Election Thought

Many years ago there was a Spitting Image sketch which explained the reign of Tory evil for 16 years - people would go into the polling area full of determination to vote the right way, and then their cheque book would whisper into their ears and persuade them to vote Conservative.

I have a feeling something similar will happen today.  Only, all the people who were going to switch from Labour to Lib-Dem will find that they have somehow voted Labour, because voting Lib-Dem is a wasted vote.  This despite the fact that if everyone who _wanted_ to vote Lib Dem did so, they'd be the next parliment...

If there's a better reason to believe in Proportional Representation than this election, I don't know what it is.

Best Dalek Livejournal Ever

If you watched the Dalek episode of Doctor Who a couple of days ago, you will loosen your bowels with pure pleasure at this.

Voting

I have no objection to people voting the wrong way _deliberately_.  I have friends who will vote Conservative, and if they have thought about the issues and believe that this is the best thing to do, then that is what they _should_ do.

I object to people voting without knowledge or understanding.  I'd happily have a (very simple) quiz before the election.  One that asked people to identify the leaders of the main  parties, and identify a couple of policies of each.  One that could be passed by anyone who spent five minutes reading up on things before the vote.  Because then at least people would have had to spend 5 minutes taking an interest before they voted. 

They might even learn something.

More voting stuff

bohemiancoast said:
In many ways the lack of fervour amongst voters is quite a good sign; it means that the quality of life for people has risen to the point where the poor are no longer forced to politicise as a means of meeting their basic needs.

Which is, in some ways, a very good point.  If party A was going to actively oppress you then you'd be out there voting against them.  So the fact that things are so close and people are so apathetic seems to mean that either all the parties are oppressing people equally, or that the general public doesn't feel horribly oppressed by any of them.

Either that or they're all watching Friends re-runs.

I am currently...

downloading my favourite episode of the X-Files - Jose Chung's From Outer Space
Listening to tisme playing Zelda: Ocarina of Time on the GameCube
Waiting for 0olong and diotina to arrive
Wondering about the results of the election.

Election fun

My Dad voted at 7:30am.  My Mum went down later and asked if he'd been in to vote.  And they told her.

Isn't there supposed to be some kind of secret ballot thing associated with the election?