The Manifest Evil of First Past the Post

A last minute, pre-election EKOS poll in Canada shows that 65.6% of Canadians intend to vote for parties OTHER than the governing Conservative Party of Canada (CPC).

The CPC had been leading a minority government. An election was triggered by the CPC losing a non-confidence vote after the government was found to have been in contempt of Parliament.

Yet the CPC may actually end up winning a majority of all 308 seats with an even smaller share of the vote than they got last time - thanks to the First Past the Post voting system. This is because the two major opposition parties - who together have more than 50% support - may split the anti-CPC vote and allow the CPC to win an outright majority of all seats with as little as 34.5% of the total vote.....less than they got last time. The latest poll shows the usual 3rd-place NDP are running a close second to the CPC and ahead of the Liberal party. In Canadian terms this is a huge shift in voter preference at the federal level. But what hasn't changed is the monster-majority (65%) voter distaste for the Conservatives.....yet FPP has allowed them to win elections due to a split opposition vote.

That could never happen under MMP. In November, I'll be voting to keep MMP.

(Canadians are voting on their May 2nd. So the polls will open in eastern Canada around 11pm NZ time tonight and the last polls will close in the Yokon Territory around 2:30pm tomorrow, NZ time. Canada has seven time  time zones.)

Iran: Now it makes sense

Now I understand why the US and others boycotted the UN conference on racism. Pondering this issue, I watched the TV news tonight to get my head around the narrative we are supposed to suck up unquestioningly.

As expected, on both TVNZ and TV3, we got a big "I told you so!" from the countries who boycotted the conference after the Iranian President reportedly had a go at Israel in his speech. From the reports, we have no idea what he actually said, but I did get the very clear message that whatever it was, it more than justified boycotting the conference....if you buy the argument that what a single leader *might* say about another country is reason enough for your country to boycott a major conference on an important issue. I don't buy it. That Canada felt the need to announce the boycott over a year ago makes it even more odd.

I've seen this kind of pantomime before and know very well there is a lot more going on here than some countries getting upset about insults in Israel's direction. That's why the reasons given made no sense to me.

As is too often the case, I had to use the Internet to find out what's REALLY going on. (Amended sentence follows) The major wires services (AP and Reuters) and NZ's TV news and most newspapers, too often are either lazily purveying some government's (country of origin) propaganda as news or actively participating in misleading us. It hardly matters which as the result is the same: we aren't told why things are really happening.

Guess what I found out in about 15 seconds?

Iran is having elections on June 12th (less than 8 weeks from now) and they include the presidency. Conservative incumbent, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, hate-doll of the US and Israel, is standing against two reformers, pormer PM Mir-Hossein Mousavi and former speaker of the Majlis (legislature), Mehdi Karroubi. Both are reformers.

Now the boycott and theatre around it make sense....right down to the silly rainbow wig of the "protester" (I wonder who he really was?) thrown out of the conference venue during Ahmadinejad's speech. The US and others have a very real interest in making it very clear to Iranian voters that a vote for Ahmadinejad is a vote for more of the same lack of engagement with Iran and continued banking sanctions against Iran. The US and its allies (including NZ) want to see a reformer elected.

The Wikipedia article reports a poll taken in late March showing Mr. Mousavi on 52% and President Ahmadinejad on 36%.

It may well be that Ahmadinejad, running behind in the polls, had every intention of using his speech at the conference to play to a populist, America / Israel-hating home crowd and show he is able to stand up for Iran in before the world. Maybe this was the Iranian version of Bush's "Bring it on". A play to patriotism to win votes.

I don't like Ahmadinejad. He is divisive and negative. I hope he loses. But what a shame the 8 countries who didn't turn up at the UN Conference on Racism saw it as disposable in their wider game. Racism isn't a trivial issue and everyone could have sat quietly through Ahmadinejad's rant and got on with real, important work. That they chose not to is revealing by itself.

How National won the 2008 elections

In a recent talk, Noam Chomsky talks about the role of people like Crosby / Textor in election campaigns and how they undermine democracy. Also included would be the those like NZ Herald who banged on and on about the cost of the ETS while never mentioning the cost of doing nothing or reporting (that I can find) the latest research showing climate change to be caused by humans. Similarly the mis-named "anti-smacking" law. Never once did they tell people (that I can find, anyway) it has ALWAYS been illegal to hit children. Under the old law, the S59 defence only became relevant AFTER the police laid charges. Only people who actually read the law know that. The other 85% didn't....and still don't.

Arguably, they actively mislead people in order to prevent them from making an informed choice....and they are still doing it.



The full length talk ("What Next? The Elections, the Economy, and the World") can be seen here:

Part 1 - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0ohXvM648mc
Part 2 - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Vpstw1EAuI
Part 3 - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W3ofeCz4b7o

And then there were nine......

In the final elections results released today, the Greens picked up a 9th MP - Kennedy Graham. Kennedy is brother to former National Party minister, Sir Douglas Graham.

I'm glad he made it. He's a credible person and will make a worthwhile contribution.

The Green vote share in the specials improved enough over the preliminary result to get them to 6.72% of the vote and win that final seat. National's Cam Calder, their 59th MP, came out the loser on the day. They now have 58 MPs.

MMP Question of the Week

For those would like to dump MMP and return to FPP, I'd like to know your answers to some questions. I'll be asking them over the coming weeks.

Question 1:

Why do you want to vote for only one MP locally, when MMP lets you do that, AND vote for dozens more nationally?

Green Party vote by electorate

Interesting....and thanks to Jeremy Hall.

Election night Green percentages by electorate

20.13%   Wellington Central

16.50%   Rongotai

15.46%   Auckland Central

15.42%   Dunedin North

13.58%   Port Hills

10.83%   Christchurch Central

10.46%   Mt Albert

10.28%   West Coast-Tasman

  8.91%   Nelson

  8.89%   Ohariu

 

  8.19%   Mana

  7.79%   Ilam

  7.59%   Dunedin South

  7.53%   Hutt South

  7.38%   New Lynn

  7.32%   Coromandel

  7.22%   Te Tai Tonga

  7.18%   Selwyn

  6.97%   Christchurch East

  6.95%   Northland

 

  6.95%   Hamilton East

  6.79%   Kaikoura

  6.69%   Waitaki

  6.61%   Wigram

  6.47%   Northcote

  6.37%   Epsom

  6.36%   North Shore

  6.30%   Palmerston North

  6.24%   Waitakere

  6.16%   East Coast

 

  6.14%   New Plymouth

  5.76%   Tukituki

  5.74%   Whangarei

  5.69%   Rimutaka

  5.62%   Wairarapa

  5.39%   Maungakiekie

  5.39%   Otaki

  5.34%   Napier

  5.20%   Rangitikei

  5.19%   Waimakariri

 

  5.07%   Hamilton West

  5.06%   Rodney

  5.04%   Whanganui

  5.00%   Tamaki

  4.79%   Clutha-Southland

  4.76%   Rotorua

  4.72%   Helensville

  4.68%   Taranaki-King Country

  4.66%   Bay of Plenty

  4.31%   Taupo

 

  4.31%   Tauranga

  4.02%   Mt Roskill

  4.02%   Invercargill

  4.02%   Rangitata

  3.91%   Tamaki Makaurau

  3.90%   Te Atatu

  3.81%   East Coast Bays

  3.68%   Waikato

  3.42%   Pakuranga

  3.42%   Te Tai Tokerau

 

  3.40%   Te Tai Hauauru

  3.24%   Hunua

  3.14%   Hauraki-Waikato

  3.06%   Ikaroa-Rawhiti

  2.84%   Papakura

  2.57%   Waiariki

  2.35%   Botany

  2.28%   Manurewa

  2.11%   Mangere

  1.82%   Manukau East

Congratulations and other things

Congratulations to National and John Key for their success.

Congratulations to Helen Clarke and Labour for holding a solid 34% of the vote despite the hostile press.

Congratulations to Winston Peters and NZ First for polling far higher than anyone expected. Special praise for the gracious speech few expected.

Congratulations to Rodney Hide for winning Epsom and winning ACT 3.7% of the vote.

Congratulations to the Maori Party for picking up another local seat.

Congratulations to Peter Dunne for holding Ohariu-Belmont.

Congratulations to Jim Anderton for holding Wigram.

Well done, Greens, for winning 8 (maybe 9) seats and becoming the 3rd-largest party in the Parliament.

I don't think John Key will be overly keen to meld with ACT and lose any chance of a second term. If the economy tanks and National fails to look after the people who left Labour to support National then, again, they will be a one-term government. It would only take 6% to change their view of National and John Key to see a different government in 2011.

The campaign to defend democracy and MMP from an anti-democracy National Party and to win the next election for the centre-left, begins tomorrow morning.

Election Day

08:55: Arrived at Beach Haven Community Hall. The doors were not yet open to voters and there were about twenty people waiting to vote.
09:00: Doors opened and we streamed in. Lots of tables and staff waiting. All over in about 5 minutes. Three National Party scrutineers, one Green scrutineer (Hi Roy!), one Maori party scrutineer at the Te Tai Tokerau voting table......and no scrutineers from any other party at that point.

09:10: Grocery shopping at New World in Birkenhead. The wait begins.

What a party vote for the Green Party stands for

• reducing New Zealand’s oil dependence and climate change emissions
• improving public transport and the rail system
• cleaning up our waterways
• increased protection of threatened species and ecosystems
• improved local food security, keeping NZ farming and environment GE free and supporting organic growing
• reducing child poverty and reducing violence against children
• forming a genuine partnership with Maori under the Treaty
• making education free and accessible
• protecting our national sovereignty from overseas ownership of land and strategic assets; and keeping us out of foreign wars
• protecting public healthcare, and investing in preventative health measures to keep us healthy and well
• protecting workers’ rights and raising the minimum wage
• open government, protecting democracy and civil rights

(h/t Frogblog)

The one party I can't vote for is the National party. They are the party who want to take my vote away. They do not resepct democracy. They deserve no one's vote. It's perverse that such an anti-democratic party enjoy the support they do from people who don't appear to understand that a vote for the National Party tomorrow may mean one day soon they no longer have a vote that counts.

A National Party voter in Porirua who votes for National is voting to have their own vote taken away one day soon. If MMP is dumped, that National voter in Porirua will once again be condemned to electing no one if they don't vote for Labour.

Dawn after the long Republican night

Barack Obama is to be the next US President. It also appears Americans have given the Democratic Party majorities in both houses of Congress.

This represents a comprehensive rolling back of the Reagan/Bush conservative agenda. Not surprising, as it has proven itself to be ultimately destructive rather than constructive.

There is a certain irony in this. Living on the North Shore, as I do, where the National Party is dominant, I'm surrounded by people who echo the views of the US Republicans while at the same time apparenly not realising much of it is nonsense and propaganda. It's the usual menu of dumbness: Invading Iraq was a good idea; unregulated, free markets will cure everything; government is always bad while private business is always good.....and so on, without actual evidence ever intruding on the minds of these faithful.

America had to suffer the disasters wrought by this nonsense. If National wins on Saturday without understanding that much it has advanced as good has been shown to be not good (PPPs too often = unaccountable crony capitalism, etc...) then that will be sad for New Zealand.

There is much in conservatism that is good.....but not much that is good in religious fundamentalism (whether the deity is the Sky Father or markets) and its partner, wilful blindness. National has been too prone to faith in things the evidence has long shown to be wrong or not the best way of doing things.

National is also New Zealand's declared anti-democracy party. They seek a return to First Past the Post and don't appear to mind at all that this will mean depriving fully half of all voters of the meaningful vote they currently enjoy under MMP.

How anyone could vote for a party who want to take their vote away is a mystery to me......but blind faith does make people do silly things.

Thankfully, today, here was a moment of reason - open-eyed, clear thinking - in the United States sufficiently widespread that Brack Obama won.

Fingers crossed those eyes remain open.

Obama vs McCain: Final YouTube stats

As of November 4th, 14:00 EST, my final count in the YouTube subscriber stakes between Barack Obama and JOhn McCain stands at:

Obama: 116,731 subscribers / 18,593,478 channel views

McCain: 28,784 subscribers / 2,068,249 channel views

If this is seen as a measure of immediate interest (channel views) and ongoing interest (subscriptions), then Obama has wiped the floor with Jon McCain.

Today we get to find out whether or not Obama wins by a landslide. That he will win appears to be all but certain.

If McCain were to win today, despite all the polls showing Obama 10 or more points ahead and other indicators in Obama's favour, I think we'd see the biggest "WTF!!!" moment in the US since 9/11.

The rest of the world would be left to wonder what is really going on.

It would not be pretty.....

US elections: Says it all, really.

The comment quoted below highlights the gap between reality and propaganda in the Republican narrative.

I'm a little confused. Let me see if I have this straight.....

* If you grow up in Hawaii, raised by your grandparents, you're "exotic, different."
* If you grow up in Alaska eating moose burgers, you're a quintessential American story.

* If your name is Barack, you're a radical, unpatriotic Muslim.
* If you name your kids Willow, Trig and Track, you're a maverick.

* If you graduate from Harvard law School, you are unstable.
* If you attend 5 different small colleges before graduating, you're well grounded.

* If you spend 3 years as a brilliant community organizer, become the first black President of the Harvard Law Review, create a voter registration drive that registers 150,000 new voters, spend 12 years as a Constitutional Law professor, spend 8 years as a State Senator representing a district with over 750,000 people, become chairman of the state Senate's Health and Human Services committee, spend 4 years in the United States Senate representing a state of 13 million people while sponsoring 131 bills and serving on the Foreign Affairs, Environment and Public Works and Veteran's Affairs committees, you don't have any real leadership experience.
* If your total resume is: local weather girl, 4 years on the city council and 6 years as the mayor of a town with less than 7,000 people, 20 months as the governor of a state with only 650,000 people, then you're qualified to become the country's second highest ranking executive.

* If you have been married to the same woman for 19 years while raising 2 beautiful daughters, all within Protestant churches, you're not a real Christian.
* If you cheated on your first wife with a rich heiress, and left your disfigured wife and married the heiress the next month, you're a Christian.

* If you teach responsible, age appropriate sex education, including the proper use of birth control, you are eroding the fiber of society.
* If, while governor, you staunchly advocate abstinence only, with no other option in sex education in your state's school system, while your unwed teen daughter ends up pregnant , you're very responsible.

* If your wife is a Harvard graduate lawyer who gave up a position in a prestigious law firm to work for the betterment of her inner city community, then gave that up to raise a family, your family's values don't represent America's.
* If you're husband is nicknamed "First Dude", with at least one DWI conviction and no college education, who didn't register to vote until age 25 and once was a member of a group that advocated the secession of Alaska from the USA, your family is extremely admirable.

OK, *much* clearer now.

Even the Colmar-Brunton poll is narrowing

The One News / Colmar-Brunton poll today shows the gap between National and Labour to be narrowing. National slipped 3 points to 47% and Labour is also down 1 to 35%. The Greens are up 3 points, on 8%. That's a very high rating for the Greens in a Colmar-Brunton poll.

This is the poll that typically gives National a 6% to 8% bonus over actual election results, so the slip back for National to 47% in a C-B poll leaves one wondering. Allowing for C-B's usual bias to National, is that party now really on something more like 41%? Or have Colmar-Brunton changed the way they do their polling?

Who knows. But I was interested to see Guyon Espiner's reaction to last week's rendering of 50% to National in the previous edition of the C-B poll. He more or less said he didn't believe it and thought the election would be much closer than that.

It struck me at the time that when the TVNZ political analyst fronting the C-B poll discounts it, they (Colmar-Brunton) may have realised the game was up. Espiner didn't say his polling emperor had no clothes, but he came very close.

If C-B didn't alter the way they do their sampling in the past week, then the election IS much closer than it looks.

Polls? What polls?

Here's today's Roy Morgan poll.

I don't normally publish results from polls commissioned by companies openly campaigning for a particular political party. That means the Herald-Digipoll and the Fairfax poll normally won't attract much comment from me other than to note those organisations have been staunch in their support for the National Party for the past couple of years (Herald) or couple of decades (Dominion Post). 

Winston in the clear. ACT hoist by own petard

The Electoral Commission has found that NZ First has done nothing it can be prosecuted for. Any likely offences regarding reporting of donations are too old to be actioned and none were committed within the current window of legal liability.

On the other hand, the ACT Party has been found to have not correctly declared the benefit of office space provided to that party by businessman Sir Robert Jones in 2005. They are being asked to submit an amended return.

I had a feeling when this all began that Winston Peters would successfully navigate the shoals of waiting pirahna.....and it would appear he has done so, though at some cost to his reputation with respect the donation from Owen Glenn.

My attention now turns to whether or not Winston Peters and NZ First climb back from their current low poll ratings and win seats in the next parliament. If enough people vote for him, he will.

Why they would want to vote for him is no more clear to me now than it ever was.

Close election?

Tonight's TV3-TNS polls makes it look this election will be much closer then many have expected. National remain the party with the largest minority support, but the overall picture appears to confirm a recent trend seeing the centre-left regaining ground as a group.

If the election outcome looked like this, it would be too close to call and any of a number of parties could swing it one way or another. Granted, the Greens have said they prefer Labour and I have no doubt they do. The Maori Party could - conceivably - go either way, but I'm fairly certain that if they actually had a choice, they would go with Labour, though only after they had extracted some serious policy initiatives for Maori.

Here are today's numbers:

Canadian Election

Canadians have returned a minority Conservative Party government. The Conservatives won 143 of 308 seats, with 37.4% of the vote nationally. They needed 155 seats for a bare majority.

In most provinces, the Conservatives won a clear majority of seats, but Canadians in the two most populous provinces - Ontario and Quebec - did not back them. The Conservatives won the largest minority of seats in Ontario and ran 3rd in Quebec. More than half of all Canadians live in these two provinces, so if you don't win them, you don't win a majority.

The First Past the Post voting system threw up the usual upside-down results.

The Bloc Quebecois won 10% of the vote nationally and 50 seats - all in Quebec - where they won a clear majority of seats.

The New Democratic Party (NDP) won 18.2% of the vote nationally, but only 37 seats.

The Greens got over 940,000 votes nationally or 6.4% of the total vote. That's 50% more than in 2006 and two thirds of what the Bloc got this time out. But the greens won no seats as Green support is accross the country rather than regionally based.

The total turnout was 59.1%, putting the shares of each party into perspective. Even the Conservatives, with 37.4% of the vote are only supported by barely 20% of ALL Canadians. The rest have even less support.

In Alberta, no party other than the Conservatives won more than 13% of the vote and no seats. The turnout was a dismal 52%. Low even by Canadian standards. If you aren't a Conservative there, there is no point in wasting time voting.

Overall, 65.4% of Canadians voted for parties other than the Conservative party, but won slightly more than 50% of all the seats.

The election result leaves Canada more or less where it was 6 weeks ago prior to the election being called, with a minority Conservative government required to seek support from three opposition parties who have more in common with each other than with the Conservatives.

Conceivably, those three parties could form a government if they chose to. But the main stumbling "bloc" there is the separatist Bloc Quebecois who have little interest in working constructively for the good of a united Canada.

Canada's balkanisation, disunity and dysfunction under First Past the Post continues.

Polls on the move

Today's TV3-TNS poll shows a gap between Labour and National of 6 points. The latest Roy Morgan poll shows a gap of 3 per cent. Both polls show a sharp convergence in support between the two main parties. In both polls, the Green party also gained support. (Right-click on the chart below to enable other functions - like rotation)

Saturday before last (Sept 27th), the NZ Herald published an informal poll that they titled "Swinging to the Right" despite the 43.5% result for National, which was actually one of the worst this year for them.

With today's polls in view, it may well be that the Herald's poll was an early indication of the shift that the two latest polls are also capturing.

So maybe we should call that three polls showing people becomign wary of electing a National government.

Democracy - You know when you haven't got it

The Canadian federal election to elect the members of the Canadian House of Commons in Ottawa is next week, on October 14th.

Millions of Canadians face the prospect of once again casting votes that elect no one.

The voters who elect no one in any electorate anywhere are called "Orphan Voters". They now have their own web site at orphanvoters.ca .  If you want to see how many votes were wasted in London-Fanshawe, try entering "N6E 2V7" in the post code field. It's a shocker.

Canada doesn't have MMP. They still use First Past the Post. While some in New Zealand have clearly forgotten (or failed to appreciate)  how truly awful First Past the Post really is, millions of Canadians will very soon re-discover how pointless it is to bother casting those wasted votes that elect no one.

Canada has essentially been balkanised into virtually monolithic regions thanks to First Past the Post. Actual votes show that almost all parties enjoy broad support across the whole country, but thanks to First Past the Post, one party with minority voter support is able to dominate in a given region.  This has lead to considerable partisan politicking between regions and no small amount of dischord. No one party has a majority in the Federal parliament and regionally-based minority governments have been the outcome in the past two election and are likely in this one, too. 

Essentially, First Past the Post has produced a divisive and destructive political environment where parties with minority support in their own regions are over-represented in the national parliament.  

For example, the Bloc Quebecois, with 10.5% of the vote in 2006, won 51 seats out of 318 - almost 20% of all seats. But the NDP, with 17.5% of the vote only won 29, less than 10% of all seats.  Almost twice as many votes won the NDP a bit more than half as many seats. 

In the three prairie provinces of Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba, if you don't vote for the Conservative party, you are unlikely to elect anyone.

In Quebec, if you don't vote for the Bloc Quebecois, you are unlikely to elect anyone.

In Ontario, the Liberals tend to hold sway, with a few Conservative pockets in rural areas, and a vote for anyone else, much of the time, is pointless.

In each case, the 'winner' is simply the largest minority - not the majorityi

In an effort to cast a vote that actually counts, there is a Facebook group devoted to matching voters who have worthless votes in their own electorate with voters for other parties in electorates where their votes are also worthless. They co-operate to vote strategically for a common goal - in this case, keeping the unpopular Conservative party from gaining a majority of the seats with barely 35% of all the votes.

There is a desperate air among these voters seeking - somehow - to cast a vote that actually matters.

Here in New Zealand, we would be fools to get rid of MMP and return to this situation...... 

November 8th NZ election

I'm looking forward to voting on November 8th. It will be for the Greens.

I can't vote for Labour, for reasons given below.

I can't vote for National because they want to take away from hundreds of thousands of Kiwis the vote that actually counts. The vote that MMP gave them and that they never had under First Past the Post, no matter who they voted for.

I can't vote for NZ First because it's lead by Winston Peters, whom I've respected as a survivor, but never felt he spoke for me.

I can't vote for ACT because to me, they represent all that is selfish and retrograde in human behaviour.

I can't vote for United Future because they lack the wider vision it takes to chart the course for a nation.

I can't vote for the Maori Party, though I have a lot of respect for them, because the Green Party promote the same things and much more besides. There is much in Maori culture that we would do well to learn from, and the Green Party has taken that lesson on board. As Derek Fox said on Radio NZ tonight, the top 10 NZ companies of 20 years ago no longer even exist, while the top 10 Maori companies of 20 years ago are still there and still generating wealth and overseeing resources.  Sustainability is the underlying theme for both parties in many ways.

I can't vote for Jim Anderton's Progressives because, though Jim is worthy in many ways, he is a failed leader in much the same way Winston Peters is a failed leader. They alienate others by not sharing the vision.

The Green Party best encompasses my own values, particularly their strong commitent to democracy, internally and externally and their pragmatic approach to  problems of all kinds. Despite the propaganda from some quarters to the contrary, Greens are essentially unbound by any ideology other than working to ensure we build a sustainable world system for all who come after us. Greens understand we are, together, stronger and more whole than we are separately. That community can exist alongside individuality and that joint stewardship is just as important as individual property. 

No other party makes the planet we all share and rely entirely the centre of their view of the world. To NOT behave this way is madness in the long run. No other party seems to grasp how long the long run really is.  Labour comes close at times, but has opted to compromise in the short to medium term, rather than face the debate that we all need to have about where New Zealand is headed. The consequences of that failure to make and win the arguments is all around us.  

It doesn't help genine debate that the daily newpapers in New Zealand, with their monopolies in each major town and city, are almost exclusively owned by foreign interests who do not share Kiwi values. There is much "dog whistling" and misdirection (Tony Veitch, Winston Peters, Millie Elder...and on and on....) and the big issues get short shrift.  

I'll be looking for 10% or more for the Greens.