You Can't Complain If You Don't Vote

[Tezcatlipoca]

For whom will you be voting, just out of interest? Mainstream or Minority?

[Fred Bassett]

For whom will you be voting, just out of interest? Mainstream or Minority?

 

Mainstream.

[Bookworm]

Apart from interim PMs, like Margaret Beckett, has there ever been one that has never been elected? If there hasn't Brown will hold that not-too-distinguished record soon.

 

Fred

 

Ermmm, John Major? Came to power after the ousting of Thatcher. Granted his party then won the next set of elections, but he still held the reins for about 18 months not having been elected by the people, in exactly the same way GB currently is. Is there a point that you're trying to make here, because if there is I don't see it? :-?

[Bookworm]

Now let's change track here for a moment and assume Uncle Tez has been playing Devil's Advocate to generate debate. Let's now assume that I do vote, and have done since I left home, but that in this election I am choosing to use my vote on local rather than national issues.

I could hardly condemn that, since I am, by dint of my nationality, doing the same. For all that I encourage people to the urns, I alas do not vote in the general elections, since they seem reluctant to let us non nationals do so. I do however vote in the local elections since that's allowed.

 

Citizens for the Undead Rights and Equality (no, this last one is not a joke).

Of course it's not, as anyone who reads Pratchett should know. I want to live in Brighton, that is pure genius. Either that or really, really bad taste joke relating to the number of pensioners in Brighton.

My vote will be going to the Caroline Lucas, the Green candidate.

Shocking. funnily enough, I was mentioning this thread to Mr Bookie earlier and was talking about you and on how surprised that if you didn't want your vote to count, why you didn't vote Green at least.

 

 

Would this also remove the right of somebody to complain about a particular aspect of their society under the heel of an alternative government? And before answering, remember that I am voting Green to total expectation of a Tory and/or Labour win.

No, because then at least you are not giving your silence the power of a more motivated party to go on. If that makes sense. Mr Bookie, who occasionally comes up with the odd pearl of wisdom (or it might have been a wisdom tooth, I can never be sure with him!), commented that not voting is like giving away 2 votes to the other side(s), 1 fewer vote for the person you least fear in power, and 1 by giving the other side an extra vote against the void you've left. Oooh, he can be right deep that man.

 

At least by voting for the local issues, you are standing and being counted. It means, by default, that you can not be treated as a silent minority. Out of small acorns and all that. ;-)

 

In Croydon, makes no difference, local and national issues converge. Our local Tory council has decided to build themselves a £450 million new HQ (when the one we have may be a bit faded but still has a few tens of yrs in it), whilst telling us that there isn't enough money for schools, renovating our crumbling swimming-pools or indeed filling a few crater-like potholes. Hmmm, not a great vote grabber that one.

 

Meanwhile, our local authority is being investigated by Childrens' Services as their SEN budget is one of the highest in the UK with some of the poorest results. Oh dear.

[Fred Bassett]

Ermmm, John Major? Came to power after the ousting of Thatcher. Granted his party then won the next set of elections, but he still held the reins for about 18 months not having been elected by the people, in exactly the same way GB currently is. Is there a point that you're trying to make here, because if there is I don't see it? :-?

 

Yes, that's what I was getting at really, Major won the next election. I'm just wondering if we've ever had one who, like Major and Brown, replaced a sitting Prime Minister in mid term but then failed to get re-elected.

[SteveH2508]

Yes, that's what I was getting at really, Major won the next election. I'm just wondering if we've ever had one who, like Major and Brown, replaced a sitting Prime Minister in mid term but then failed to get re-elected.

 

Sir Alec Douglas-Home IIRC - took over in 1963 but then beaten by Harold Wilson in 1964.

[Fred Bassett]

Ah well, at least Gordon can console himself with the fact that he won't be the first.

[Tezcatlipoca]

I want to live in Brighton, that is pure genius.

 

Who said we're inviting you? We have an enormously varied population in terms of age, ethnicity and language, near-endless celebrations of art and literature (most of them free) throughout the year and we're home to multiple grassroots organisations and activism groups. I just don't think you'd really fit in here... ;-)

 

that if you didn't want your vote to count, why you didn't vote Green at least.

 

A vote for a non-mainstream party because you believe in their local policies, and, indeed, support the idea that those policies should ultimately go on to shape national legislation isn't a wasted vote, of course; unless you're policially conditioned to the point of believing the Labourservatives can only ever be the front-runners.

 

I seem to recall sort of support for seemingly radical ideas around the turn of the twentieth century that it was thought would never be taken seriously or end up shape national legislation..

 

In more seriousness, it comes back to my earlier point that voting for local rather than national candidates, and on local rather than national issues, is not only a valid use of a vote but, perhaps, more politically relevant than casting your vote aimlesly into the void without really following or believing in any of the carbon-copy policies being wheeled out by the major parties.

 

Meanwhile, our local authority is being investigated by Childrens' Services as their SEN budget is one of the highest in the UK with some of the poorest results. Oh dear.

 

Oh dear indeed, but then all local authorities have that to a degree. Even a superficial degree of digging into Brighton Council shows they're not quite as squeaky clean as they'd like to suggest. Outright corrupt, might be another term you could employ.

[sillygirl1]

Im going to vote for one of the small independant parties standing in my local area, none of the party leaders convinced me on Thursday to give their parties my vote.

[Bookworm]

I just don't think you'd really fit in here...

Pfffft, fascist.

[Bookworm]

Ah well, at least Gordon can console himself with the fact that he won't be the first.

Spoken like a true politician, why let facts get in the way of one's one-track reasoning?

[babybear39]

*bleep bleep bleep bleep bleep bleep bleep bleep*

[Fred Bassett]

Spoken like a true politician, why let facts get in the way of one's one-track reasoning?

 

???

 

Well I suppose there is always the possibility that he might win a majority but at these stage it doesn't look likely. Given that, is this not the fact?

[babybear39]

Nothing is fact until the ballot closes

[Fred Bassett]

Nothing is fact until the ballot closes

 

True enough. We shall find out on Friday morning. Either way, it won't matter to Gordon as he'll retire on a big fat pension, unlike the ones he's wrecked in the private sector.

[caro]

No prime minister is ever voted in.

 

All we have is the opportunity to vote for our candidates locally, and the leader of whichever party gets the most votes becomes PM by default.

[SOD'EM]

I vote for the caro party then:p

[SOD'EM]

Why do they call it 'PARTY' anyway?

 

I don't see any fun in it whatsoever:confused:

 

The only similarity is the balloons that run the country;).

[Bookworm]

???

 

Well I suppose there is always the possibility that he might win a majority but at these stage it doesn't look likely. Given that, is this not the fact?

I was referring to the fact that first it was "oh, 1st and only PM who wasn't elected, what a terrible person that makes him" which you have been going on about for months now, when shown that he was in fact not the 1st one, you smoothly switch to "ah well, he won't be alone then, it really doesn't matter after all".

[babybear39]

*BB sits and watches eating tapas*

[Fred Bassett]

I was referring to the fact that first it was "oh, 1st and only PM who wasn't elected, what a terrible person that makes him" which you have been going on about for months now, when shown that he was in fact not the 1st one, you smoothly switch to "ah well, he won't be alone then, it really doesn't matter after all".

 

I don't think I've ever used those words and I don't think it is "months" since I mentioned the fact he might never be an elected PM - in fact I think it was yesterday. I asked the question out of curiosity and it was answered.

 

I know you want him to be (re)-elected - that's your choice. I don't. What's the problem?

 

Regards.

 

Fred

[Bookworm]

Begging to differ, but you have gone on about him not being elected PM whenever any conversation has turned to politics, which has been a few times on here. I could go and look for the threads, but life's too short, they're your words, I'm sure you can find them easily.

 

and I haven't said these words were the exact ones you used, in fact I know they weren't, but the inference has been made time and again.

 

I don't particularly want GB to be elected, no. but I DO want a Labour government and he comes part of the package, whether I like it or not.

 

FWIW, if Labour were to get through (which I unfortunately don't believe will happen either), I'm pretty sure it wouldn't be long before he gets ousted by the young lions in waiting. Milliband in particular has been honing his skills and I think a leadership contest won't be far one way or another.

[babybear39]

Let's face it. We can elect the party, bite the proverbial then decide with a leadership contest.

[Fred Bassett]

Begging to differ, but you have gone on about him not being elected PM whenever any conversation has turned to politics, which has been a few times on here. I could go and look for the threads, but life's too short, they're your words, I'm sure you can find them easily.

 

and I haven't said these words were the exact ones you used, in fact I know they weren't, but the inference has been made time and again.

 

I don't particularly want GB to be elected, no. but I DO want a Labour government and he comes part of the package, whether I like it or not.

 

FWIW, if Labour were to get through (which I unfortunately don't believe will happen either), I'm pretty sure it wouldn't be long before he gets ousted by the young lions in waiting. Milliband in particular has been honing his skills and I think a leadership contest won't be far one way or another.

 

Well, splitting hairs maybe, but I was actually talking about whether he'd ever get elected and if that had happened before - something I don't think I'd previously posted on. But it's not important.

 

I do agree with a lot of what you say though, for what it's worth, although I think that if Brown wins he will stay and that there will only be a leadership contest if he loses. Let's hope for Milliband and Labour's sake, that if Milliband does become the next leader, he is elected as such, not shoe-horned in as Mandelson apparently wants him to be. Milliband strikes me as being thoroughly decent but I'm not sure he's really got what it takes to sort out Labour's problems. I'd certainly prefer to see him as PM one day than that very nasty piece of work Ed Balls.

 

Regards.

 

Fred

[Fred Bassett]

Let's face it. We can elect the party, bite the proverbial then decide with a leadership contest.

 

 

Well you can BB, I'll be voting for a different party!

 

Regards.

 

Fred