Posts by tussock
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They could have a database entry to not send out the EasyVote card to the returned enrolment checks.
But leave them enrolled.
Then do a check after the election, that if those missing people voted anyway (which is checked to defend against people casting multiple votes) they stay enrolled, and if they didn't they're purged.
Person fails to have updated contact address and also fails to vote, they can enroll again before the next one, person voting is fine. Still clears the list.
Probably somewhat more easy to abuse, but theoretical abuses never seem to matter as long as there's no way to automate it via a machine, given the impossible nature of a massive conspiracy. As long as we're physically voting with an orange marker, easier enrolment is a convenience for everyone rather than an existential threat to the system.
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The National party ain't much like it was in the 70's either, and Labour even further away. They just never changed their names, even though a few in National used to fly other colours.
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*electorate, not electoral. Hehe.
Greens in most places were campaigning for Party Vote only, there's not all of the Green party voters would prefer the Labour candidate even when the greens leave out a candidate (as they did against Peter Dunne which saw him give up the contest). From what I saw of Labour candidates, they were also strongly asking for Party vote.
But really, a lot of people who are National party voters will happily elect a competent and experienced Labour party electorate MP. You can't assume anything about the electorate votes, IMO.
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Legal Beagle: Election 2017: the Special…, in reply to Russell Brown,
I don't think that the electoral vote is a big deal. National voters will vote for a local Labour electorate candidate, and Labour voters will vote for a local National electorate candidate, because you can.
If the Labour party had 46% to National's 36%, the blue bars would be grouped a long way above the line too. The electorate votes simply don't swing as far as the Party votes do.
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There's some fairly new science to it, Curia runs it for National, turns out you can just say certain things and get a fair chunk of people to change their opinion. You test a bunch of things to say, on people of one opinion, and count how many of them change that opinion, and for most things you can find a short phrase to tip people over on any subject.
Most of the population isn't vulnerable to it, but enough are that if you figure out what to say and just keep saying it, there's like a three-week window where you can shift a vote or whatever.
The Brexit thing was so many or other hundred billion pounds extra for the health system if you vote yes on Brexit, and it swung about 5% on that and they won. Completely unconnected with reality, but that's not important. The MSM largely tried to not push it, they had to run cars with loudspeakers and stuff, but it still works.
For the Nats here it was, in a few different ways of saying it, that Labour was either under-selling how much tax they'd put on or over-selling how much they'd deliver with government spending, that the two didn't match up, it couldn't really be that easy, and they jumped a good 5% on that.
It works, and it will always work forever now that people know how to do it reliably. Trump in the US hammered on the Clinton emails, because that dropped Clinton a couple %, and that was enough.
The only thing you can do against it is find something to say to change them back. Not the truth, not policy, none of that shit matters for people who are persuadable by short phrases unconnected with reality. Research your own magic words and just repeat them ad nauseam, and make sure the delivery doesn't put off your more stable voters.
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Mana party got in under a sitting Māori party MP, though he won a by-election first when he switched to Mana.
Greens had sitting MPs from the Alliance, and won a seat their first time on their own, though only just on special votes. They also trace back to the Values party that used to split the left vote in the 70's, and has had seats on and off for a rather long time. Bloody splitters.
I liked Gareth Morgan's comment that people vote on self-interest, in that 1: no they don't (it's complicated), and 2: that is how it's supposed to work, if your policies won't help most people, maybe just fuck off.
But vanity parties that go nowhere will always be a thing because rich people aren't especially smart. It's obviously cheaper to just buy policy off the National party.
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So, roughly, Greens will need ...
2 - 6% of specials to hold at 7.
7 - 11% of specials to gain an 8th. <- expected.
12 - 17% of specials to gain a 9th too. <- hmm.
18% of specials to make 10 seats.Labour will need ...
34 - 39% of specials to hold at 45.
40 - 44% of specials to gain a 46th. <- expected.
45% of specials to gain a 47th too.Labour-Green are somewhat inversely correlated, so it's hard to see +3 seats between them unless first time voter turnout was way up.
National needs ...
30 - 34% of specials to scrape 55. <- hmm.
35 - 39% of specials to stop on 56. <- expected.
40 - 44% of specials to manage 57.
45% of specials to hold at 58. <- No.And for completeness ...
NZF needs ...
3 - 7% of specials to hold 9. <- Yes.
8% of specials to get a 10th. <- No.ACT needs ...
0 - 5% of specials to hold 1. <- Yes. -
And because there's no better place for it, my tri-annual, stop stealing people's seats and giving them to the big parties, you bastards, post.
First divisor 1.4, no threshold, from the night's results.
National 56 (-2)
Labour 44 (-1)
NZF 9
Greens 7
TOP 3 (+3)
Māori 1 (+1)
ACT 1 (-1, +1 overhang).Which is the same, except tens of thousands more people have a voice in parliament, and ACT could just die instead of the Nats giving them that lifeboat just in case anyone votes for them again.
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Polling averages made it Winston's choice, almost certainly so, and late polls were pretty much on the spot for what he'd be looking at for a choice, give or take the specials (go go magic late enrolment swing!).
Well done the pollsters again. Good old math and sampling doing it's thing again, second-guessing the people who understand the math about as useful as betting against the met-service these days it seems.
538 says don't trust the polls just because they're right a couple times, because the margin of error is real and undecided voters really do swing hard very late, but yeah, they were right again, eh. :)
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The people grieving Metiria's harsh exit see journalists as pursuing the poor, brown solo mum she was 20-odd years ago.
Hi. Yes.
It's the default assumption of so much of the media attention that Metiria must have ripped the system off for tens of thousands of dollars. Who the fuck thinks beneficiaries could take tens of thousands of dollars? How distant from reality do you have to be? And yet that's the story they chased.
And when she said, publicly, that she didn't want her family dragged into this, the media seems to have delighted in hunting around the relatives to try and find what else she was "hiding".
Local newspaper, 10th, day after retirement announced, front page.
'Scrutiny' too much for Turei
Poll shows Green vote collapsingSo that's the national framing, right, that everything the brown woman says is a lie, and every rumour against her needs digging into for the real story.
The real story here is the one Matiria told. That benefits are stupidly hard to live on and most people get lots of help from family and aren't completely forthcoming about every single thing with WINZ. If the media had investigated that for a second they'd find people living on the fucking street right outside their buildings. They probably fucking well pass them on the way into work each morning. That could be some questions worth asking maybe, is some of this "massive increase in freedom camping" thing that folk go on about actually a symptom of impossibly grinding poverty in this country.Then again, the last time I saw an investigation into living in poverty on the TV, the reporter ran out of money half way through the week, and had enough convenient assets and stores in the house to get by for the last few days anyway. Which is just colossally vacant, that's nothing like being poor, there are no backups, there are no convenient low-cost assets to fall back on, and the extended family is often not that well off to help out much.
But still you'll never get it right
'Cause when you're laid in bed at night
Watching 'roaches climb the wall
If you called your dad he could stop it all.You'll never live like common people
I don't think people get it at all. I had support, I had wealthy enough family nearby to solve my problems if I asked or sometimes if I didn't, and thus I am not homeless today, but it was still impossible. The system is cruel, it assumes you are cheating and forces you to constantly beg for what the law says you must have, and to prove your innocence. Even if you're in a fucking wheelchair now they want you to prove you can't walk to a doctor on a regular basis, just in case your spinal injury went away while no one was looking.
It's like that for everything, all the time, on top of there not being enough money for anything at all. People have to walk around collecting signatures now, to stay on the dole, and if you're one short they cut you off. How fucking terrifying that must be.
It was quite a relief, you know, for me, getting kicked off the dole each time, because it meant a few weeks or months of being cold and hungry and bored out of my skull with nothing to do, but I didn't have to go into WINZ any more, not for a while, not if I stretched things out a bit. That was my early 90's. Life might've gone a lot better if I'd just lied to them all the time.