@randahl I agree, I am worried about the Europeans drifting off to the fascism & right wing extreme. 28% is nothing to be happy about, still I see the positive in the declining trend of idiocracy. I just hope they all keep watching USA closely & hope they want to prevent what is happening there from happening here as well.
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@randahl Brexit was truly one of the most ill-advised decisions ever made by British voters. I rarely order anything from the UK, but this time I wanted a specific comic book. And honestly, it's crazy how expensive it has become due to shipping and customs, and how long it takes. I've been waiting for over a week now, even
@randahl It’s mind bending that that large of a % are that stupid.
@randahl
The Farage Fascist Party is getting more scrutiny now they're actually in power in some areas. In my area, there is going to be a 9% increase in council tax this year, by a Reform-led administration that promised tax cuts. There is a limit to how much you can blame other people (particularly dark skinned ones) and I'm hopeful that their support will diminish when their incompetence and lack of any kind of rational plan starts to affect people's everyday lives.
@dave that is what happened in Denmark with Dansk Folkeparti. They made a lot of promises, but when it came to executing, they delivered close to nothing. So eventually, people had enough.
No matter what problem they were asked to solve, their answer was always along the lines of, "when we get rid of the muslims, everything will be fine".
When they started sending Syrian care workers back to Syria, that turned out to not solve the problem with too few care workers.
Who would have known? 🤷🏻♂️
@randahl @dave We do not yet have any federal states in Germany with an AfD government, but elections are coming up in five states (including Baden-Württemberg, Rhineland-Palatinate, and Saxony-Anhalt) where the AfD has a good chance of coming in first. In some cases, with up to 40% of the vote.
The AfD has provided two mayors in Thuringia and Saxony (two German states). Largely considered unsuccessful, promises such as maintaining schools and clinics
@randahl rest of the world REALLY needs preferential voting
@bgrinter okay… please elaborate… ?
@randahl I agree with @bgrinter ! Preferential voting is much better than first past the post (which they have in the UK). Randahl - here’s an explanation: https://www.aec.gov.au/learn/files/poster-counting-hor-pref-voting.pdf
However, it arguably only really works with the other part of Australia’s secret sauce: compulsory voting. That’s how you ensure 90%+ of the people vote.
@james @bgrinter while I agree that FPP voting is bad for democracy, I do not think preferential voting is the only right solution.
For instance, Danish elections use socalled leveling seats to ensure proportionality. When we vote for our 179 members of Parliament, 40 seats are reserved for ensuring proportionality.
First the 139 normal seats are assigned, and then we assign the last 40 seats in such a way that we come as close as possible to correct proportional representation.
@randahl @bgrinter Annoyingly, the Aussies have thought of part of that, too. Every Australian “electorate” (the seat, or the constituency) is the same population size. So a vote in inner Sydney counts just as much as a vote in the middle of the Northern Territory. Quite neat.
The downside with proportional representation is that if 1% of the population votes for the racists, then the racists get 1% of the seats.
With first past the post, your vote is often wasted, or you are voting for people you don’t really want to win but they’ll get the others out.
All voting systems have their downsides, but I’m quite impressed (as a Brit) at the way the Aussies work it.
@randahl @bgrinter As a British Citizen I still get to vote in the UK General Election. But here’s a strange thing - I get to vote based on where I last lived. So somewhere in North London, I have the chance to change the MP. Ludicrous!
The Italians have an MP for “Italians who live overseas” which seems to be a good system to me. I wish the British did that too. Expats have some things we need fighting for, after all.
(Actually, the Italians have a total of twelve seats for Italians who live overseas, which is less good, but lets gloss over that).
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@randahl that means 28% are at the USamerican cognitive level. Better than at Brexit voting times: 53% of the English and 52% of the UK ppl voted for Brexit.
@Ilka4You you are right! We should remember that is in fact an improvement. But it is still a dangerously high support for madness though.
@randahl I agree, I am worried about the Europeans drifting off to the fascism & right wing extreme. 28% is nothing to be happy about, still I see the positive in the declining trend of idiocracy. I just hope they all keep watching USA closely & hope they want to prevent what is happening there from happening here as well.
@Ilka4You @randahl I wish someone would create a graph of wealth distribution and far right popular support.
I don't know the numbers so threading carefully here, but in general the wealth distribution gap was smaller in the period after ww2 until the mid 80's in most western democracies. There was a greater outtake of taxes on the top 1-5% in society and social welfare reforms were implemented.
We now have about the same distribution profile as before modern democracy.
#inequality
@leanderlindahl that is an excellent idea. I am writing this down.
@Ilka4You
@randahl Ah! yes, that 1/3, well almost. A few more months of social media disinformation and targeting should get that up to 1/3. Totally insane, but here we are. Perhaps labour, the greens and lib dems need to coalesce .... Perhaps there's a need for counter-disinformation on the same scale? Whatever, but something has to be done before the UK becomes the 51st state....
@randahl and 70% of the voters know Nigel Farage will never do anything for their country and do not give him their vote.
I am as shocked as you that 28% of the voters do not see through his madness, but we should not ignore the silent majority that does and wants to vote for real politicians.
