matgb: Artwork of 19th century upper class anarchist, text: MatGB (Spam)
Mat Bowles ([personal profile] matgb) wrote2006-11-01 09:45 pm
  • Add Memory
  • Share This Entry
Entry tags:

Canadian question

Specifically for the Canadians on my friends list, and/or anyone that knows a bit more about local colloquialisms. Given that Canada uses the same system of elections as the UK, and also has multiple parties in operation, do you either use the term Tactical Voting or have a similar term which describes the phenomena? The reason I ask is because I received this comment at my old blogspot site, on a post that's clearly labelled as a promotion for my new site.
I've been doing it for years! Although my favourite party is the NDP (yes I'm Canadian), I almost always voted for the Liberals, hoping that would help beat the Conservatives, because I knew NDP wouldn't end up getting elected. Now I know what this kind of phenomenon is called. :)
It looks legit, and human, and it's on topic. The problem with it is that her sig profile links to a wordpress powered spam blog (www.6home6.info - del-linkied for obvious reasons).

So, while I'll likely keep the comment, I'm very tempted to edit out the link. A human spammer is still a spammer, even if it's on topic comment. But at the same time, should effort like that be at least acknowledged?

Oh yeah; if you don't have analysts and discussion of the phenomena, why the hell not?
Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[identity profile] theweaselking.livejournal.com 2006-11-02 03:52 pm (UTC)(link)
"Safe seats" aren't inherently stupid. After all, my riding goes NDP because Broadbent was damn good at his job for a lot of years, and was sane, sensible, articulate, and quite popular. Because of this, he won over a lot of voters to vote for *him* even if they didn't like the NDP as a whole. Since voters are habitual creatures, this means that the NDP are still strong in the area despite Broadbent retiring.

Proportional voting and instant-run-off voting make a lot of sense. The problem is, they're both *bad* for the major parties, and so none of the major parties will implement them - and without them, nobody but the major parties gets to change the rules.

(My ideal possible Canadian government: Liberal minority, with both NDP *and* CPC holding Swing, so either one can make any legislation and you can't leave out both of them. Oh, and BQ with 0, count 'em, 0 seats. I think that's a good start.)
matgb: Artwork of 19th century upper class anarchist, text: MatGB (Deja Vu)

[personal profile] matgb 2006-11-02 11:27 pm (UTC)(link)
My problem with safe seats is the abuse parties put them to (at least over here), they get parachuted in aparatchiks with no local links, and get abandoned as they don't need the core votes they represent to win, so you get rising tides of disillusionment &c.

Not that I've written (and studied) this at great length of course. It's sorta my biggest obsession. I'd rather multi-member constituencies with STV as then decent local MPs get re-elected and crappy ones are easy to get rid of.

But you're right, the major parties will never go for it, which is why the minor parties need to have a real balance alnogside a reform groundswell. Shame the citizens assemblies things (or whatever they were called) didn't work out over there; were they national or just a few provinces?
Flat | Top-Level Comments Only