ya know - in oz, we have compulsory voting - which is kinda weird/anachronistic - but it has some good spinoff benefits. not the least of which is that theres no real GOTV (get out the vote) effort - cos its a given. and its kind of a headache sometimes but people dont really complain about it being compulsory. seeing the 'already voted - go away' photo kinda reminded of the enormous overhead of optional voting - youve got a bunch of people knocking on doors of people who have voted - or wont vote - the waste/inefficiency is kinda ridiculous. and on a school day too. (not to demean your noble noble efforts g - its the system im critiquing.)
and another benefit is that success of a campaign is based on whether u convince a majority of the population that your guy/gal is better than the other guygal. and thats important cos yuor success isnt dependant on pandering to those who might otherwise stay home - cf kroves 4m christocreeps. if his goal is to get these people over-represented, then he has to over-represent them in policy. perversely, the system encourages over-reaching to people who dont normally vote.
and another benefit is that u dont have 'vote or die' campaigns.
and another benefit is that u truly do get a full representation of the population. and people are incented to know at least something about the election. they have to vote so they might as well have a preference. im not sure that the decision is any smarter, particularly given the role the media plays, but at least we arent left wondering 'what would have happened if more marginally-informed people gave us their opinion?'
there are some problems with mandatory voting of course - eg the fact that it is mandatory - but its also mandatory that u take your shoes off when u get on a plane - so praps mandatory voting isnt as awful as it seems with a bit of context thrown in.
oh yeah - and a weekend election isnt a bad idea either.
----- Original Message -----
From: "Adam
Subject: Philly-uja
Date: Sat, 6 Nov 2004 00:46:38 -0500
>
> A few pics from the ill-fated day.
>
> http://www.ofoto.com/I.jsp?c=ven8u3j.8woy5qez&x=0&y=-s8n4uw
>
________________________________________________________________________________
Four more years. Seriously.
wotisitgood4.blogspot.com
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment