Australians Running On-Line Poll Based Senators

exeme writes "The 2007 Australian election was recently announced and a new completely on-line based political party is running for election to the Australian Senate. Senator On-Line will give Australian residents eligible to vote a chance to vote in on-line polls for every piece of legislation that comes to the Senate. The senator will then blindly vote in accordance with the majority. The party has no position on anything until it is voted on and has been approved by the Australian Electoral Commission as a legitimate party. The party will be running two candidates in each Australian state." I imagine this could have a huge impact on CowboyNeal related legislation down under.

Comments

Interesting approach

[Z00L00K]

but there is a danger here too - unless you can actually verify that vote-spamming doesn't occur. Another catch is the cross-section of society that is different when it comes to online-voting than regular voting, but that isn't necessarily a problem.

But in all - this seems to be the next step in democracy.

A unique concept

[IBBoard]

Australia seems to have this "blindly voting senators" idea a bit better than the rest of us.

Australia:

Australian residents eligible to vote a chance to vote in on-line polls for every piece of legislation that comes to the Senate. The senator will then blindly vote in accordance with the majority. The party has no position on anything until it is voted on.

Rest of capitalist, democratic world:

Large corporations who have enough money can buy votes for every piece of legislation that comes to the Senate. The senator will then blindly vote in accordance with the money. The party has no position on anything until it is bought.

Perhaps a bit of a cynical view?

Superdemocracy is a terrible idea.

[dada21]

Democracy doesn't work. We've had them for thousands of years, and they always fail as the majority learns they can just vote to steal from the minority. Superdemocracy is even worse.

The United States Beta that was started in the late 1700's had a great idea: let there be a pseudo-democracy at the Federal level, but limit is greatly. Don't let there be an easy way for the majority to steal from the minority. It worked for a while, until the People slowly upset the restrictions provided for in the Constitution. It was a sad day when Lincoln was elected, the first tyrant of many.

The idea of voting en masse online sounds like a good idea. I recall that MajorBBS founder, the late Tim Stryker (a man I knew personally) was a big proponent of a Superdemocracy. Back then I agreed with him, until I started to realize that the failings of a nation/society generally happen because the People want more without giving more.

My own political thought is what I call a Unanimocracy: a law doesn't get passed without unanimous consent. If you can't get it at the National level, try at the State level. Keep going down the ladder of size until you might end up with a law passed only in a home, or even only by an individual who restricts themselves. Sure, it's a grandious idea, but I feel it is the only fair way to set legislation. The Internet is a great Unanimocracy, with individuals deciding what limitations they'll accept, and others forming relationships based on agreeing to those limitation. You could say that the dreaded click-contracts are similar, although they're covered by "laws" rather that voluntary contracts that can be broken by either party.

The only way I'd accept a Democracy of any kind is if there was an agreement that 10% of any voting bloc can veto any legislation they disagree with. Let 50.1% say "We want to tax tall black men to pay for education of short asian women." Let the legislation be unless 10% of the population votes VETO. That's three ways to vote: Yes, I want it. No, but I don't really care. Veto, this is bad. A 10% veto requirement would get me to support government again, because the minority has power to stop a crazy, and theft-prone, majority.

Re:Superdemocracy is a terrible idea.

[nine-times]

You do understand that absolutely nothing would ever get done, right? I'm not saying that's necessarily a bad thing, but if you want your government to ever do anything, your ideas won't really work. No matter how great an idea is, you'd probably find 10% who would be willing to vote "veto".

Of course, the traditional American theory of government is that deadlock is good, government "getting things done" was bad. (Don't believe me? Read the Federalist Papers.) Now that we have a two-party system, that idea has been subverted. You need a 50% vote to get something done, and usually one single political party controls at least 50%. The original Federalist idea was that there would be many different factions, so that reaching 50% would require getting people from different factions to agree. To that end, I think it might be worth considering that we could raise the percentage needed to pass legislation to something like 60%, making it difficult for a single party to force legislation through. But a 10% veto would happen all the time.

Today's Tom Sawyer?

[fygment]

Some thoughts:

a) Homogenization of the vote? Any other senator would be wise, in the absence of strong constituency lobbying, to simply vote with the Senator Online. How could you go wrong if the Online vote is a reflection of the public desire?

b) What is the likely demographic of those who would use Senator Online? The hard working middle-class type isn't likely to want the added burden of being a defacto senator added to the existing job, parenting, soccer mom'ing, etc. Maybe the Senator Online would reflect the will of those with time to spare eg. retirees, welfare abusers, other politcal candidates with an agenda to push, Slashdotters wanting to comment on something different?

c) What platform would a Senator Online candidate use? Great to be a candidate if all you do is vote as told. Who could find fault with your performance? A job for life if you could get it. But what's your election platform? "Vote for me. I'll do exactly what you want ... uh ... better than the other guy who wants to do the same thing. Umm ... I'll do it naked!"

Doesn't this almost seem like Tom Sawyer? Get someone else to do the work (assume researchers/collaters are hired), get someone else to take responsibility (the online voters) but you take the perks (and pay). Does this seem like a scam to anyone else?

As opposed to...

[C10H14N2]

The American Ideal. ...or...

more to your point.

Re:Democracy?

[timeOday]

Everything you said applies just as much to voting for a representative as it does voting on individual issues. Can I think of many ways direct Democracy would fail? Sure. But in most every case, representative Democracy is already failing the same way. Vote buying? Check. Uninformed ballots cast? Check. Pork? Double-check!