Here's the Blast!

[skyring]

Sneezed this afternoon and the dog literally cringed. It was an award-winning sneeze, and I'm coming down with an award-winning cold. I think I'll spend the next day or so in bed.

Except I can't - too much to do.

LJ was down this morning, so it took me a while to catch up this evening. Seems like most of my LJ friends are in a different political quadrant to me. My law enforced by goons was to make everybody vote. I really hate seeing people marginalised because there's no votes in their demographic for the politicians. It's a vicious circle.

Comments

[resqgeek]

>> make everybody vote << says the man from the country with compulsory voting! :o)

Actually, I've always felt that voting is an obligation rather than a right. I used to tell my non-voting friends that they forfeited the right to complain about politics/government (at least to me) if they didn't vote. However, the last year's presidential race left me much more sympathetic. How do you vote when you dislike both candidates equally? I can almost understand people not wanting to vote under the circumstances. I voted anyway, but I would have given my right arm to have had a choice worth voting for...

[skyring.livejournal.com]

Preferential voting would do the job. You rank the candidates in order and if, when the votes are counted, your first choice has the lowest total, he/she is eliminated and all those votes are re-examined and their second choices are counted at full value. Keep going until one candidate has more than 50% of the total vote.

It's quite possible (and often happens) for minor party candidates to be able to band together and get one of their candidates elected, especially if one of the major party candidates gets eliminated and their votes get transferred.

Once they are elected, minor party and independent representatives can often hold "the balance of power", where their votes will determine who wins if the two big parties differ on an issue (as they so often do).

In the Australian Senate, it's been fifty years since the biggest party has had a majority in their own right. They HAVE to get the support of minor party and independents to get anything passed.

[resqgeek]

I like the Australian voting system. I wonder how long it would take us to count the ballots, though. Our media loves to be able to predict the winner the night of the election, and this might make that difficult.

[skyring.livejournal.com]

We generally know who won on the night. Close seats can take a while, mainly because postal votes can take up to a week to straggle in.

However, in Australia we have a more rigid system of party discipline, and we don't have primaries. "Pre-selection" for a seat is an internal party matter.

It is rare for representatives to "cross the floor" and vote with the opposing party, unless there is a so-called "conscience" vote.

The main reason I like compulsory voting is because it demonstrates that in our democracy, the vote of the billionaire and the vote of the bloke with the arse out of his strides count for the same. We all get a say in who runs the show and we are all a part of it.

[resqgeek]

>> We generally know who won on the night. Close seats can take a while, mainly because postal votes can take up to a week to straggle in <<

I'm assuming this means the ballots are tallied electronically. If they had to tally paper ballots and then recount those ballots for the eliminated candidate(s), I would think the count would take longer.

One of our (admittedly many) problems is that the exact nature of the ballots and counting is controlled locally. There is no single unified system for voting and counting the ballots. In my county we use touch screen computer systems to vote, but there are many areas of the country that still use paper ballots or mechanical voting machines. Each of these systems has its own issues, but the lack of uniformity, by itself, creates issues. When you move, you often have to learn how to vote all over again!

[skyring.livejournal.com]

Actually, we count the votes on the night. I've been a scrutineer at a few elections and I see the process in action. Each polling place counts its own ballots and the totals are phoned in to a central office. Generally you can get a pretty good feel for the flow of preferences without having to count them.

For instance, if the USA had preferential voting, most primary ballots for a Green candidate would probably have the Democrat as a second preference.

The ballots are all sent into a central office for that electorate and a second, more thorough count is conducted over the next few days for the record.