OT 2 party political system

[Erax]

Having two-round elections takes care of the 'candidates A, B and C' situation. In the first round, everyone votes for the candidate they like best. The two most-voted candidates go on to the second round, then everyone votes again. Unless someone changed their mind between rounds, A gets all the votes he had before, plus some of C's votes. Same for B. Those who voted for C in the first round didn't throw away their votes, they are still getting to decide who gets elected. Candidate C's situation is not too bad either, as he can gain political capital by supporting A or B or neither in the second round.

[Narrew]

One thing that bothers me is the career politician. I had always felt that serving the public should be a sacrifice not a full time job. At one time I thought term limits would be great, but I know there are good politicians on both sides of the isle, that they want to work for the public, but I don't want to throw the baby out with the bath water.

I admit I am biased and when I hear politicians like Daschel and Kennedy spew excrement, I tend to waffle on the term limit idea.

I do think that we need to repeal their perks when they leave office (yearly wage and medical) make them live off of Social Security and Medicare, if they did that, then perhaps politicians on both sides of isle will decide to do the right thing. If it is good enough for me then it should be good enough for them.

Since we don't have term limits we have to hope the voting public will change their view on career Politicians.

[Loser]

The problem with cutting the pay of a politician is that s/he is still a politician. These are powerful people. If they are not secure, financially and in their future, they may use their power for the benefit of specific Groups who will then give them that security.

Of course, it's also possible that they are doing that already....

Wha'ch gonna do?

[Narrew]

Thats true Loser, but if they knew they were not going to get a free ride after being elected, perhaps they will do their thing then get back to the private sector *shrug*

[Suicide Junkie]

As for pay, what if every person were given something like $5 to divide up amongst the politicians in office?

Disallow any other payments to them.

With hundreds of millions of people, that should give them all a reasonable amount of pay, and keep them focussed on serving the people.

[PvK]

Originally posted by Phoenix-D:
"That is, everyone votes for all of the candidates whom they approve enough to want in office, and the one with the most approvals wins"

How is this any different than the current? Unless you restrict people from voting twice for the same person..

Tbontob and SJ seem to have understood what I meant.

The difference from the current system is that in the current system, a voter can only vote for one candidate. In my suggestion, voters can vote for some, none, or all candidates.

Example:
Three candidates for president: Democrat, Republican, and Independent.
40% of the people actually like the Democrat.
40% of the people actually like the Republican.
60% of the people actually like the Independent.

Note that adds to 140%, because some voters actually like more than one of the candidates.

However, half of all voters are sure either a Democrat or a Republican will win.

In the current system, that means half (probably more in reality) of the people who like the independent decide to vote for either the Republican or the Democrat, because they like one better than the other, and think voting for the Independent will have no effect.

Results:
~45% Democrat
~45% Republican
10% Independent

Democrat and Republican look like they are really popular, and Independent voters could have determined the vote for one or the other, if only they hadn't "wasted" their vote.

In my system, the results would be:
Democrat: 40% approval
Republican: 40% approval
Independent: 60% approval

The truth comes out, and the most-approved candidate actually wins.

PvK

[Captain Kwok]

JimBob:

I disagree with you. I think the main reason the Liberals keep getting elected is because the right is too splintered. If the Canadian Alliance and PCs got together, it might help - but many here in Eastern Canada still hate the PCs from the 80s (and the fact there leader is not so strong). The Canadian Alliance (basically Canada's Republicans ) are percieved here by many as overly religious and too eager to privatize. That kind of stuff only flies in Canada's little Texas, Alberta, and parts of BC and Saskatchewan. You're right about the NDP, too far left to win an election but still a healthy part of the process.

[Will]

Originally posted by Loser:
The problem with cutting the pay of a politician is that s/he is still a politician. These are powerful people. If they are not secure, financially and in their future, they may use their power for the benefit of specific Groups who will then give them that security.

Not to mention that 99% of the politicians in federal office were millionaires before they decided to run for office, and the same for the high level positions in state governments and a few large urban centers.

I've seen the multiple-round voting system suggested a few times, but I doubt it will be implemented any time in the near future. There will be several people that will argue that the current system is more stable (in its ability to keep the status quo -- when you really look at it, there are pitifully few issues that are really in contention between Democrats and Republicans, especially in election years). The only way to change it on the federal level would be an Amendment to the Constitution, requiring IIRC, the approval of 75% of the states' legislatures, and 2/3rds of the US Congress. So that's quite a bit of inertia to overcome, seeing that most politicians have a vested interest in keeping the one-round, two-party voting system intact.

It would be nice if the two-round system was in place, though. I wouldn't feel like so much of a foolish idealist for not voting for Gush or Bore... err... Demicans and Republicrats... errr... whatever.

[PvK]

Yep, that's why I called it a tyrrany. It may be labelled democracy (tm) - government by the people. However, if all the people can vote on is whether to have Scumbag A or Sleazebag B, etc., er...

It's more of a tyrrany by way of defective system, the people's own ignorance, and the people who take advantage of it. So it goes. I like to think that eventually, however, people will change it. Not that that's really any good.

The way to get enough support and awareness to change it is through discussion, media, and arts. Fortunately, it's a pretty easy concept to illustrate.

PvK

[narf poit chez BOOM]

automatic lie detecter tests for polititions whenever they say something.

[ June 01, 2003, 06:17: Message edited by: narf poit chez BOOM ]