. I really don't think the appeal will get up, even though the margin is less than thirty votes. The ballots are all on paper, not in some computerised system so they are easily examinable; they have all been studied three times already, two of those times individually and in detail; and the only scope for argument is whether or not the AEC officials have obviously mis-interpreted the voter's intention. Benefit of reasonable doubt will go with the AEC's original ruling. |
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Hare-Clarke System Here's how it works... www.abc.net.au Even though it might be hard for Americans to comprehend, Tasmanians have no problems. The state of Australia most famous for in-breeding resulting in imbeciles uses the system to not only elect the party they want to govern, but also to elect WHICH members of that party will represent them. Since seven members are elected in each seat, that means that each major party will present at least six candidates in their best seats, hoping to get at least five or six of the places available. That also gives the voters a choice of WHICH candidates from their chosen party will be elected. So a sitting member who has not performed can be replaced by another from the same party without that party losing the seat. WHAT A GREAT SYSTEM! |
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Colin 13:33 Yes, the same here in the Land of the Limping Lyrebird. To my mind, it is a good reason why one SHOULD vote for a minor party. In my experience, a single party having an outright majority leads to stuff-ups. A critical (in the best sense of the word) crossbench tends to filter out the worst aspects. I was involved in a 'Third Party' that held the balance of power in the Australian Senate for about 20 years. When the Conservatives wanted to bring in a Goods and Services Tax (aka 'VAT'), they insisted it was a complete package and any alterations would throw it out of balance. But somehow they still managed to agree to a swathe of adjustments before they got impatient and walked away. It breezed through the Reps where the government had an outright majority. Then, in the Senate Committee stage, THE GOVERNMENT ITSELF moved over 200 amendments; most to pre-empt amendments from the floor, others to compensate for those anticipated amendments. At a later election, that same Conservative Party actually wone enough Senate seats that they didn't need to negotiate. They pushed through reforms to the Industrial Relations system here in Australia. Wildly unpopular, but (being conservatives) they simply KNEW it was right. The next election that conservative government was booted out, even the Prime Minister losing his seat. But not before the economy dropped into a hole, with every salary or wage earner stopping all discretionary expenditure because they didn't know if they would have a job or what their pay might be 're-negotiated' down to by the end of the year. A strong cross-bench is the way modern politics acts as a check on the Executive's delusions. Bring on Proportional Representation! |
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At this point, we see almost nobody who is a winning presidential platform coming forward, and thank God that Harris (at-least) says that she's not running again. My opinion is that the Democrats have a chance to win big-time if work hard now instead of waiting for near election day to present a few blind-horses and bickering with each other. |
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Boutique Issues |
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UK situation |
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Texas Imagine the following voting population: s. a b c d 1 R R R R 2 D D D D 3 D D D D Divided into three row districts, representation is fair and proportionate, one Republican and two democrats. Divided into four column districts, representation might be fair, but not proportionate. Democrats would control all four seats. What Republicans are doing in Texas is five districts, one for each R and then all the D rows in one district, so the legislature is four Republicans and one line Democrats. Representation is neither fair nor proportionate. |
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Shiva 16:15 Let me offer a darker option a b c. d e R R R R R R R D D D R R D D D If you have seats based on vertical rows, then there will be three 'D' winners and only two 'R' winners. the 'D' side will win. But if you instead take horizontal rows, there will be two 'D' winners and only one 'R' winner. The 'D' side wins that way as well! But if you take the whole of the vote, there are nine 'R' voters and only six 'D' voters! How can one side score 60% of the vote, but still lose no matter which way the seats are distributed? If the vote had been on Proportional Representation, the result would have been 2R/1D (if three members) or 3R/2D if five members. The fault is in the whole concept of separate seats. Matters that are of concern only locally should be managed locally; but to take the winners of local elections and give them state-wide (or nation-wide!) authority is a conceptual misfit. Apart from which, it is a great incentive to pork-barrel for local areas at State expense. That is not an efficient use of public funds. There are several different systems for P.R., the differences being technicalities in the order of candidate eliminations and manner of preference re-distribution in the later stages of the count, but these usually have no effect on the outcome. I have seen only one example where two different techniques would result in different outcomes, and that was determining who won the last seat in a very close contest. No system is perfect, but some are better than others. |
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Update on our contested election (my 16 July22:36 post) Meanwhile Sussan Ley, the new Conservative Leader, is trying to tell everyone that she is a centrist. Perhaps she is just a tiny bit more centrist than her predecessor, but still hard right; and her troops are already doing a lot of freelancing. She is the first woman to lead the Party. That in itself is a cause for shame, because there was an excellent woman candidate (Julia Bishop) for the job last time around; but the Conservatives over here are radically 'Blokist' (a polite word for 'patriarchal'), so Julia was passed over for perhaps the worst 'daggy dad' impressionist in recent history. But now, when there is no chance of winning the next election, they give a woman the job of Sisyphus. But the ultra-right 'bloke' whom she beat is making sure that she gains as little respect as possible; and undermining a woman is not frowned upon in conservative circles nearly so much as undermining a bloke. So he is continuing to trot out precisely the same policies that were rejected at the last election, and all his blokey supporters are quietly edging out of camera shot when Sussan is asked to respond. She has to look like she has no support. Ah, to see these right-wingers shoot each other for not being Right enough! A perverse pleasure, but unfortunately it is depriving Australia of an effective Opposition. |
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Texas |
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Felon Tom Delay Quote from HCR: Texas governor Abbott responded to the Texas House Democrats' quorum break by threatening to remove from office any Democrats who are not back in their seats for Monday’s vote and to replace them “swiftly” with his own appointees thanks to his power to fill vacancies. He also suggested he would consider them felons for accepting money to pay for their food and housing in Chicago and that such a designation would enable him to cross state lines to get them back. He threatened to use “my full extradition authority to demand the return to Texas of any potential out-of-state felons.” |
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Shiva It's called garymandering. So what's gerymandering? Ask Governor Eldridge GARY blogs.loc.gov |
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Shiva |
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Gerrymander |
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Are Americans becoming distrustful of Democracy? No, they are becoming distrustful of what the American Establishment call 'Democracy'. And unfortunately, the average American doesn't realise how REAL democracy is done, because the American Establishment call it 'Marxism'. Has anyone noticed how the most prosperous and best-educated states in the Union, meaning those whose populations can afford to go to Europe for holidays, are the most 'Socialist'? And how the least prosperous and least-educated states are solid Republican red? Plot each state on a graph, in which one axis is per capita income before tax and the other axis is the popular vote for Republicans, and you will see a disturbingly strong inverse correlation. |
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Pedo Groper’s Gestapo Strikes Again The woman was an honors student here on a fully legal R2 visa and has never done anything wrong. ICE kidnapped her to a concentration camp absent any explanation or due process. |
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Shiva 21:37 |
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"Defending Democracy" So California leaps to the defence of 'fair representation' by saying it will do their own gerrymander to offset Texas. Isn't it marvellous how the defence of democracy depends on who can be the more undemocratic? Is this another Joseph Heller novel? Or even Franz Kafka? Perhaps Texas and California should agree that they will BOTH adopt Proportional Representation. |
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Never Happen The idiot claimed Putin told him the way to fix US elections starts with abolishing mail in ballots, so his new step is to do just that. One would think both sides could agree independent districting committees (which most blue states already have) are the proper way to go, but how do you reason with people who make taliban imams look conciliatory in comparison? |
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Independent redistricting committees Vermont's redistricting committee: "Hi, John." "Hi, Susan." "Well, it's that time of the decade again." "Yup." "The census still says practically nobody lives here." "Again?" "Again." "John, it's your turn this time." "Alright, I guess." (traces outline of Vermont) "All done." "Ok. Kinda wish we were Wyoming. Their border is SO much easier to draw." "True. Meeting adjourned. Your turn to buy the Ben & Jerry's." |
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Equal Representation California gets one vote per 730,000 people. 730/195=3.744. So every Wyoming resident is worth 3.74 California residents. Isn’t that nice. In other news, Don’s administration has determined that states are not eligible for federal forest land timber rebates, a blow to the red communities that threw their support behind the orange menace, on top the anticipated closures of rural clinics and hospitals, MAGA. |
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Shiva and Vanessa This will require enabling legislation to be passed in each state, but Australia managed that without too much blood in the streets. Of course, it helps when there is already a high degree of trust in elections and an apolitical Public Serice in the first place, something that both sides of American politics have been quite eager to manipulate for partisan advantage over the years. Look up 'Australian Electoral Commission' for details. |
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Shiva 21:13 Thank you! |
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US Electoral College, etc. (OK, taking 'here' as the US of A, there's WAAAAAY more than a couple of problems here, but let's just focus on these for now.) The US federal system devolves a great deal of power to the states, especially power over elections. The power devolution is baked into the system, both constitutionally and historically. * Constitutional changes are quite difficult here, ** but without constitutional changes, fixing them is probably impossible. Enabling legislation, if enacted everywhere, would be nearly impossible to enforce. The proposed interstate compact, where states pledge their electoral votes for the presidential election to the national popular vote leader, is unenforceable. Borders of congressional districts cannot cross state lines, since representatives are constitutionally allocated by state. Ideally, the president would be chosen by popular vote. Ideally (IMNSHO), multi-representative states would be handled by some combination of fewer districts with those states, with the additional representatives by party list within each state. Ideally, we'd have more than two viable parties. I just don't see how we get there, given the structural limitations of the system. * Current efforts by Trump to destroy the system excepted. ** To demonstrate the difficulty: the last two constitutional amendments that passed were the 26th (Lowers the voting age to 18 years from 21) back in 1971, and the 27th (Delays laws affecting Congressional salary from taking effect until after the next election of representatives) which was proposed in 1789 and took 202 years to collect the 3/4 of the states' assent required. The proposed Equal Rights Amendment was one state short, but the legislation passed by Congress had a time limit for ratification which is well past. The only other proposed amendment to make it out of Congress in the past 75 years, the District of Columbia Voting Rights Amendment, only collected 16 of 38 states before its allocated time ran out. |
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Vanessa 02:28 That did not stop Australia from forming a consensus and a Federal oversight body, adopted in each state (with only minor variations in two) by free acts of each state legislature. Your proposal "multi-representative states would be handled by some combination of fewer districts with those states, with the additional representatives by party list within each state" has been adopted in New Zealand and I haven't read of any riots in the streets over there. A similar system has been adopted in several other nations. en.wikipedia.org <I just don't see how we get there, given the structural limitations of the system.> It's not the structural limitations in the American system that prevents progress. As mentioned above, the Australian Constitution contains the same difficulties, relying on consensus between the states rather than any law imposed on them from the federal level. Any state is free to opt out at any time. It's America's rabidly adversarial culture that makes it impossible. There are some situations where the only way to change a system is to have it collapse, and then re-build with the second-hand bricks thus made available. But that is not a pleasant process, and I pray America will be spared it. |
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Critical Difference Australia was (and largely remains) governed by fairly reasonable people. Here in the US ine party views the other as controlled by Satan, rejects science, and is swayed by “gut instinct” and religious whimsy over logic and reason. |
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Lord Shiva |
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