Proportional Representation Discussion

[mowich]

I was reading that people were going back and taking it again, so I did too.  The only thing I changed was my postal code and for the second time I fell into the Guardian category.  This time I paid a lot more attention to the way questions were worded and I noticed that, not satisfied with addressing a certain subject once, they came back as many as three times in the case of one topic - the wording was changed but the result was the same.  I almost felt as if I was being not so subtlety coerced into something. 

What a bloody waste of a 1/4 million dollars. 

I am still waiting for the post card.

[eyeball]

9 minutes ago, mowich said:

I was reading that people were going back and taking it again, so I did too.  The only thing I changed was my postal code and for the second time I fell into the Guardian category.  This time I paid a lot more attention to the way questions were worded and I noticed that, not satisfied with addressing a certain subject once, they came back as many as three times in the case of one topic - the wording was changed but the result was the same.  I almost felt as if I was being not so subtlety coerced into something. 

What a bloody waste of a 1/4 million dollars. 

I am still waiting for the post card.

 

 

Quote

 

What does my result mean?

Based on your responses, MyDemocracy.ca associates you with one of five groups or “archetypes” (Guardians, Challengers, Pragmatists, Cooperators or Innovators) and compares your results with other Canadians.

From the survey FAQ

 

I wonder which consensus the government is trying to generate...

Pragmatist sounds a little sycophantic mind you so does Guardian as in Guardians of the status quo. Cooperator (me) probably conjures up an image of fluffy unicorns in kindergarten to a Guardian.

[poochy]

48 minutes ago, eyeball said:

Nah...they're just indistinguishable is all. As mediocre and bland as the other.

Nah, only liberals are so arrogant as to think they could promise, an iron clad guarantee of a promise, to change our voting system, while not so secretly wanting indeed to change it to the one that clearly favors them, and then transparently try to torpedo the entire promise when they don't get their way, AND get away with it, and they will.  That's the truth and it's barely being talked about, the conservatives would get no such quarter had they done anything remotely close to this.

Permanent liberal rule, the only difference between that and what Putin has done is the method, it's an incredible attempt to subvert democracy.

The cons got hammered for two years over 90k they paid back to us, and covered up, liberals blatantly try to ensure at least liberal lead governments, permanently, and it's ho hum, in other words it is as it always is for politics in this country, whether the liberals are in power or not, they've already won.

Edited December 7, 2016 by poochy

[eyeball]

37 minutes ago, poochy said:

Nah, only liberals are so arrogant as to think they could promise, an iron clad guarantee of a promise

Nah, they're both as arrogant as the day is long.  In any case the material politicians use to clad the guarantees on their promises is composed of 100% pure unobtanium. 

[PIK]

It is sad to see this happening. Trying their best to fool Canadians into letting then have a rank ballet system so Trudeau can be PM till his son wants to be PM. Acting like Canadians are so stupid and yet Canadians just love the guy,. Maybe Trudeau is right and Canadians are stupid.

[Smallc]

Maybe we just don't agree with you.

[poochy]

1 hour ago, Smallc said:

Maybe we just don't agree with you.

So is that general support for libs or on this particular issue where it's patently obvious what the intent was?  Do you agree that if Harper had blatantly attempted to game our entire election system in his favor that the cries of dictator and fascist would be deafening? And for once, deservedly so?  So how is it that you can support these self serving liars, who are actually doing the things they accused the last guys of doing, or at least being?  I know, these are hard questions to avoid, maybe we should stick to the cash for access scandal that gets worse everyday, i know one thing is for sure, you would be far more capable of formulating a plausible answer than our current leader.

Remember how when you attend a liberal fundraiser you arent supposed to be discussing business with the politicians?  Well it is, EXACTLY the same liberal party it always was.  They are so arrogant they now advertise these fund raisers as an opportunity to do just that.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/trudeau-fundraiser-touted-as-a-networking-opportunity/article33233874/

[cybercoma]

4 minutes ago, poochy said:

blatantly attempted to game our entire election system

Harper began the electoral reform portfolio. Then, people elected Liberal MPs on a party platform that promised electoral reform by the next election. Your dysphemism aside, people voted for reform, whether you like it or not. 

[segnosaur]

1 hour ago, cybercoma said:

Harper began the electoral reform portfolio. Then, people elected Liberal MPs on a party platform that promised electoral reform by the next election. Your dysphemism aside, people voted for reform, whether you like it or not. 

It is true, the Liberals (and the NDP for that matter) both had election promises of election reform. However, I doubt whether such a single issue was the deciding factor for a significant number of voters. So, they voted for parties that promised reform, but they may not have voted for the reform itself.

It should also be mentioned that while reform was promised, the exact nature of the change wasn't specified. So its hard to say people "voted for reform" when there was no consistency of what people thought it meant.

The way I see it, the promise of reform was a very badly thought out election promise by Trudeau. It would have made sense to promise "We'll hold a referendum on it", or promise to start the process of change even if things aren't ready for the next election.

[Smallc]

4 hours ago, segnosaur said:

It is true, the Liberals (and the NDP for that matter) both had election promises of election reform. However, I doubt whether such a single issue was the deciding factor for a significant number of voters.

And that could be said of any issue - which makes it irrelevant.

[dre]

On 12/5/2016 at 9:16 PM, segnosaur said:

My suggestion... loosen up the rules that force party unity during votes. Like in the U.S., allow MPs to vote how they want (except for money bills and on issues directly related to campaign promises). 

Outlaw political parties and make all the MP's run independents. ALL of the elected MP's then elect the prime minister.

[drummindiver]

I know a lot of people were dismisve  of the online questionairre . Here is one made by the National Post in response. I was deemed Rebel.

http://www.nationalpost.com/m/wp/news/canada/canadian-politics/blog.html?b=news.nationalpost.com/news/canada/canadian-politics/democracy-mine

[SpankyMcFarland]

On 2015-10-21 at 0:58 AM, -1=e^ipi said:

And here I thought the purpose of a representative democracy was to 'represent' the electorate.

In that case, why not just do away with the house of commons? You don't need seats. Just directly elect a prime minister every 4 years (using a run-off voting system) and then have the prime minister be essentially the dictator for 4 years. 

Isn't that basically the system now? Apart from the direct elections bit.

[PIK]

Everything the liberals said about harper is coming true under the liberals. Trudeau is the one with the secret agenda.

[Smallc]

What's so secret?

[cybercoma]

.

Edited January 30, 2017 by cybercoma

[PIK]

1 hour ago, cybercoma said:

The plan is so secretive that he's going around the country taking questions from the electorate. The best place to hide something is in plain view, huh?

So very true, except he didn't misspeak, he got caught telling the truth. 

Edited January 25, 2017 by PIK

[-TSS-]

The disadvantage of PR is that small cliff-hanger parties often have undue influence compared to their size. Similarly, while the main parties alternate there may be parties which are always in the government like the German Liberals until the 90's.

[-TSS-]

I have just glimpsed through the election-history in your country since the WW II and I noticed that there have been numerous elections which have resulted in hung parliament.

The main argument in favour of the FPTP-system is that it is supposed to provide decisive election-results with one party able to command the majority of the parliament but in your case that is clearly not the case.

Therefore all the more bizarre that you have stuck with a system which is clearly dysfunctional, unfair and capricious.

 

[Argus]

1 hour ago, -TSS- said:

I have just glimpsed through the election-history in your country since the WW II and I noticed that there have been numerous elections which have resulted in hung parliament.

The main argument in favour of the FPTP-system is that it is supposed to provide decisive election-results with one party able to command the majority of the parliament but in your case that is clearly not the case.

Therefore all the more bizarre that you have stuck with a system which is clearly dysfunctional, unfair and capricious.

There aren't all that many minority governments. And they normally don't last all that long.

[PIK]

14 hours ago, -TSS- said:

I have just glimpsed through the election-history in your country since the WW II and I noticed that there have been numerous elections which have resulted in hung parliament.

The main argument in favour of the FPTP-system is that it is supposed to provide decisive election-results with one party able to command the majority of the parliament but in your case that is clearly not the case.

Therefore all the more bizarre that you have stuck with a system which is clearly dysfunctional, unfair and capricious.

 

It is the fairest system out there and allows actual government work to get done., in most cases. The others are just to give the fringe more say and we dont need anything from the fringe.

[-TSS-]

Even if there is an overall majority for one party then the next balancing act is to soothe the possible various fringes of that party like with the Tories in Britain.

[-TSS-]

There are pros and cons to switching to PR. One of the biggest cons in my view is the long process of forming the government. In the system you have now if you have elections today then a new government takes office tomorrow.

Not in PR. It may take weeks if not even months to cobble up some weak coalition together. In finland we once had two months between the election and the new government taking office and we always have at least a month.

In Germany they had their election on Sept 24th. Still no results in the government-talks which seem to have heading for a breakdown and there may be new elections ahead.

[-TSS-]

For people who want to campaign against changing your current system of FPTP the best campaign-material is to refer to the currently ongoing total stalemate in Germany where the government-formation talks broke down and now they are pondering whether to have new elections or try some new combination of government.

 

In Spain they had a total of 314 days of a caretaker-government following two inconclusive elections.

[Queenmandy85]

The whole issue breaths hypocrisy. The NDP claims the Grits want a ranked ballot because it favours them. Why is the NDP so fixated on PR? Because it favours the NDP. The Social Credit...sorry, the new "Conservative" party wants FPTP for the same reason. At least FPTP has the advantage of not allowing fringe parties (NDP) to get positions in government and gives both real parties (Grits and Socreds) a turn in government.

Edited November 25, 2017 by Queenmandy85