Another good questions from Simon Bridges:
Why is literally every political journalist in this country pro MMP, and what does this say about the level of political debate in this country?
Is it too much to ask for a) balance and b) some detailed, factual information on the options?
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Homepaddock 
Plenty of that about HP, try this lot…
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/typepad/liberationbybryceedwards/~3/rUj2IU2yFG0/nz-politics-daily-30-june.html
but I have the feeling you would like a change 🙂
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Yeah! Give Peter Shirtcliffe a chance to explain himself, poor mouse. And Roger Kerr – let those bastions of moderate thought have their say, you mean journalists. And poor, poor Mr Key. He never gets the chance to say what he thinks. I wonder when he’ll join the debate to tell his adoring people that they love Supplementary Member. It’s just so unfair!
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Very well put by Simon Bridges. Even those in favour of retaining MMP should have the nous to acknowledge that.
RG – one thing the left is not is moderate – rabid is a better word for the left.
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The answer Simon is: Political Scientists are not practitioners of anything resembling a science. Their product is as ephemeral as reading tea-leaves.
There is a discernible mood for a change from MMP and the current politicians would be foolish to ignore this mood. What to replace it with? My favoured method is a reversion to FPP.
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There is a distinctly socialist atmosphere at all learning institutions that is not representative of society at large. Journalism school is no different and in fact has been recognised by the socialists with their long view of the achievable, as a key position of influence, along with primary and secondary school.
Every year my service club sponsors a speech makers competition, yes there are winners and losers. Some of the propaganda that they put into their efforts as opposed to a balanced view would leave one with the conclusion that their notes came direct from the Greens or Labour. Almost never is there a capitalist, free market, or entreprenurial thought presented. There was one young fellow with aspergers syndrome who clearly was not so influenced when he gave a very good speech on leggo that included factory, marketing and utilisation aspects, looking back he was home schooled with both parents self employed and self starters, duh.
Don’t tell Robert but the hotbed of capitalist reactionaries had given him the prize at the premeeting contest, only the winners get to present to the club tea-meeting that we make a ladies night in honour of the guest speakers.
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Codswalloper says:
“My favoured method is a reversion to FPP.”
A stunned silence fell over the land – who could have seen that coming!!!!??
Political commentators everywhere packed up their notebooks and keyboards and wandered out into the streets, bemused, gutted and befuddled – everything they’d ever believed, relied upon, hoped for, every plain truth they’d held to, shattered !
Codswalloper! A First Past the Post man!
Overhead, doves wept. The sun turned blood-red and wavered on it’s axis. Four figures in torn cloaks, astride skeletal horses hove into view.
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Why do most socialists fear alternative voting systems to MMP.
Would it be cynical of me to suggest that they cannot have rational and reasoned debate without factionalising the outcome as opposed to reaching a consensus, and then suffering the disunity of their party as evidenced by the plethora of parties spawned as what they thought were support options in very safe seats splintered off. eg The Alliance, The Progressives, United Future, The Maori Party, ACT and now Mana. The Greens didn’t so much leave as they were never in.
Yes Peters left National and survived but in contrast to the above those who find they can’t work within National discover their irrelevance and disappear. Peters had the distinct advantage of an electorate with a large number of a single demographic that although dieing off just loved the “adorable little man”. Some ex Nats have found a home in the current Act party but are finding it difficult to connect to the electorate at large.
Many people decry the “unfairness” of FPP and totally ignore the filtering process that those on the fringe should inhabit as lobby groups within mainstream Parties, by influencing the hearts and minds at grassroots level. If they cannot then that is in most cases where it should end.
Of course those enamoured of MMP love to raise the ghost of Social Credit that has ironically been adopted as a base for Obamanomics, but was a very fringe policy that appealed when simplistically put in front of an audience largely ignorant of basic economic theory but hungry for a “better way”. However it is attractive to voters as evidenced by the current disorder in Greece.
Naturally the socialists support many little parties based on ethnicity or pure racism, and any other fringe fruitloops that are rightly buried as such in an electorate only system but can manifest as a possible support base when counted nationally. Most on the right of the political spectrum are too busy to be bothered with such trivia as they get on with growing their lives and businesses. nb The Maori Party have always enjoyed “overhang” under MMP but that was not a problem until John Key brought them into government much to the chagrin of the left.
More clear weaknesses of the MMP system.
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“My favoured method is a reversion to FPP.”
If people vote for change and FPP is the system preferred by most as an alternative I predict we’ll keep MMP.
I don’t think FPP would win the second referendum in a straight run-off against MMP. ANother system might not either but I think it would have a bertter chance than FPP
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GD says `Why do most socialists fear alternative voting systems to MMP.’
My question is why are Socialists afraid of debating the alternatives and instead always `play the man’?
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… and a blogger from Riverton received a revelation; it wasn’t actually necessary for him to ridicule people who held an opinion contrary to his own.
Then I woke up 🙂
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Ele knows that the plan is to create enough ‘discontent’ to require a second referendum where Key would instruct us to vote for Supplementary Member. Your passion for FPP will lead to nothing but disappointment pdm and Gravedodger.
‘Socialists’ are not afraid to debate the alternatives – they’ve already done so, at length. The question now is not what system to use, but why the rejection of MMP is being so fervently sought and by whom. The Socialists are right on the ball. with this.
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psssssst! Inv2 –
you
are
still
asleep!
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Gravedodger – please send through the date of your ‘ladies meeting’ – that’s one engagement I’d be loathe to miss.
Oh, and thank you. I feel honoured.
Dress code?
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Robert Robert old chap I will type it slowly just for you,
i t i s o u r r e g u l a r m o n t h l y t e a – m e a t i n g i n A u g u s t w h e n w e i n v i t e o u r p a r t n e r s. W e r e f e r t o i t a s a l a d i e s n i g h t f o r m a i n l y h i s t o r i c a l r e a s o n s, o u r o n e l a d y m e m b e r’ s H u s b a n d i s a l s o a m e m b e r .
D r e s s c o d e i s t i e a n d j a c k e t b u t m o s t o f u s w e a r t r o u s e r s a l s o, i t i s a l i t t l e f o r m a l a n d i t c a n b e a b i t c o l d.
D i d y o u g e t a l l t h a t.
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Always in a rush, you GD!
Modern writers, btw, employ the space bar – it’s a new idea, yes, but one that with practise, you’d surely master.
Mind you, I didn’t read your original comment slowly enough to grasp its sense, so we’re one as bad as the other.
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Humble apologies Robert but thankyou for making the effort.
My cunning plan with the spacebar was torpedoed by our gracious hosts blog thingy that produced that appalling outcome.
The electronic wizards can be quite capricious at times, My laptop shut me out of my own shared blog yesterday and I had a panic attack when I believed I had crashed the whole system, but a full on panic search on swmbo’s Bench top revealed it was all in the Sony vaio, and it self corrected with a little liedown overnight.
Bit like me really.
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“It self corrected with a little liedown overnight.
Bit like me really.”
This has become my favourite ‘clip’ GD.
Somehow, it resonates 🙂
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