I am less pessimistic

Post #384,923 by pwhysall 1/4/14 5:45:36 AM Reply	I am less pessimistic Although the RWNJ tendency over here is loud, it's also not all that popular. True, in the affluent South East corner (i.e. London and the M25 sphere, reaching out to Surrey and Kent) it's particularly noticeable, but the other 45(ish) million people don't live there. There's a significant difference between what you see on the web and what you see at the ballot box. The only reason Labour lost the last election was because they fucked things up spectacularly and, in particular, Gordon Brown was revealed to be an utterly incompetent megalomaniac, clinging onto power long past the point at which he should have conceded. His handing of the poisoned chalice to Alistair Darling, who got the unenviable job of cleaning up Brown's fuckups (long story short: Brown borrowed and spent like a mofo (not necessarily bad), but didn't tip it into as much capital investment as he should (definitely bad), flogged the gold reserves off in a monumentally stupid way, and then deregulated the banks and looked on aghast as the banks did what banks do when you don't regulate the shit out of them) was also particularly disgraceful. The Cameron/Clegg ConLib coalition is not particularly compelling. Their best asset - Vince Cable - oscillates between being laser-accurate and correct, and saying really fucking stupid things. Osborne is out of his depth. Cameron has a significant gravitas shortfall. Clegg will say anything to stay elected. And the cabinet is a bunch of nobodies. We will elect a Labour government in 2015, because reality tends to the liberal, and British people, despite being a pack of arses quite a lot of the time, are fundamentally in tune with this. We have this gestalt of "fairness" (an ill-defined concept, but we know it when we see it and vice versa) and backing the underdog, which I think counterbalances nicely with our willingness to be selfish wankers.
Post #384,928 by Another Scott 1/4/14 9:58:27 AM Reply	Do you have periodic "redistricting" to scramble the deck? Over here, national congressional districts are redrawn after the decennial census. Unfortunately, even though the districts end up having the same number of people, usually the incumbents (of both parties) determine where the boundaries are. What that means is there's usually bargaining to keep most of the minority incumbents in office (to gain their support), while the majority draws the lines so that they win a few more marginal districts to increase their majorities. Sometimes, though, the majority simply rams through the changes they want and the ones they think they can get away with (see Texas and DeLay). This means they have a larger majority in the House of Representatives than they "should", but it makes the majority fragile to demographic change or relatively small changes in views of the electorate. It makes "wave" elections more likely. So while over here the Republican's have a ~ 33 seat majority in the House (when they should be in the minority) - 17 needed to flip the majority, by 2016 or 2020 or 2024 they risk having a ~ 40+ seat minority and having a tough time getting it back. Especially if their attempts at disenfrancisement are slapped down... Non-partisan redistricting in California changed the game there - it would be nice if something similar became a universal system. I don't recall hearing about "redistricting" in the UK. Do similar things happen there, or is the population so stable that it's not needed? How are House districts done there? Thanks. Cheers, Scott.
Post #384,930 by pwhysall 1/4/14 10:25:44 AM Reply	Not really There are boundary changes, of course, but they're not a big deal - evolution, not revolution. We have a separate commission that looks after this process. Example of their work: http://consultation....proposed/eastern/
Post #384,945 by drook 1/4/14 2:52:57 PM Reply	That map is entirely too reasonable -- Drew
Post #384,962 by static 1/5/14 2:45:07 AM Reply	Same thing happens in Oz, too. Our electoral commission is also federal and independent. It also has teeth and can't be bought by politicians. I know it would be "un-American" to centralize all the election stuff like the UK and Aus does, but it sure would solve a lot of problems. :-/ Wade. Just Add Story http://justaddstory.wordpress.com/
Post #384,937 by boxley 1/4/14 11:21:18 AM Reply	ya ever stop to think that it is anger at party in power that flips the seating? It was the anger against the democrats that put the repos in charge not redistricting Any opinions expressed by me are mine alone, posted from my home computer, on my own time as a free American and do not reflect the opinions of any person or company that I have had professional relations with in the past 58 years. meep
Post #384,941 by Another Scott 1/4/14 12:00:14 PM Reply	It wasn't one thing. Lots of people were angry that the Republicans blew up the economy. Lots of people were angry that a black man had been elected president. Without the way that DeLay and his compatriots changed district lines in 2010, the damage would have been less. Cheers, Scott.

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