Friday, December 13, 2019

Is There Anything To Learn From The U.K. Elections? Part I

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"Massive" 43.6% win

Before people kill themselves over the terrible results in Britain yesterday, remember, more people voted against Boris Johnson and the Conservatives than voted for them. His party only took 43% of the votes. The British version of gerrymandering gives him a commanding control of Parliament, not the will of the people, despite all the crowing from the corporate media and rightist politicians from Trump to Biden. This is what actually happened:
Conservative Party- 13,966,565 (43.6%)-- 365 seats (+48)
Labour Party- 10,295,607 (32.2%)-- 203 seats (-59)
Liberal Democrats- 3,696,423 (11.6%)-- 11 seats (-1)
Scottish Nationalists (Scotland)- 1,242,372 (3.9%)-- 48 seats (+13)
Green Party- 835,579 (2.7%)-- 1 seat
Brexit Party- 642,303 (2.0%)-- no seats
Democratic Unionist Party- (Northern Ireland) 244,128 (0.8%)- 8 seats (-2)
Sinn Féin (Northern Ireland)- 181,853 (0.6%)- 7 seats
Plaid Cymru (Wales)- 153,265 (0.5%)-- 4 seats
Alliance Party (Northern Ireland)- 134,115 (0.4%)-- 1 seat
ocial Democratic and Labour Party (Northern Ireland)- 118,737 (0.4)-- 2 seats (+2)
Cas Mudde is an international affairs professor at the University of Georgia who writes for The Guardian. He's not buying all the Biden-Bloomberg and corporate media crap that Labour's loss in the U.K. means the Democrats have to move right. "In many ways," wrote Budde, "the results were in line with broader trends in Europe, notably that (radicalized) mainstream rightwing parties are quite successful, as, for instance, in Austria and the Netherlands, while social democratic parties are getting hammered virtually everywhere, irrespective of whether they are 'moderate' or 'radical.' The idea that British elections are most similar to U.S. elections is based on a simplistic understanding of the two political systems. It is true that both share a first-past-the-post system, with single-member districts, leading to a two-party system, but that is about it. The UK has a parliamentary system and the US a presidential one, which puts much more emphasis on one person and makes the undemocratic electoral college the key decider."
But most importantly, all elections are still primarily national rather than global. The British election had its own, partly unique, issues and candidates. First and foremost, the election was about Brexit, an issue irrelevant to the U.S. electorate. Also, Corbyn was an extremely controversial candidate. While very popular within the (new) party base, and among millennials, 61% of Brits had a negative opinion of Corbyn, which included particularly older white men, who vote in large numbers. This unpopularity was only partly related to his “hard left” platform; issues such as his weak stance against antisemitism and his non-position on Brexit didn’t help either. To be fair, Johnson isn’t popular either, but he is much less unpopular than Corbyn.

So, which lessons can we draw for next year’s presidential elections? Many, although most are general lessons, not specific to this result.

First, unpopular candidates can win elections-- a lesson we should already have drawn in 2016. It doesn’t matter whether a majority of the population dislikes you, but that a majority of the voters likes you. Trump’s base might be small, but it is mobilized and united.

Second, internal divisions, over candidates and policies, will harm both support and turnout. While Corbyn has a pretty strong grip on the party membership, which is why he can probably stay on to oversee his own succession, he has been involved in an ongoing and public conflict with much of his parliamentary party. Moreover, the party was internally divided over key issues, most notably Brexit. This all meant that the Labour party contested the elections with an unclear profile. Given the divisions within the Democratic party, and the open animosity between donors and supporters of both “moderate” and “radical” candidates, there is a serious risk that this could harm the Democrats in 2020, too.

Third, the electoral system is key to any successful electoral campaign. Plurality systems are extremely disproportional. In Thursday’s election the Tories got one seat for every 38,304 votes, while Labour needed 50,649 votes for each seat-- the numbers for the Liberal Democrats and Greens were 331,226 and 857,513, respectively. Moreover, Corbyn’s “dramatic” result last night was only 3% lower than the 35.2% that won Tony Blair his third election in 2005. The U.S. system is even less democratic, given that the electoral college trumps the popular vote.

Fourth, and most importantly, campaigns matter. Yes, Labour had fantastic short videos, and an incredibly detailed and elaborate election manifesto, but its campaign missed a clear focus and target-- obviously, in large part because Corbyn was unwilling to take a clear position on the key issue of the election. In sharp contrast, the Tories had a clear message (“Vote to deliver Brexit; vote to respect the referendum”), however problematic in reality, and spent much of their money on Facebook in the last week of the campaign, when many voters decide whether and who to vote. The Trump campaign has been spending millions of dollars on Facebook for the last year, pushing a very similar message-- in the language of its leader, “DEMOCRATS WANT TO STEAL THE ELECTION.”

What this all means is that Democrats should put much less trust in general polls, as in a highly polarized country like the US average levels of public support do not necessarily tell us much about who will win the presidency. What matters is who shows up. Republican voters know who and what they will show up for. Do Democratic voters?
Part II will be tomorrow in this same time slot.





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4 Comments:

At 9:42 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Basically, the UK election was mainly about one issue -- brexit, with a little flavor from anti-Semitism creating a small anti-labour wave. Both party leaders are loathed, so it was a choice of issues with the loathed party leader coming along for the ride?

"Republican voters know who and what they will show up for. Do Democratic voters?"

This kind of illustrates the fundamental difference between our shithole elections and anyone else's -- ours are about parties. period.

(all of) the Nazis always vote for Nazis. The worse they are, the more likely they will be supported.
those who show up to vote for democraps are really simply voting against the Nazis. It's fear or hate or, more likely, post-hypnotic. But it's pretty simple.
The Nazis make an issue of anything that stirs up limbic hate.
the democraps pander to the voters while they answer to the money. only to the money.

Basically, both parties and all principals are roundly loathed. Voters are voting against the ones they hate the most, not voting FOR those they hate the least, without much regard to issues. Hatfield vs. McCoys. The electoral college decides who rules.

which is maybe why more people don't vote than vote for either the Nazis or the democraps.

Now, if someone with some charisma and a halfway decent progressive agenda were to divest from the democrap party, maybe those who don't vote may have a reason to awaken... and maybe a vast swath of those who reflexively vote against the Nazis might have a reason to vote FOR something for a change.

So far, nobody on the left with charisma and a halfway decent progressive agenda has seen fit to divest him/herself from the democrap party. Someone with principles might be expected to do so out of simple conscience -- doing the right thing. Perhaps America is so degraded that this cannot happen.

 
At 10:51 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

"Perhaps America is so degraded that this cannot happen."

This is likely to be the case. With corporatism in control of the major elements of governance and the media (the ultimate goal of the Powell Memo), those who challenge the rule of the corporations are at a major disadvantage. Elections are overtly rigged in favor of those owned by corporate money, and voter rolls are selectively manipulated to remove those who don't vote in support of corporatism. The final tallies cannot be trusted because there is no way allowed to audit the results.

Sanders is only getting any coverage at all because he polls so well and does have a large following. Despite these assets, Biden and Buttigieg dominate the media coverage and both are clearly corporatists. Very little attention is paid to anyone else.

Resistance is futile. You have been assimilated. You will do as you are told until the rights to you are sold.

Now get back to work. Your elite masters desire more wealth from your labor.

 
At 11:34 PM, Blogger Cirze said...

Clap! Clap! Clap! Clap!

 
At 7:16 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

His "win" was just a little bigger than Hitler's biggest "win".

Trump's "win" was with 32% of the eligible electorate over $hillbillary who had about 34% of the eligible electorate (!).

yet they both share one thing with hitler: absolute power.

and, yes, I'm saying that trump will survive "impeachment" and come out even stronger because of it.

democraps cannot seem to get out of their own way... ever. be proud.

 

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