#alternative voting

Fix Our 2-Party Government with Alternative Voting:

With Presidential elections coming up in the next few weeks, let’s talk about our two-party political system, how it seems to have broken our government’s ability to govern and how it’s left people feeling so disappointed with politics that the majority of American’s don’t even bother to vote anymore because they feel that they have no real choices.

Things have gotten so bad that our government is not able to effectively govern any more.  The losing party blocks everything the party in power tries to implement because they actually WANT the current administration to FAIL so that they get voted back into  power.

So now we have half our government trying to make the country fail, which is not a good thing, right? And it only repeats itself with each new administration.

Well.. How about if I told you that the first President of the United States actually warned us about such a scenario happening?

Also.. How about if I tell you that there is actually a simple way to not only fix this problem, but also get people excited about politics again and get everyone trying to make things GOOD in our country again?

Well, during George Washington’s farewell speech he warned that the formation of Political Parties may result in frightful power grabs and revenge by one party against another. Which is exactly what we see happening today.

So, how do we get ourselves out of this mess?

By changing the way we vote.  Currently we use the “First Past The Post” voting system - a “winner takes all” process where you ONLY pick one person to win.

The problem with this is that even though you may start with many different parties, over time you eventually only end up with 2 parties with wildly opposing views as we have today, and no chance for a new party to be elected.

Why is this?  Because people do not want to waste their one vote on a candidate that has no chance of winning, as it ends up wasting their vote and putting the person into power they least like.

This is why people like Ralph Nader or Ross Perot, or even Ron Paul, who may have appealed to people on both sides, can never get elected into office.

The way around this problem is to have people vote by RANKING their favorite candidates in order of preference - called Alternative Voting.

Be sure to subscribe to C.G.P. Grey's Channel on YouTube he is awesome!

This way you are able to pick your favorite candidate then your second favorite and so on without fear of wasting your vote or putting your least favorite choice into office.

The two extreme candidates cancel each other out and you end up with someone who actually appeals to the majority of voters.

People will again feel that they have a say in their government and we will end up with candidates that the MAJORITY of the people will actually like having represent them in government.  This would be a far-cry from what we have today.

Here is a great video explaining the shortcomings of First Past The Post Voting.

NOW DO WE MAKE THIS HAPPEN?

Some local elections use Alternative Voting in the United States... so it can start there and work it's way up to National Elections.

It is used in some elections in Portland, Maine; San Francisco, California; Oakland, California; Minneapolis, Minnesota; and Saint Paul, Minnesota.

As people become more aware of the process and more upset with governmental gridlock, change can ultimately be voted in.

What Brigette DePape did was deeply Canadian. It was quiet, dignified, and eminently sensible.

Let’s be equally sensible in our response. Anti-Harper alarmism aside, it is a serious problem that our system produces unstoppable four-year Kings of Canada with the assent of a quarter of the population. That should offend your conscience, whoever you are, and (in that much if nothing else) you should tip your hat to this young girl and the frustrated outrage she embodies with such Canadian dignity.

First, we need electoral reform. Proportional representation is unacceptable for a number of reasons. But a system of alternative voting with elimination rounds would allow a community to come to a consensus about which candidate best represents them. It is an almost banal truth that many MPs only represent minority slivers of their vote-split ridings. If a more sophisticated voting process would allow the majority of citizens to agree on a particular candidate, that should obviously be preferable to anyone not blinded by purely partisan goals.*

Second, we need parliamentary reform. And I’m not even talking about the senate. We elect a parliament of representatives to govern us collectively, not a single individual to rule us autocratically. But we’ve fallen into the habit of running our elections as if they were presidential elections, and most representatives become potted plants sitting in the commons behind the Prime Minister. This should not be. Party discipline needs to be relaxed massively, so individual MPs can vote according to their constituents and consciences. The Canadian practice of using whips and indefensibly massive cabinets to control caucus as carrot and stick needs to end. Parliament needs to hold government to account even in majority situations. Until this change happens, Canadian democracy cannot legitimately be called healthy, no matter what happens with senates and queens.

Third, and most importantly, the Canadian population needs to start caring. When politicians get on radio and TV, they only talk in hyper-simplified little jingos and slogans. To someone who follows politics closely and knows the issues, this habit is deeply insulting and infuriating. But they do it for a reason: because most Canadians don’t follow politics closely. These politicians are counting on the fact that most of their audience will be forming opinions on issues based only on impressions gained while listening to soundbites, so they’re spinning soundbites and refusing to give serious, specific answers. Serious, specific answers will alienate an audience with no real interest in the topic.

So Canadian politics, like politics elsewhere, becomes a business of competitive slogan-writing. The only answer is for the population to become engaged and interested enough that everyone is insulted by the sloganeering, instead of just us few. When everyone is insulted by the solganeering, it will have to stop, and politicians will be forced to give serious answers to our serious questions.

Yes, that seems like a naive dream. Yes, history and inertia are against us. But now we — we young Canadians — have an affirmation that such a change is possible. We’ve watched Egypt. We’ve watched something in Egypt happen that we’ve been led to believe was just an impossible fairy tale; people started caring, a lot, all at once, and things changed. It’s not too much to hope for. Things don’t have to be this way.

So yes, Brigette DePape, “Stop Harper.” Not because of jet planes or neoconservatism or hidden agendas, but because Canada shouldn’t be ruled like this. We deserve a House of Commons full of members who legitimately represent the choice of their constituents and who are empowered to fulfil that representative function. We need people to care about government. We need people to understand that the Canadian system needs reform. We need people to understand that, despite the impressive formality of the big throne and the vaulted ceiling and the officers in shiny uniforms, this situation is unacceptable.

We have rejected a fairer voting system.

We have committed ourselves to a system that can and does allow a government who do not represent the will of the majority. In doing so we have eliminated any chance of a referendum on an even better system, such as AV+ or PR.

We have allowed a campaign of desperate lies to succeed in manipulating the public where it should have been exposed for the deceptive hypocritical weapon it was. The negligence of the media (and ourselves) to make its falseness well known paves way for a future of political campaigns full of outright lies and bullshit.

We have shown that we are willing to punish a Politician by surrendering our chance for a better democracy.

We have proven just how gullible we are, that we would believe such a terrible campaign.

We have shown just how pathetic and stupid we are.

What's wrong with you?

Is it not a bit late to step in?

Surely if somebody is actually going to the polling station to vote, then they have actually spent time contemplating their decision before hand, and are going to the station knowing who they are voting for.

Unless they didn't, but who goes to a polling station not knowing who they are voting for? If they did then they would be retarded. Should we really allow retarded people to vote?

Furthermore, should we allow somebody that could change their vote in a few minutes to vote?

So no, I will not listen to you. And if I was going to vote for you in the beginning, and you attempted to canvas me: I would be so offended (that you think that I am that retarded) that I would not vote for you.

Apart from I wouldn't not vote for you, because then I'd have to vote for someone I didn't want, or null my vote, which would be retarded.

Lots of love,

A concerned retarded voter.