The MyDemocracy.ca site went live yesterday, and immediately it became the subject of mockery because it asked questions related to outcomes rather than simplistic questions about which system of counting votes one preferred. Of course, focusing on the proportionality of votes to seats fixates on a facile notion of “representation” while ignoring the substance of what those votes actually mean, the effect on accountability, and the effect on our overall system of government. No, it won’t mean that whoever gets 50 percent of the votes will get 50 percent of the power. That’s a wrong-headed notion that ignores the ways in which our system operates currently, and the various roles that MPs have versus ministers.
Anyway, here’s Phil Lagassé explaining why the questions are the way they are (which are not some kind of People magazine pop-psychology quiz like Nathan Cullen constantly derides them as), and no, it’s not about ensuring that the fix is in for whatever the Liberals want – it’s designed to see what kinds of outcomes people are looking for and then working backwards to find an electoral system that favours those outcomes, and anyone who thinks that you can focus on electoral reform without looking at outcomes is deluding themselves.
https://twitter.com/pmlagasse/status/805766392888885249
https://twitter.com/pmlagasse/status/805779092796796929
https://twitter.com/pmlagasse/status/805779313891086336
https://twitter.com/pmlagasse/status/805779663578611712
https://twitter.com/pmlagasse/status/805780375599509504
https://twitter.com/pmlagasse/status/805781357733548036
https://twitter.com/pmlagasse/status/805782982552420353
https://twitter.com/pmlagasse/status/805816160168112128
https://twitter.com/pmlagasse/status/805816570379239424
https://twitter.com/pmlagasse/status/805816880837619712
https://twitter.com/pmlagasse/status/805817286665846784
https://twitter.com/pmlagasse/status/805817858529853440
https://twitter.com/pmlagasse/status/805818551835721728
Good reads:
- Justin Trudeau has agreed to talk healthcare when he meets with premiers later in the week.
- Chrystia Freeland says that the government needs to seize the opportunity to attract foreign investment while everyone is waiting for the Trumpocalypse to fall.
- Rona Ambrose is asking the Ethics and Lobbying Commissioners to investigate Liberal fundraising practices.
- The Competition Bureau is stepping up monitoring of infrastructure contracts to avoid bid-rigging and has already found problems.
- Environment Canada spent $430 million on a new supercomputer and $83 million in upgraded weather radar systems to improve forecasting.
- The RCMP have admitted to fabricating and backdating a response to an Access to Information request on the long-gun registry.
- Some Liberal MPs think that returning to the per-vote subsidy is the way to stop the appearance of “cash-for-access” fundraising.
- Crunching the number shows that Maxime Bernier’s donor base is broader and bigger than Kellie Leitch’s, which is mostly clustered in Ontario.
- Michael Chong and Deepak Obhrai have denounced that anti-Notley rally in Edmonton. Neither seemed to criticise Chris Alexander or The Rebel, however.
- Chris Alexander now claims that he was “mortified” by the chants and his smile was “stalling for time.” Rona Ambrose called the chanters idiots.
- Tyler Dawson calls out Alexander for his apparent lack of spine by not condemning the chants at the time.
- Susan Delacourt gives her political naughty and nice list for 2016.
- Stephen Gordon looks at the policy implications of phasing out large-denomination banknotes.
Odds and ends:
A public servant at DND plead guilty to falsely invoicing almost $1 million in computer parts and selling them over Kijiji.
Alexander is clearly waving his left hand in time with the chants. For him to say he was embarrassed by the demonstration only serves to characterize him as more hypocritical than he has been.
The MyDemocracy.ca site is being derided because respondents expected a survey of opinions and got instead a way to “draw a picture of your democratic values”.
There is an interesting interview here (http://www.macleans.ca/news/canada/the-making-of-mydemocracy-ca-the-liberals-electoral-reform-survey/). The VoxPop CEO confirms what I wrote in a previous comment: this was part of a segmentation study.
As the interview points out, the segmentation and cluster analysis (using sophisticated
stastistical analyses likely including least squares regression and the dreaded square root — wait until that hits the fan!) have already been done. Arguably then, there will be no new learning from the site. That is, the composition of the segments and their proportion in the population is already known or at least estimated.
So the mystery is: why would the Government position what is an engagement tool as a survey, and promote it with a mailout to the entire population? Further, why is an engagement tool standing all by its lonesome, without examples or explanations or supporting information? My guess is that it was originally intended as support material for either a website explaining electoral alternatives or for the Minister’s summer tour, but fell behind schedule.
I see the point, but the survey itself does not live up to the goal.It is repetitive, irritating and often offers unacceptable choices. And the social media claptrap is what makes it laughable
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