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andrewducker ([personal profile] andrewducker) wrote2012-03-07 11:00 am
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Interesting Links for 07-03-2012

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matgb: Artwork of 19th century upper class anarchist, text: MatGB (Default)

[personal profile] matgb 2012-03-07 06:27 pm (UTC)(link)
No reason why you can't have voting allowed for several days except security of ballot boxes, but publishing results as they come in is problematic, especially in single member seat FPTP elections.

Basically, there's a natural tendency for voters to want to "back a winner" or stop the least liked option, if voters are published as you go then that can lead to marginal or third party candidates getting even more squeezed in vote share than they already do, and rewards parties who can mobilise their voters to get out early.

For a yes/no referendum it's less problematic, but still not a great idea-amongst other things it can lead to a depressed turnout if it looks like a foregone conclusion, if "Yes" gets an early lead then some "no" voters may give up and stay home, or vice versa.

It's a known problem in California in Presidential elections, because they declare state by state turnout is significantly lower in CA if there's already a clear winner, and that also depresses the vote for other elections held at the same time, etc. (that's from memory and I'm ten years out of date on the research, but it won't have changed that much).

[identity profile] bart-calendar.livejournal.com 2012-03-07 11:14 am (UTC)(link)
I can sort of see it with the student athletes. If just one player accepts a gift from a member of the alumni then the entire team can get suspended - and alumni are very crafty about finding ways to give gifts to athletes.

These guys are already going to university for free while non-athletes have to pay tens of thousands of dollars a year and taking spaces in the student body that could otherwise have gone to people who actually want an education.

If you accept the free ride that student athletes get then it seems reasonable for the university to do everything in it's power to make sure you don't shut down their athletic program because you are too dumb to realize that an alumni giving you a car is a NCAA violation and that if you put up images of you and the car on Facebook you are likely to get caught - should you ever piss off one of your "friends."

(A better solution would be to get rid of sports at the university level, but because sports brings in so much money, that won't happen. Another solution would be to pay the student athletes for playing games since their games bring in millions and millions of dollars for the universities. If they got a check from the school they'd be less tempted to accept cash and gifts from alumni.)

[identity profile] gonzo21.livejournal.com 2012-03-07 11:46 am (UTC)(link)
Damn, that's a really good question. Why does voting all have to happen on one day? Surely if it was an all week event, turn outs would be way up... and that would be awesome for democracy.

If, perhaps, very bad for tv stations.

[identity profile] momentsmusicaux.livejournal.com 2012-03-07 11:54 am (UTC)(link)
> daily updates on the ongoing count!

I'm pretty sure there's a very good reason we don't start the count until all voting had happened. There'd be all sorts of chaotic effects as parties and candidates and voters would discover how things were progressing.

In France, there's a total media blackout on elections for the final week (or two) of campaigning, which I imagine is for broadly similar reasons.

[identity profile] spacelem.livejournal.com 2012-03-07 12:26 pm (UTC)(link)
Sorry, did you say you wanted my username and password? No, I'm not giving them to you. In fact, I don't think I'm willing to work where my employers will not respect privacy. I'm sorry you wasted my time.

Jews in Scotland may be disenfranchised by a Saturday vote.

[identity profile] cartesiandaemon.livejournal.com 2012-03-07 12:38 pm (UTC)(link)
Wow, multiculturalism is hard. I assume many Jews would be willing to vote, but many would not.

I suspect the case of proxy voting is complicated. A quick google suggests that if you ask someone to do something for you, and they happen to do it on the Sabbath, but you didn't ask them to or see them doing it, it may be ok. Here, where you don't specifically require them to do it on Saturday, but you know they almost certainly _will_, I don't know for sure. Of course, it's still unfair if you have to use a proxy vote and other people don't -- people who can't find a convenient proxy will still be disenfranchised.

OTOH, maybe they could hold the vote in winter and/or keep the polls open after sunset? :)

[identity profile] ipslore.livejournal.com 2012-03-07 03:34 pm (UTC)(link)
The third one could be framed equally well as 'Jews in Scotland may be disenfranchised by Judaism'.

[identity profile] johncoxon.livejournal.com 2012-03-07 05:49 pm (UTC)(link)
How did you become a guy called Nick?
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