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Politics

Dethroning the dictator

A simple electoral reform that might actually make our democracy more representative **** Canada’s democratic system has been likened to a four-year “elected dictatorship.” Why? The fault is often lain at the feet of our First-Past-The-Post electoral system which allows a political party with only a minority of the popular vote to form a majority government. We saw that happen again in 2015, when the federal Liberal Party won a majority government – 54% of the seats in Parliament – with only 39.5% of the votes cast. But does this make Canada a dictatorship? No, not this alone. The bigger issue is the control that party leaders have over who gets to run for their party. Anger your party leader, and he won’t sign your nomination papers. Then your only option is to run as an independent. However, independents don’t win; there have only been two elected independents over the last three elections. So if you want a seat in Parliament, you’d best not do anything to annoy your party leader. That means that, while the Liberals control Parliament, Justin Trudeau controls the Liberals. That allows him to sets the agenda for Parliament. He also chooses who will get Cabinet positions, selects individuals to the Senate, and picks Supreme Court Justices. Three hundred and thirty-eight Members of Parliament are elected, but all the power of Parliament is concentrated into the hands of this one man. Canada is an elected dictatorship. This is a problem This would be a problem even with the best and most noble of men leading our country – unfettered power is a potent temptation to anyone. As Lord Acton put it, “Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.” Our neighbor to the south recognized this corrupting effect, and it led the American Founding Fathers to design a system of government that split power between three separate branches of government: Congress would vie with the President and with the Supreme Court. The three would compete with and hold the others in check to ensure that power was never concentrated in any one branch. But what holds the prime minister’s power in check? Theoretically, it’s the other Members of Parliament (MPs). The prime minister has only one vote, so if his MPs don’t like what he is doing, they could vote against it and stop him. But that’s not how it works. As party leader he has both carrots ands sticks with which he can control his party. An MP who stays loyal may eventually get rewarded with a Cabinet position. An MP who makes trouble may get demoted or even kicked out of the party. The result? MPs dare not disagree with their leader. More parties in control So what can be done? One frequently mentioned proposal is to replace our First-Past-The-Post electoral system with some form of Proportional Representation (PR). Though there are a number of different versions of PR, under the simplest version parties would receive seats in proportion to their popular vote. So if the Liberals received 39% of the popular vote across Canada they would receive 39% of the seats in Parliament. This would result in many more minority governments, forcing the PM to share his power with the other party leaders. Instead of dictating to them he’d be forced to cooperate with them to get his bills passed. The problem with Proportional Representation is that it most often involves voting for a party, not a candidate. A party puts out some sort of list, often with an order of their choosing. If they get enough votes for, say, three MPs, then the three people at the top of their list will get in. This gives the party leader even more power over his party because anyone who isn't willing to pick up his dry cleaning will get put far down the list, or not make it at all. It's true, PR would move us from a dictatorship, but to an oligarchy; instead of rule by one party leader we would be ruled by a council made up of two or three party leaders. However, those party leaders would have an even firmer grip on their parties. So that’s not much of an improvement. Empowering MPs A better option is to change the way a party leader is chosen. Presently, party leaders are chosen by the party members. This method means that, come the next leadership election, a party will be able to sell a lot of memberships. But this is what’s behind the power imbalance: a party leader still has his carrot and stick, and the MPs have no way to constrain their party leader because he is hired and fired not by them, but by their party’s membership. What if the party leader was chosen by the MPs? That’s how it used to be done in the United Kingdom, up until the early 1980s. Under such a system a party leader would still be able to exert considerable control over his caucus, but he wouldn’t be able to run roughshod over them. If he annoyed too many, then out he’d go. There would be some balance. Individual MPs might then feel free to occasionally vote as they think best, or as their constituents think best, and not simply as their party leader thought best. This is a change that the party membership can bring about, starting at the riding level, and the pushing it on to the annual convention. It would take time to win support – this would be a multi-year process – but it can happen. And if a party's membership demands this change, then we might well end up with a more representative democracy, and without any of the radical electoral reforms that have been proposed. Of course, in a sin-stained world a democracy isn't always ideal either: just consider how giving the people their say won’t put an end to either abortion or euthanasia any time soon. But a democracy is a step up from our dictatorship of one....

News

Canada’s conspiracy-proof elections

Controversy over Scheer's leadership win highlights just how blessed we are to have our unimpeachable federal electoral system Days after Andrew Scheer won a close, final-ballot victory for the leadership of Canada’s Conservatives, questions were raised about the vote total. The Conservative Party reported that 141,362 ballots were counted, but in a list sent out to the different leadership candidates’ campaigns, it showed only 133,896 votes. Some from second-place finisher Maxime Bernier’s camp wanted to know, why the big difference? They were troubled because the two vote totals differed by 7,466, which was greater than the 7,049 votes that separated Scheer from Bernier. Then came news that party director Dustin van Vugt has ordered, right after the votes were tallied, that all ballots be destroyed. It was becoming the stuff of conspiracy theories. Fortunately, the answers that were demanded came quickly. Yes, the ballots had been destroyed, but a snapshot of each one still existed. The lower total on the list sent out to the campaigns was due, in part, to a block of about 3,000 votes from polls around Toronto not being entered into the Party database. The remaining difference, of about 4,000, was attributed to human error, as volunteers had to process 140,000 ballots in a very short time. While these answers satisfied most, the Party’s reliance on an electronic record – retaining only a digital snapshot of each ballot instead of keeping the paper ballot itself – was a problem to some. As iPolitics columnist Michael Harris noted, “Have you ever photo-shopped a snapshot? Let’s just say digital images aren’t necessarily the last word in reality.” Harris doesn't seem to like the Conservative Party, so he may be looking for ways to cast doubt on the results. But it's important to note, it’s the Conservative’s reliance on electronic records that allowed Harris to stir up doubt. The need for accountability On June 6 Maxime Bernier tweeted his “unconditional” support for “our new leader Andrew Scheer,” which seems to have quieted the questions. But this controversy highlights how important it is for voters to be able to trust the reported results. An electoral system needs to be as transparent and accountable as possible. Why? Because, everyone, even unbelievers, know that Man is fallen, prone not only to sin, but also to make mistakes. Therefore, how very dangerous it would be to leave the vote counting up to a select unaccountable few. To protect from fraud, and from mistakes, there needs to be accountability. Now, one reason questions about the Conservative leadership election came up is because the party used a complicated means of running the election – their ballot included 14 names. With that complexity came more opportunities for human error. The use of voting machines to count the ballots also raises questions as to transparency – how do we know the machines were working right? One reason some of the questions were quickly answered was because the Conservatives tried to make their system accountable. They involved scrutineers – representatives from all of the campaigns – to monitor the ballot count. While there were some questions from the Bernier camp, other losing candidates were quick to say they had no such doubts. Electronic voting requires us to trust blindly This incident also highlights the strength of Canada’s federal electoral system. Some want to change it, and move to online voting, or electronic voting machines, because these methods are supposed to be easier and faster. But these counting computers also come with a complete lack of transparency. Did the computer count your ballot the right way? Or might there have been some sort of bug or error? How can anyone know? While we can’t be certain as to how many errors occur, we do know they happen. In the US, where these machines are put to regular use it’s easy to find stories of voters who cast a ballot for one candidate but saw it being recorded for the other. There's also the famous example of a precinct in the 2000 election that gave Al Gore a negative 16,022 vote total. This was caught, quickly, but what of the errors that aren’t so obvious? A vote total is only as accurate as the counter, but these electronic counting machines are not open to scrutiny – their computer code is a proprietary secret. So when we make use of them we have to accept, on the basis of trust, that the programmers are both honest and completely error-free. Canada's system doesn't require trust Contrast that with our federal, incredibly simple, entirely transparent, system. No need for trust because everyone is held accountable. You arrive at the poll, you mark your ballot in secret, cast it in front of two witnesses, and then know that it will be counted in front of scrutineers from the competing parties. With that simplicity comes the confidence that your ballot, as it was cast, has been counted. Our system allows us to do what few other countries can: we can verify the official government vote count independently. Because each ballot is counted by hand, in front of scrutineers from the Conservatives, Liberals, and often times the NDP too, that leaves us with as many as four different counts for each riding: the official one, and one from each party. And should there be any notable discrepancy between a party's total and the government total, we can be sure they will let us know! Around the world elections are plagued with accusations of ballot tampering and other shenanigans. Before the latest US presidential election Donald Trump was complaining that the system was rigged. The Democratic Party was accused of rigging their presidential nomination in favor of Hillary Clinton (and against second place finisher Bernie Sanders). It doesn't matter if accusations are justified or completely unfounded – voters' trust will be undermined if there is no way of proving the results reliable. We can see that in the Conservative leadership campaign too; despite all their efforts at transparency, they still had questions raised about the totals. What a blessing it is, then, for Canada to have a federal electoral system that it is so simple, transparent, and accountable, that such accusations are simply unthinkable....

Politics

Electoral Reform: paper and pen beat bits and bytes

As we progress ever farther into the digital age there is going to be an increased push to have voting go from paper to digital, with voting done on, and tabulated by, computers. Part of this push comes from those who just think it a natural progression. After all, isn't everything going digital? Others think it will increase voter turnout, especially if we open things up by allowing voting over the Internet (then you could vote from your own home). But another reason for this push to digital comes from the complicated ways that other countries do elections. In Australia's 2016 federal election, because of their ranked ballot, it took more than a week for the country to find out who had won. If voting had been done electronically this could have been resolved almost right after voting concluded. But there is a problem with electronic voting that makes Canada's present paper and pen voting method vastly superior. If we want people to be involved and invested in the democratic process, then the one thing we need them to know is that the results reported at the end are, without a shadow of a doubt, legitimate. That’s true of the Canada’s present federal system…and in a way that should be the envy of every other country. Our paper ballots leave a paper trail that can be checked and double check and triple checked too. In fact, in most ridings there are people with at least 3 different perspectives counting each vote: the (hopefully neutral) Elections Canada staff a Liberal Party scrutineer a Conservative Party scrutineer In addition there are often scrutineers from the smaller parties like the New Democrats and the Greens (though they don’t have the manpower to scrutinize at every poll). This independent triple check keeps the system entirely transparent – if Elections Canada, the Liberals, and the Conservatives can all agree on the vote total (and they do 99% of the time) then we know that the result are trustworthy. Compare that to United States, where electronic voting tabulates the vast majority of votes and there is no paper trail. Every election there are reports of computer errors – someone voting Republican and their vote being given to the Democrat candidate, and vice versa. Some of these errant votes are caught – one famous example occurred when, in a precinct where just 412 people voted, presidential candidate Al Gore received a negative vote count of minus 16,022 votes. Someone, it seems, had hacked the machine. Errant totals like this are easy to spot, but if a machine can be hacked once, why should we trust all the others? And how many of the other vote totals might be the result of simple computer error? American voters can only wonder how many less obvious errors may have escaped notice. Long ago Joseph Stalin said something to the effect of: "The people who cast the votes decide nothing. The people who count the votes decide everything." Americans’ dependency on electronic voting machines means their system is based on trust – trust that the machines our counting properly, and trust that the people making and programming these counting machines are competent and honest, and trust that their security is flawless. Meanwhile in Canada our hand counting approach recognizes that it is foolish to trust overmuch, that we are fallen and depraved creatures. Of course election officials have never stated it in such explicitly biblical terms, but that is the difference nonetheless. Instead of trust, we have verification, with two, three and even more vote totals from the different parties available to check against the official results. From a Reformed perspective then, the Canadian hand count is vastly superior to the American voting machine count. On the federal level Canada currently has the most trustworthy, and therefore best, vote-counting system in the world. We need to let our friends and neighbors know that when it comes to voting and verification, bits and bytes don't beat pen and paper....