That is Amazing!!  I love it Faerenach!  I hope it works too.  I think I'm stuck in a more typical swing-vote riding. 

I would question his analysis that most of the green voters are former conservatives who would never vote Liberal... if that's truly the case, it is an anomaly  in your riding, and generally does not apply to ridings across Canada. The greens are taking liberal votes and some NDP, but not as a rule the Conservative voters.

I also strongly disagree that strategic voting is fundamentally undemocratic. Democracy is about the people deciding their government. Strategic voting in elections like the current one, if anything is more democratic because it helps the people ensure their voice is truly heard when they have a strong statement to make. Just because they have a strong statement to make AGAINST a certain political philosophy rather than FOR a certain philosophy, does not detract from the fundamentally democratic nature of strategic voting.

I dunno, cate... I've never been convinced that voting the way that you THINK the rest of the country is voting is very a) diplomatic or b) logical.  Trust the polls to decide your own vote?  Why don't you find a platform you can stand on, or if you can't, lobby one to change theirs?

I'm not sure why you bolded my name in your response...

Did you mean democratic when you said diplomatic? How is it not logical or democratic if logically my goal, as a voter in a democratic election, is to prevent someone I believe to be a borderline fascist from taking over my country NOT because the majority of voters want him to but because voters are being split between too many parties? How is that illogical from a democratic standpoint? Why is another person's goal to have a certain platform forwarded automatically democratic while others who try to prevent what they see as an extremely dangerous platform from being put forward is undemocratic? What is the distinction between democratic and undemocratic based on?

I don't know if they were meant that way, but your comments regarding trusting polls to decide your vote and "why don't you find a platform you can stand on" read as a very condescending and insulting remark to the many voters on this site who have spend hours upon hours reviewing the platforms of the parties, lobbying friends and neighbours and politicians to think critically about the issues, and in many cases we are working at the party level as well. Why do you assume that just because some of us are passionate about preventing a Harper majority, that we don't have a platform to stand on or that we don't lobby politicians?

If anything, strategic voters in this election will have ensured the platform they stand for has the strongest representation in the House, by helping to prevent (at least theoretically) a Harper majority which would have quashed all opposing platforms.

 It's to make your name stand out so you can see it.  Obviously you did.  You'll see me do it again, I'm sure.

...yes.  Yes I did.  (eep)

I see your point.  I think the real problem is the electorate system, and that people are trying to fix it themselves instead of pressuring their government to change it.  Lowest turn out ever?  Nearly useless shift of numbers?  I think everyone who was watching this election closely will agree that there was a much greater emphasis on how much your vote counted/didn't count than what it was actually going towards.

I truly apologize for this remark - I realized afterwards that it sounds like a personal attack.  I only meant that there are a bunch of people who find out what a platform consists of... and a whole bunch of others that just don't care.  I have full respect for informed voters - but not a lot of respect for those who vote for someone based on image and ad campaigns.

And this is where we disagree.  If the majority of Canadians trust Harper, then that's their vote.  If the minority of Canadians trust Harper but he somehow gains a Majority (which now seems to be beyond his reach), then there's something fundamentally wrong with the voting system.  I don't think voting strategically is the right solution.  Now, if by voting strategically you mean choosing between voting for a party and voting for the candidate in your riding... maybe.  But ABC?  Anti-Harper votes?  I think my real frustration comes from people who have told me that voting Green is just a protest vote, that I'm 'throwing it away'.  Unfortunately I know too many people who WOULD vote Green as a protest vote.  But that isn't why I am, or why anyone should.

I do sincerely apologize if I came of condescending - it was not at all my intent.

from the sidelines - yep- Matt it sounded a bit harsh, and with her name bold, it seemed pointed.  However, I read into it immediately that you were simply responding to her, but still ranting about political life in general

Make peace- take a breath...

I missed the part about Faerenach's candidate being ex-conservative & thinking about that swing.  I think the Greens can appeal to a more conservative voter if looked at closely. 
What I wonder about:  The Greens didn't pick up votes at just 6.5 %.  So where did the other 5.5% go (they polled at 12).  I bet it went to Liberal.  BUT if the Liberals did poorer than expected, what the heck happened to their support?  Did it go NDP - probably, since the NDP came out ok, but also I bet it went Conservative (turncoats!)

And Faerenach - are you in the riding where the Lib lost by only 39 votes or something?  That was a wild race to watch!  I was disappointed to see the seesaw land on the Conservative side.

Birthstone, alas no, I was in a riding that was soundly defeated by about 2,000 votes.  But our winning candidate (Conservative) is not a bad choice.  In fact, I was going through some old newspaper clippings this weekend and found a picture of myself and his daughter promoting our high school's musical.  She is a fantastic musician, and a very lovely woman.

Again, truly sorry.  I didn't realize a bit of bold could throw off the direction of my ponderings!  As you'll see above, if I am replying to or directing a comment towards another person (for example, Birthstone or cate) I will bold it so they can pick up on it if they're scrolling through posts.  It's a habit I have developed from other forums, and have never had the opportunity to use it on WonderCafe until now.  I wonder how many other little nuances we'll learn about other people, now that they have formatting to colour their expressions.

Thanks for the apology Faerenach. I have no problem disagreeing on whether strategic voting works or not, I just don't want it painted as undemocratic.

As someone who works in a large office and does 70% of my communication via email, I would strongly (as a friend) suggest you lose the bolding habit. It's pretty much the equivalent of caps... 'yelling while you're spelling'. I still use caps when I intend to yell, of course

Birthstone, I think you might have thought Faerenach's post was RevMatt's, because their avatars resemble eachother...

I also didn't quite understand this comment Faerenach: "And this is where we disagree.  If the majority of Canadians trust Harper, then that's their vote."

Strategic voting only works when a majority of Canadians DO NOT trust Harper, and the goal is to ensure that the majority who do not trust him aren't split so many times by so many parties that he ends up forming a government.

PS. no yelling was intended by those particular caps... 

Personally, I don't see a problem with vote splitting.  If I'm voting for a party that isn't the Liberal party, it's because I agree with another party MORE than the Liberals.  I may not want Harper to have power, but I alone cannot do anything about that.  My vote is worth one, for me, and I have every intention of using it to express my voice as sincerely as possible.

Back to strategic voting - what it does is try to convince you that there are only two sides: those who are with you, and those who are against.  Encouraging someone to give up their freedom of expression for a 'lesser of two evils' vote to me, anyway, seems like your vote is being used.  Strategic voting only works when a majority of Canadians are so desperate that they abandon their own right to self-expression on the chance that their peers are voting the same way they are.  How can we tell what they're voting, or what others are voting?  Polls?  Forecasts?  I don't think I can do that.

Now don't get me wrong - banding together can be good, sometimes.  I think coalition governments are great.  And the way us Canadians stood up to get May in the debates was fantastic.  So why don't we do that with voting?  Because it's all about parties.  With the debate situation, it became not about Green or Conservative or NDP, but about democratic rights and the voice of the people.  When that transcends parties and factions... that's when we see action.  And I think strategic voting, the ABC vote, is flawed because ultimately, it's still about parties.

Which brings us back to the reason this topic's original post is both seriously strategic and slightly satirical.

(I was very good and resisted the urge to caps many things.  *back pat*)

Wandering from the original topic:   I think this is what must happen from now on.  Canadians must, whenever Harper strays from the narrow path of power he has been given, speak up and speak loud. 

Don't just write to Harper, write to the Opposition parties, write to the media, blog, do what ever it takes so that when Harper claims to represent the "ordinary" Canadian he can not deny what that person believes in.

btw, I hold hope that Obama gets elected down south because that will affect the "extremity" licking of Harper.  If McCain is elected, I will be joining Holden and change my citizenship to a country of one....

LB

i watch the spine of my country bend and break.  i'm a sorry state     Spirit of the West, Far too Canadian

I am origially from Switzerland, and it amazes me that in a multiparty country we still vote as we had a two party system as in the US. Switzerland uses a  proportinal system. The voter votes both for a party and also for a member, but that name can from any of te party lists of canditates. Parties have seats proportial to the percentage of votes. The members are elected fom the party lists based on the number of votes they receive overall. It happened in my time that party favorites did not get elected because other candidats received votes from voters who also voted for another party. You still then vote strageically for a platform but also vote for a candate who you know and trust.

Old and puzzled:

It's  comforting to hear that others are puzzled by the chaos of beaurocracy used to institute an archaic and failed system.