After reading that the Democrats have once again decided that Enemy No. 1 at the upcoming federal election is not the Howard government, not the Labor Party and not the religious nutbags Family First, I won't be directing my preferences to the Democrats as has been my usual practice.
Australia needs more Greens in the Senate. I think it also needs more Democrats in the Senate, but not at the expense of the Greens- rather it needs to be expense of the Liberals, Nationals or Family First if this country isn't to remain in the moral quagmire it has occupied for the past decade.
8 comments:
I left the Dems because of what they did to the Greens.
Sigh, indeed. It's not a tactic that I truck with.
I know where they're coming from, in that a significant proportion of Dems voters are disaffectected liberals who hate the Greens and would never vote for them (roughly 1/3 I would say. I was surprised how high this was when I started getting involved with the Dems).
But that leaves 2/3 who feel a lot of sympathy with the Greens.
The only sense that they're competition is that there's roughly 10-12% of voters who won't/don't vote majors, and it doesn't matter what the minors do, that percentage is pretty stable, it's just internally that it divides.
Obviously, I prefer Dems in parliament to Greens, and I'm still convinced anyone who reads Hansard would too, but sometimes... Sigh. Ignoring 2/3rd's of potential voters in order to appeal to 1/3. You don't need to be a mathematician to work that one out.
The other problem is that the democrats preferenced Family First at the last Federal election (where Fielding got elected on 1.9% of the Vote over the Greens). This time only Andrew Bartlett in Queensland has ruled out preferencing Family First ahead of the Greens.
So Mayb Lyn needs to be asked if she's serious about what she talks about.
i had no idea about that serena.
Gam, oh yeah. The Dems did, so did pretty much everyone else.
You can read a little bit about it here, if you're interested.
I would also point out that parties - all parties - decide their preferences flows at a state level. So what's true for one state ain't true for any other necessarily.
Some more preference gems of wisdom:
"Pre-election warnings about the Government’s chances of winning control of the Senate proved to be true. If the Greens had swapped preferences with Family First ahead of the Coalition, as the Democrats did, then the Coalition would not have won four seats in Queensland and would not have gained control of the Senate."
In Dems defence of FF preferences, it's not like they were like, "ohhh, let's give preferences to FF" FF were _well_ down the list, near the very bottom, in all states, it was just that they were above the liberals. It was a conscious strategy to try and preserve balance of power, but it didn't matter in the end anyway. :(
You're right, the Dems don't make the people they have to work with in the Senate their 'enemies'. Unfortunate as it is, most people vote for the old parties, so you have to work with them.
From what I've heard, the Greens have driven a hard bargain, they want everything in exchange for Dems preferences, yet Dems wont even benefit from a preference deal with the Greens! The Dems primary vote is likely to be lower, so the Greens will benefit from Dems preferences.
What about the Greens preferencing Labor in marginal seats? Surely that also means that the Greens Enenmy no. 1 is not Rudd.
Is that not also a betrayal according to your understanding?
"What about the Greens preferencing Labor in marginal seats? Surely that also means that the Greens Enenmy no. 1 is not Rudd."
er... what?
Post a Comment