How to achieve some political sanity in the Disunited States

[Stuart Mackey]

Stuart:

I fail to see why a plurality cannot be an effective executive.

Oh I never said it couldnt, our own Parlimetry system has plenty of precedents to prove that.

Does not your own system allow for minority executive if they can manage to find consensus in the legislature? If you have 3 parties in the government splitting the vote 30:40:30 could you not have a centrist plurality executive running the cabinet and holding the portfolios if they could keep the left and right wing parties from uniting against them? Hell what stops the middle party from effecting a coalition with the right party even if 60% of the country would have voted left rather than have a center-right government?

If 60% of the population voted 'left' that would be reflected in the House and a government, as you suggest, could not form as they would not have 60% of the seats in the House.

In the most extreme case the New Zealand government can be holly elected by a fractional percent majority and 5% plus change plurality. Yes you read that correctly, if you have a plethora of parties and one party wins the plurality in each electorate and only two parties have over 5% in the list, then you can end up with the government being totally dominated by a plurality of under 6%.

Nope. Whatever way you cut the pie, a minority government, cannot govern without the support and co-operation of a majority of parties and you cannot get into parliment without either
a) winning an electoral seat or
b)having gained over 5% of the party vote.

Remember that we have a proportional system {MMP}the vote will, with reasonable accuracy, be represented in parliment. And no government can form without letting others share in government if they have a minority, or have support on supply and confidence from other parties. The current government is a case in point.

On the French system, are you bloody serious? The French use a two tiered voting system where the top two candidates face a runoff with no third parties. Its most recent running had a field with multiple socialists of various stripes split the left vote sufficiently that the second round was between rightist Chirac and ultra-rightest xenophobic Le Pen. Chirac has less of a true plurality (20% as I recall) than just about any US president ever.

Really? French.....

snip.

Actually campaigning to change this type of stuff is almost tilting against windmills; to get anything close to MMP you are going to need a super majority of states to sign on and good bloody luck getting places like Montana and North Dakota signing on. Splitting the presidency is anathema to all political stripes in America.

I admitted as much in my fist post in this thread. But I never advocated spliting the presidency.

[Beowulf]

Stuart:

I fail to see why a plurality cannot be an effective executive.

Oh I never said it couldnt, our own Parlimetry system has plenty of precedents to prove that.

Then why the hell were you saying that a President shouldn't be elected without a majority?

[Darth Wong]

I hope this hasn't been said before (I've been regarding the whole electoral-college argument as being irrelevant to the thread subject so I haven't been following it), but the fact that a president can be elected by a minority really is irrelevant to the subject, since the country is heavily divided but the president did win by a majority.

[Stuart Mackey]

Stuart:

I fail to see why a plurality cannot be an effective executive.

Oh I never said it couldnt, our own Parlimetry system has plenty of precedents to prove that.

Then why the hell were you saying that a President shouldn't be elected without a majority?

We found that when we had FPP that the government did not represent the people. Rob Muldoon was happily ruining the nation without the consent of the governed, and the next, Labour, behaved in a similar manner but that pain was nessary in hindsight. {allthough I do freely admit that I voted against MMP, I have since changed my mind}.
I have since then been of the opinion that the government should represent the expressed will of the people. FPP does not, and cannot, deliver that.

[tharkûn]

If 60% of the population voted 'left' that would be reflected in the House and a government, as you suggest, could not form as they would not have 60% of the seats in the House.

BS. Let's say going into elections you have the left, right, and center parties which have made no discussion of possible coalition partners. 40% of the electorate most agrees with the center party; of that 30% are strictly opposed to the rights proposal for say a ban on gay marriage. 30% vote left and 30% vote right because they most agree with those parties. Now it comes time to form the government, there is no popular vote for whom to go into coalition with and the only people with a vote are the MPs who may have slightly different priorities than the electorate. The right's price for coalition is a gay marriage ban, the left demands a basic living stipend, stricter pollution controls, and an increase in the income tax. Now most of the electorate would rather have the pollution controls, the basic living stipend, and increased taxes rather than a gay marriage ban. The center party campaigned against all of the above in the general election and they have some monetary backers so they value keeping down the taxes more than gay marriage. A coalition is formed with the right even though had the electorate known such a coalition would happen the majority of the electorate would have voted left simply to avoid the gay marriage ban.

Nope. Whatever way you cut the pie, a minority government, cannot govern without the support and co-operation of a majority of parties and you cannot get into parliment without either
a) winning an electoral seat or
b)having gained over 5% of the party vote.

Remember that we have a proportional system {MMP}the vote will, with reasonable accuracy, be represented in parliment. And no government can form without letting others share in government if they have a minority, or have support on supply and confidence from other parties. The current government is a case in point.

I suggest you learn your own election system.
Imagine an election with the following party tallies:
A: 5.1%
B: 4.9%
C: 4.8%
D: 4.7%
E: 4.7%
F: 4.6%
G: 4.6%
H: 4.6%
I: 4.6%
J: 4.5%
K: 4.5%
L: 4.4%
M: 4.4%
N: 4.4%
O: 4.4%
P: 4.4%
Q: 4.4%
R: 4.4%
S: 4.3%
T: 4.3%
U: 4.2%
V: 4.1%

And the left over being either blank, invalid, or for even more obscure parties. If nobody else wins an electoral seat then only part A gets list seats. If parties A and U manage to carry electoral seats then they are the only ones counted for list seats and you end up with a majority government winning from a plurality.

Less farfetched would be a scenario with say 5 parties:
A: 47%
B: 30%
C: 15%
D: 4%
E: 4%

D and E capture no electoral seats, and hence are disregarded when doling out seats. A thus gets 51% of the seats and hence has a majority of MPs and can rule without minority backing. A similar scenario is possible with overhang seats. New Zealand has no garuntee that a plurality vote cannot rule without minority support. It is entirely possible to have a majority stranglehold on parliament without acheiving an majority in the popular election.

The point of all this is not the New Zealand's electoral system is in any way bad, but rather that it, like the American system, has no GARUNTEE that the ruling partying MUST have won a majority of the general election votes. In such circumstances there is nothing which makes the plurality government, be it American or Kiwi, illegitimate.

We found that when we had FPP that the government did not represent the people. Rob Muldoon was happily ruining the nation without the consent of the governed, and the next, Labour, behaved in a similar manner but that pain was nessary in hindsight. {allthough I do freely admit that I voted against MMP, I have since changed my mind}.
I have since then been of the opinion that the government should represent the expressed will of the people. FPP does not, and cannot, deliver that.

FFP/MMP is completely different kettle of fish than having a divided executive or not. Even within MMP there is potential for governing without consent of the governed through the 5% cutoffs and overhangs from electoral votes. It may be a more democratic system, but I remain unconvinced that more democracy is what the US needs.

The reason the US doesn't have powerful third parties is because whenever they arise they cast a wrench into the system and one party or another co-opts the major issues. For instance when the Republican party rose up on the slavery issue they chewed up the whig party which died as was split between democrats and Republicans. When the Bull Moose Party split the electorate and let Wilson win the presidency, fences were quickly mended and a coalition of Republican progressives and old guards worked togethor till Herbert Hoover. Other nations have their issues represented by individual parties (like the Greens), in the US those types of issues are settled in the primaries (do you want a fundy republican or a libertarian republican running for the seat) and their are parties within parties. Very few issues don't get a voice in one party or the other and with a closing divided legislature, even minority parties can horse trade to get contentious bills through.