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TJ: just cos I'm bored

here's the b3ta election so far using the BBC's seat calculator

edit/ by the way, SOCKSY!

From the General election: Other / Spoilt ballot challenge. See all 186 entries (closed)

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Wasp Box like a nervous random stranger at a glory hole, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 15:43, archived)

Nicely.

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LordManley twitter.com/LordManley, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 15:44, archived)

What I'd like to see is what the map would like

if it was coloured according everyone who came second.

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Moon Girl Technologies horrendous beanbag, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 15:53, archived)

don't forget that blue mixed with orange either equals black or it equals white

depending on whether you're using light or paint.

MAN THIS IS SO DEEP

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gronkpan @vomitinglarry.bsky.social, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 15:56, archived)

blue and orange with light

makes a pale pinkish purple.

With paint it makes a mucky brown.

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Moon Girl Technologies horrendous beanbag, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 15:59, archived)

cyan and orange make yellow with light

teal and orange make black with paint

SO DEEP

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gronkpan @vomitinglarry.bsky.social, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 16:01, archived)

err what no they don't

red and green make yellow with light.
cyan and orange make pale green.

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Moon Girl Technologies horrendous beanbag, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 16:04, archived)

STOP TRYING TO MESS WITH MY DEEP POLITICAL INSIGHT

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gronkpan @vomitinglarry.bsky.social, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 16:16, archived)

Sadly, I think you'd be disappointed to find

it would be very close to being just the exact opposite of this

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Wasp Box like a nervous random stranger at a glory hole, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 15:56, archived)

there'd be more Lib Dems, I suspect.

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Moon Girl Technologies horrendous beanbag, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 16:00, archived)

There'd be at least 17 more.

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gronkpan @vomitinglarry.bsky.social, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 16:03, archived)

depends on the system used

in a literal what %age of the votes did they get system (which would never happen) they'd have got over twice as many MPs as they actually did in the last election

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Wasp Box like a nervous random stranger at a glory hole, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 16:20, archived)

I'm talking about how many constituencies they came second in at the last election.

The talk of any system other than what was used in the last election is meaningless.

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Moon Girl Technologies horrendous beanbag, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 16:29, archived)

My reply was to gronkpan (although I don't know if he was talking about PR or not)

It's difficult to find out the answer to your question without trawling through the results of all 650 constituencies, and I'm not that bored, but I refer the honorable lady to the answer I gave some moments ago - I think you'd be disappointed to find out how few that would be.

The relatively even geographical spread of Lib Dem support compared with the other two main parties means that PR is the only way they'd be likely to do much better than last time out

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Wasp Box like a nervous random stranger at a glory hole, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 16:35, archived)

I don't have enough knowledge of how your political system works to offer any real insight

I just thought it might be funny to offer an arbitrary number.

The number is: seventeen.

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gronkpan @vomitinglarry.bsky.social, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 16:38, archived)

it's a good number

i like it

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Wasp Box like a nervous random stranger at a glory hole, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 16:39, archived)

I just did a little experiment with that toy though.

Giving 50% of the vote to one main party and 25% to the other two.

When Labour have 50% of the vote, they win 467 seats.
When Conservative have 50% of the vote, they win 450 seats.
When Lib Dem have 50% of the vote, they win 532 seats.

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Moon Girl Technologies horrendous beanbag, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 16:39, archived)

The problem with the lib dem section is that 'when' becomes 'if'.

Not trying to shit on anyone's parade, maybe this will encourage a few people.

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gronkpan @vomitinglarry.bsky.social, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 16:44, archived)

I mean "when" as in "when I put those figures into the whatsit there", of course.

But it would be some good propaganda for them. It means a vote for Lib Dem isn't necessarily as wasted as a lot of people seem to think. Actually their biggest enemies seem to be the "others".

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Moon Girl Technologies horrendous beanbag, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 16:47, archived)

You've made a lot of good points

I have to say though - there is no such thing as "good propaganda". It seems good when you agree with the message, but it is never good.

How do you fight two heavily financed propaganda machines? That's a tough one. Fighting it with propaganda just perpetuates the shit.

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gronkpan @vomitinglarry.bsky.social, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 16:51, archived)

All political material is propaganda.

It's "good" if it gets people to vote for you.

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Moon Girl Technologies horrendous beanbag, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 16:52, archived)

Ok, rather than using the word "propaganda", try the eastern bloc term "transparisma"

I find it to be a bit more descriptive - transparent messages to gain power.

If you're going to put all political messages under the propaganda umbrella (even if, let's say for theory's sake, the vast majority of people voted with the exact message you were shouting), then let's differentiate propaganda from transparisma.

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gronkpan @vomitinglarry.bsky.social, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 16:58, archived)

Google returns no results for "transparisma".

All political leaflets published by political parties are produced with the aim of convincing people to vote for them. They don't need to be lies as such, they only need to be persuasive in some way. It may simply rely on the audience's general tendency not to be very good at interpreting facts or understanding statistics.

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Moon Girl Technologies horrendous beanbag, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 17:03, archived)

sorry, I don't know how to spell it in cyrillic

I hope that doesn't get in the way of the concept

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gronkpan @vomitinglarry.bsky.social, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 17:07, archived)

I'm just a bit generally disappointed in the propaganda round here at the moment,

they're all of the form "Vote X, because if you vote Y, Z will win."

I'd rather see something more along the lines of "Don't be put off voting X by people who say they can't win."

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Moon Girl Technologies horrendous beanbag, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 17:10, archived)

I live in a different country so my views are just those of an outsider looking in

That being said, Lib Dems in England have an uphill battle. There is no shame in being the underdog.

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gronkpan @vomitinglarry.bsky.social, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 17:14, archived)

Yep, I agree to the tips of my toes

I've been telling Lib Dem organisers to stop banging on about two horse races and make some proper principled arguments. The whole point of being a Liberal is not being a reactionary arsecandle.

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John Q Wagonwheel Spent, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 17:17, archived)

All three of them are playing the "two horse race" card here at the moment.

It's insane. The latest Labour one tells me that the Conservative candidate is hoping I'll vote Lib Dem. I was kind of under the impression that he'd want me to vote Conservative. But I guess I may as well now, anyway. What are they trying to do here? Make me strategically vote Conservative? I'm sure as hell not voting Labour, because then the Tories will win!

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Moon Girl Technologies horrendous beanbag, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 17:24, archived)

Labour think the Tories want you to split the Labour vote by voting Lib Dem.

Baffling logic thought up by constituency organiser drones. Surely people vote Lib Dem more because they hate both the Tories and Labour, or because they like our policies. Bizarre tactical voting is an illusion.

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John Q Wagonwheel Spent, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 17:31, archived)

The Tories aren't going to win here

unless almost everyone who voted Lib Dem last time switches parties. The idea that the Tory candidate is rubbing his hands at the thought of people switching from Labour to Lib Dem is completely absurd.

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Moon Girl Technologies horrendous beanbag, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 17:39, archived)

Ooh, isn't this the talking shop.

We've gone all heady and political. I think your estimates of percentage of vote/realistic seat share might be the wrong way round. But don't tell anyone, or they might do one of them 'tactical' votes.

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John Q Wagonwheel Spent, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 16:58, archived)

It's not my estimate.

The BBC did it.

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Moon Girl Technologies horrendous beanbag, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 17:00, archived)

Well, here are some other ones!

Currently it takes:

96,481 votes to elect a single Lib-Dem MP,

44,306 votes to elect a single Tory MP,

26,860 votes to elect a single Labour MP.

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John Q Wagonwheel Spent, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 17:04, archived)

that's that even geographic spread

The LDs will need 40% of the vote to win compared to Labour's 30% because Labour's support is concentrated in certain areas, however, the difference between 20% and 50% for the LDs is huge because they're spread out all over (really this just exposes how crude the BBCs toy is).

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Wasp Box like a nervous random stranger at a glory hole, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 16:46, archived)

The Guardian toy is quite good

But disturbingly inaccurate. Then again, all polls are.

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John Q Wagonwheel Spent, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 17:00, archived)

Ok I'm going to wade in here and suggest that the only important percentage is the one that GETS YOU THE SEAT.

I think British people have some weird dichotomy between "power thirsty bastards" and "our lords and ladies".

Don't like being called British? COMPLAIN TO YOUR LOCAL MP.

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gronkpan @vomitinglarry.bsky.social, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 16:41, archived)

It's interesting to note how the Lib Dems are all on the coast

Oh they do like to be beside the seaside

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Michael Ellis contributes nothing, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 16:02, archived)

I'm surprised there aren't more Lib Dem voters on B3ta to be honest.

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Moon Girl Technologies horrendous beanbag, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 16:08, archived)

I am utterly opposed to PR

otherwise they are grand.

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LordManley twitter.com/LordManley, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 16:15, archived)

same here...

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Moon Girl Technologies horrendous beanbag, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 16:17, archived)

I'm very glad to hear this

For some reason everyone seems to spunk over PR and I've never liked the idea. I'm glad to hear I'm not the only one.

(Unless you refer to the Lib Dems. In which case... errr, I've only ever voted Lib Dem. :( I don't *like* them but I can't bring myself to vote Labour and am extremely unlikely to ever vote Tory.)

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boris the spider, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 16:47, archived)

I like Lib Dem only in the sense that I like them more than Labour and Tory,

and my decision to vote that way has more than a hint of strategy to it.

PR would turn the entire principle of democracy in this country upside-down.

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Moon Girl Technologies horrendous beanbag, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 16:50, archived)

DAMN RIGHT

I liked the Lib Dems better when they were pledging to raise taxes to cover their manifesto - it was refreshingly honest. Then unfortunately they started stabbing their leaders in the back until they got one who looks like a clone of David Cameron but is even more boring :( I like Charles Kennedy, I'd vote for him.

Disclaimer: I did actually vote for Menzies Campbell. If you live in North-East Fife you're more or less required to by law.

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boris the spider, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 16:59, archived)

Tax rises are still in there

50% top rate for those earning 150,000 or more.

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John Q Wagonwheel Spent, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 17:06, archived)

I like this

(Though I'd add that it's easier to promise tax rises when you know you're unlikely to get voted in and have to try and force it through. Still, I like it.)

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boris the spider, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 18:01, archived)

It's not so bad

The party just hasn't made the case for it properly yet. You'd think we'd have had long enough to do so. The Electoral Reform Society has a good little book on it though.

I may be a sad act.

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John Q Wagonwheel Spent, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 16:55, archived)

PR marks the death

of minority group representation, particularly for rural voters.

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LordManley twitter.com/LordManley, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 17:48, archived)

The function of an MP is to represent his constituents in parliament,

not to represent his party in parliament and in his constituency. They may act like that already, but the problem would not be solved by embodying it in the constitution.

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Moon Girl Technologies horrendous beanbag, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 17:55, archived)

And PR allows for the election

of multiple parties of almost every viewpoint. You go to the representative you choose. It's no harder to stand as an independent. I think you've succumbed to a few PR myths here.

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John Q Wagonwheel Spent, Fri 9 Apr 2010, 20:35, archived)