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Kamala Harris Election Campaign

psionl0 said:
Even without the disenfranchisement, voluntary voting favours the Republicans.
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Australians want to vote. They don't need a law to force them. Democrats don't want to vote. A law won't force them.

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Imagine, hypothetically, that African Americans largely don't bother to vote. So you make a law criminalizing this behavior. What next? African Americans don't show up at the polls, what do you do? Fine them? Jail them? Of course not. Has anyone even thought this through?
 
theprestige said:
Australians want to vote. They don't need a law to force them. Democrats don't want to vote. A law won't force them.

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Imagine, hypothetically, that African Americans largely don't bother to vote. So you make a law criminalizing this behavior. What next? African Americans don't show up at the polls, what do you do? Fine them? Jail them? Of course not. Has anyone even thought this through?
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Yeah, we did. We've been thinking it through since 1925.
 
dudalb said:
Agreed, I just don't see how Mandatory Voting educates anybody.
It's , frankly Magical Thinking, that making somebody go to the polls is going to make them somehow a "better citizen".
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If you have to go to vote, and it is actually quite easy to do so in Australia because there are plenty of polling stations and it is all well run by an unbiased federal group, you may as well give a few milliseconds thought at some time in the weeks leading up to the election to perhaps thinking about which candidate(s) you are going to vote for. Even a donkey vote - numbering from 1 down the ballot - requires SOME intentional effort. Given our voting is entirely manual on paper, if you can't find the joules to pop down to the local school, write a couple of numbers on a piece of paper and drop it in a slot then you are just too ******* lazy.

Most of us don't personally get passionately incensed about our candidates and parties, mostly because they are usually not a million miles apart on policies anyway. Also, we tend to make our political stances like religion and sex - nobody's damn business but our own. So an election for us is simply an excuse to get out of the house on a nice Saturday morning (all our elections are on Saturdays).

Besides...democracy sausage!
 
theprestige said:
And yet none of you have ever thought to ask why you have such an unnecessary law on the books.
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Shows how much you know.

After each federal election, the Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters (JSCEM) conducts an inquiry into the election and considers public submissions. A report, with recommendations for improvement to Australia's electoral system, is subsequently published.

The 1996 JSCEM report recommended that compulsory voting should be repealed. The ALP and Democrat members of the committee did not support the recommendation, and the government rejected the recommendation, saying that voluntary voting should not be considered at this time.

The 1998 and 2001 JSCEMs received submissions on voluntary voting, but chose not to pursue the issue.

The 2004 JSCEM recommended that a full and separate inquiry be held into voluntary and compulsory voting.
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https://www.aec.gov.au/About_AEC/Publications/voting/index.htm

The idea of abolishing mandatory voting is a familiar topic in Australian politics, most famously espoused by former Liberal cabinet member and Senator Nick Minchin, who is an outspoken opponent of the system.

Earlier this year [2013 -ed], the Queensland Liberal Party released a discussion paper on election reforms that included a section on the possibility of ending compulsory voting.

The move was met with outrage from senior Labor party figures, including then Prime Minister Julia Gillard who tweeted: "Fight @theqldpremier's plan to end compulsory voting. Don't let the Liberals make our democracy the plaything of cashed-up interest groups.''

Mr Rudd also broached the topic in a wide-reaching Green Paper released in 2009 asking: "Do you think compulsory voting should continue in Australia?"
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https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-23810381

Minchin had a number of like-minded supporters of voluntary voting in the Liberal Party. Among them, importantly, was John Howard, whose prime ministership coincided with the mobilisation to abolish compulsory voting.

Howard had been on record as an opponent of the practice since his entry to the federal parliament in 1974. The Liberal Party campaign against compulsory voting manifested in, among other things:

  • the party’s federal council resolving in favour of voluntary voting
  • shadow cabinet endorsing a recommendation for a change of policy to voluntary voting being placed before the joint Liberal-National party parliamentary room
  • the introduction in the South Australian parliament of two bills to repeal compulsory voting by successive Liberal state governments
  • Coalition members of the Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters repeatedly recommending the abolition of the practice.
In the end, these agitations achieved nought.
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https://theconversation.com/compuls...ate-how-special-it-makes-our-democracy-234801

But again, this should not be a subject of discussion in this thread. I have requested a thread split, starting with my initial derail.
 
Norman Alexander said:
If you have to go to vote, and it is actually quite easy to do so in Australia because there are plenty of polling stations and it is all well run by an unbiased federal group, you may as well give a few milliseconds thought at some time in the weeks leading up to the election to perhaps thinking about which candidate(s) you are going to vote for. Even a donkey vote - numbering from 1 down the ballot - requires SOME intentional effort. Given our voting is entirely manual on paper, if you can't find the joules to pop down to the local school, write a couple of numbers on a piece of paper and drop it in a slot then you are just too ******* lazy.

Most of us don't personally get passionately incensed about our candidates and parties, mostly because they are usually not a million miles apart on policies anyway. Also, we tend to make our political stances like religion and sex - nobody's damn business but our own. So an election for us is simply an excuse to get out of the house on a nice Saturday morning (all our elections are on Saturdays).

Besides...democracy sausage!
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I see you dodge the issue of if it a good idea to force people who are totally ignorant of the issues to vote, and the moral question of whether government should coerce people to vote.
 
arthwollipot said:
Yes, I have already requested a split, and I apologise for setting off the derail.
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No biggie. I've derailed many a thread.

It's worth discussing. I agree with mandatory voting. But it really is out of place here. I didn't want to get sucked in and find myself contributing to a 4 page derail.
 
ChrisBFRPKY said:
I know you'd love to believe these things for reasons. Just like Harris would love for her crowd to believe she speaks with a Southern accent. It's all for show.
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Wrong.

Portland, Oregon, which is about as far from the deep south as one can get, is pocketed with little suburban communities of African Americans; who dress up in fancy clothes on Sundays and congregate around little community churches. And all speak to each other with a Southern-sounding twang.

It's no affectation. It's a (sub)cultural thing.
 
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Shadowdweller said:
Wrong.


It's no affectation. It's a (sub)cultural thing.
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I have lived in and around Seattle most of my life. I use to frequently go to Vancouver BC which is about 140 miles North. Still, how they speak there is quite different than Seattle. What's weird is how quickly you find yourself using their speech patterns.
 
I think it's so sad that people a discussion about this southern accent nonsense. It's such an absurd accusation. There are no people who heard what she said and were "on the fence" as to whether Kamala was faking a southern accent to pander to southerners.

This is all just another MAGA attempt to convince people that Kamala is a bad person based on nothing. They are just throwing **** spaghetti at the walls and hoping something will stick AND be appetizing to the public.
 
theprestige said:
Imagine, hypothetically, that African Americans largely don't bother to vote. So you make a law criminalizing this behavior. What next? African Americans don't show up at the polls, what do you do? Fine them? Jail them? Of course not. Has anyone even thought this through?
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Do African Americans get a free pass on petty crimes like jaywalking?
 
theprestige said:
Australians want to vote. They don't need a law to force them. Democrats don't want to vote. A law won't force them...
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Once again, you got your **** backwards. All Congressional elections show the Democrats getting more votes than the Republican candidates.

Its a long standing trend.
 
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