The electoral reform committee met for the first time yesterday and got all of its housekeeping details out of the way – “electing” Francis Scarpaleggia as the chair (though it was unopposed) and naming Scott Reid and Nathan Cullen as the deputies, allocating clerks and resources, and starting to figure out when the meetings will begin, hearing from the outgoing Chief Electoral Officer to start with. But with all of this going on, it bears reminding what we are doing with this whole “reform” endeavour in the first place, much of which has to do with the complaints that parties that don’t get a majority of the votes wield a majority of the power. Joseph Heath writes a great piece debunking this kind of thinking that everyone should read, because it is a reminder that trying to find a “true majority” becomes a futile quest – there is enough arbitrariness in any system that there can never be an actual majority, but it is simply more naked under First-Past-the-Post. Changing the system just moves the goalposts in different ways – indeed, proportional systems just removes the possibilities of majority government with the horse-trading of coalitions, which brings yet more arbitrariness into the system. So good luck, committee members, with your stated goals for the system you wish to choose when they are built upon foundations of sand.

This is why we should call it "electoral change", not "electoral reform". There's no objectively better direction to make changes.

— Stephen Gordon (@stephenfgordon) June 21, 2016

Meanwhile, as our friends in the media write yet more stories about what the committee will be looking at, can I please offer the reminder about doing some actual research when it comes to systems like ranked ballots. Consistently our media colleagues have repeated the grossly distorted line that ranked ballots somehow “increase the disparities of first-past-the-post.” We’ve seen this over and over again, especially as the NDP and their Broadbent Institute brethren have picked it up as a talking point. No.

Ranked ballots are supposed to discourage tactical voting, but you wouldn’t know it based on how it’s been described in Canadian media.

— Dale Smith (@journo_dale) June 21, 2016

This supposed fact comes from a single analysis done by CBC’s Eric Grenier using a single poll done around the time of the election regarding second choices. That’s it. It doesn’t detail how the system actually works and what it is designed to do, which is to eliminate tactical voting, and yet we’ve never heard that description used once. Oh, wait – I used it in a sidebar I researched for the Ottawa Citizen. But that’s it. It would be nice if other journalists writing about this file could actually go and do a bit of research on their own rather than repeating the talking points provided to them by partisans, because we might get a better understanding of what is actually up for debate.

Good reads:

• Talk of the town is that Jason Kenney is getting ready to make the jump to Alberta politics to “unite the right.” (No definitive statements yet, mind you).
• Kevin Milligan explains the CPP deal reached with the provinces yesterday. Kathleen Wynne takes credit for the deal happening.
• The Senate is sending Bill C-7 on RCMP unionization back to the Commons with significant amendments.
• Ruh-roh! It looks like the Super Hornet may have problems with its onboard oxygen systems.
• Activists pushing for a public inquiry into Afghan detainees says that Harjit Sajjan is in a conflict of interest in making the decision surrounding one.
• Mélanie Joly has asked the Public Policy Forum to look at the issue of the struggling media and to offer some policy ideas.
• The House of Commons administration report notes ten cases of possible harassment reported in the last year – seven inquiries and three informal complaints.
• Here’s a more in-depth look at the recent round of judicial appointments and the diversity that they bring to the bench.
• A new study shows how the presence of more women has changed the civil service – and how they remain stymied from the top jobs.
• Chantal Hébert notes Stephen Harper’s departure from Ottawa with nary a goodbye.
• Susan Delacourt writes about how the generational change in politics is butting up against the ongoing issues of the older generation.
• Colin Horgan pushes back against Andrew Scheer’s Brexit boosterism, and points the real underlying problem of English (as opposed to UK) nationalism.
• My Loonie Politics column looks at why Senator Bellemare’s proposed “guidelines” for the Senate studying bills is wrong-headed.

Odds and ends:

The PM and much of cabinet marked National Aboriginal Day with a sunrise ceremony outside of the Museum of History.

Rona Ambrose talks about the difficulty in accepting defeat after the last election, and the challenge of party unity in a leadership race.