Tornado Alley (PROG)

[fuagf]

Yep, Baker seems a reasonable guy. His 3:22 statement that 60% of those registered to vote in Massachusetts are registered as independents does say something. His comment 5:30-5:50 that people in general aren't as interested in politics as many themselves involved believe others are is something we have said here repeatedly. That fact i'd guess also would be one reason why so many are registered as independents. If you don't take much interest and are of the view all politicians are alike it makes sense you're gonna register as an independent.

In Australia there is no requirement to register at all. That on top of compulsory voting, which i am in favor of, creates a situation research suggests which goes somewhat to eliminating the extremes Baker talks about.

How preferential voting works in Australian elections
"If America used Australia’s voting system, there’s no way Trump could win"
[...]
How Australia's compulsory voting saved it from Trumpism
[...]
Australia, which has had six prime ministers in eight years, is suffering from an increasing mistrust in politicians, in parties, even in democracy .. https://theconversation.com/australians-trust-in-politicians-and-democracy-hits-an-all-time-low-new-research-108161 . And in the next few months – the lead-up to a federal election – politics is set to become even more dispiriting.

Yet, according to Brett, Australia has a degree of inoculation from the polarisation infecting politics in the United States, the UK and much of Europe. Her new book, From Secret Ballot to Democracy Sausage, teases out the reasons – prosaic at one level, profound at another.

Australia is one of only 19 countries out of 166 electoral democracies where voting is compulsory, and one of only nine that enforce it. It is the only English-speaking country that compels its citizens to vote.

The impact is hard to overstate. In 2015, former US president Barack Obama praised Australia’s system, saying it would be “transformative” if everyone voted in the United States.

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Australia was born not on the battlefields but at the ballot box
Judith Brett
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But Australia’s system is an electoral beacon for seemingly smaller reasons too. While Americans, Britons and Canadians vote during the week, Australians vote on Saturdays, making it easier for people to get to the polls. There’s a holiday atmosphere at booths, where community groups raise money by selling cupcakes, raffle tickets and “democracy sausages”. Specially-made stalls for secret voting are another Australian invention, and political parties have no role in running elections, which are left to non-partisan public servants – “something Americans can only dream of,” Brett says.
[...]
Today, more than 90% of those on the roll turn up. You don’t actually have to vote, but you have to attend a polling booth, even if you stuff a blank or spoiled ballot in the box.

Australia was an electoral innovator in many ways, but the historic disenfranchisement of Indigenous people is a “shameful story”, Brett says. When the 1902 federal Franchise Act came to be debated, the proposed law would have given “all adult persons” the right to vote in a national election, including Indigenous Australians as well as women – but the new government compromised to get the bill passed. The West Australian senator Alexander Matheson moved the amendment denying the vote to Indigenous people, saying, “Surely it is absolutely repugnant to the greater number of the people of the commonwealth that an Aboriginal man, or Aboriginal lubra or gin – a horrible, dirty, degraded creature – should have the same rights, simply by virtue of being 21 years of age, that we have, after some debate today, decided to give to your wives and daughters.”

Barack Obama praises Australia's mandatory voting rules
Read more > https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/apr/10/barack-obama-praises-australias-mandatory-voting-rules

It took until 1962 for Indigenous Australians in all states to get the right to vote in federal elections, and it was only after the election of the Hawke government in 1983 that they were required to enrol. The Franchise Act, Brett says, became another of the “infamous stepping stones of cruelty and shame” in the treatment of First Australians.

Compulsory voting keeps politics focused on the centre rather than the fringe of politics. To win elections, political parties have to appeal not just to their base but to the majority of people. Australia is also one of only a few countries with preferential voting, which means a voter ranks candidates in order of preference, compared with most countries where the candidate with the most votes wins. It ensures that those elected have the support of the majority of voters.

“It keeps the emotional temper of the conflict down,” says Brett. “That’s become more evident recently with the way politics has gone in the United States, where you’ve had issues around sexuality and race being used to motivate voters. If you need to get out the vote, you need to have things that people are going to feel passionate about, and that’s not necessarily such a good thing.”

https://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=154312334

And this - Only 6% of 135,000 Americans in Australia voted in your 2016 presidential election.
https://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=158876502

Back to the ever-increasing Trump-accelerated extreme polarization in American politics.

Charlie Baker and the Rise of One-Party Rule
The Massachusetts governor’s refusal to seek reelection is a dark omen for the future of America’s two-party system.
By Kara Voght
[...]
At least once a week during the past two years, a flock of protesters could be found outside the seaside home of the Republican governor of Massachusetts, airing their grievances about the man they call “Char-lie Baker.” (It rhymes with pie—get it?) Two years of “Char-lie Baker” would be a lot for any person to take, especially when the clamor is coming from members of your own party.

The gatherings began in April 2020, when more than a dozen anti-lockdown demonstrators drove, horns blaring and Trump flags hoisted high, back and forth past the governor’s white Victorian. For months after, picketers convened on the grassy median on Baker’s street in Swampscott, wielding life-size cutouts of Donald Trump or, sometimes, Confederate flags. The organizer of the weekly visits accused Baker of being “in bed” with “the Chinese Communist Party and the Muslim Brotherhood.” Many of the protests attracted a police detail. On some occasions, officers erected barricades. The nearby elementary school canceled classes after Election Day 2020, citing an “abundance of caution.”
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... All but 12 states are under unified control of a single party, meaning that either Democrats or Republicans control both the governor’s mansion and the legislature. Baker’s departure practically guarantees that Massachusetts will join those ranks. The triumph of Baker’s right-wing critics is a precedent and a proof of concept. If a vocal base can, without a primary, deter popular moderates from running in races they could have won, competitive state-level elections are about to get even rarer. That’s great news for the party in power, but voters stand to lose.
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2022/03/charlie-baker-massachusetts-governor-election/627157/