To give props is to say, “good job” - high five and all that.

I’m saying good on you to the Canadian government for responding to a citizen’s inquiry.  My inquiry to be specific.  I actually received a response–not a form letter.  Hey, all you American citizens, write Secretary Clinton or someone else in the U.S. Cabinet and see if you get a response.  I’m betting you won’t.

Not quite a year ago I wrote a blog post here, How Lewenza & The CAW Are Misleading Canadians which dealt with the question of how our federal government should respond to the Canadian Auto Workers plea for taxpayer dollars to bail out the Canadian auto industry.   My article included an overly optimistic suggestion that the Harper government hold firm and not provide spendulus money to GM and Chrysler.  As you recall, this was shortly after Harper buckled under pressure and requested that Parliament be suspended.  The fact of the matter is that the Ministry of Finance proposed a budget toward the end of 2008 that included a reduction in government spending and no “stimulus” money–contrary to what the U.S. was doing.  After the turn of the calendar and following the suspension of Parliament, Harper did cave in and deficit spending was authorized.

In any event, at the end of blog post, I posed a few hard questions that needed to be asked of Mr. James Flaherty, Minister of Finance.  I asked these questions and encouraged the reader to do the same.  I received a response.

Read the entire article

Obama is the inside man shuffling the peas.

Let me explain.  After you think about it,  I am confident you will agree.  First, let’s summarize what a shell game is.  A lot of people may believe that a shell game is gambling but in fact it is not.  It is a confidence game which perpetuates fraud.  I think you will clearly see that this is again exactly what Obama is doing to the American public; using a confidence game to perpetuate a lie, if not another fraud on the public.  A shell game is called a short-con because it is quick and easy to pull off.  A shell game is where a small round object (normally called a “pea”) is place under one of three shells, or the like.  The play is initiated by the inside man shuffling the pea from under one shell to the next.  At the end of the shuffle, the mark is asked to make his bet.  The mark is told that if he guesses correctly, he will double back the amount of his bet.  If the mark is wrong, he looses his bet.  In the hands of a skilled inside man, it is impossible to win because the game is based upon the slight of hand.  The operator can make the pea appear under anyone of the three shells and does so after the mark places his bet and points to one of the shells.  Typically, for the con to work, a dumb-mark has to be attracted to the game.  The operator will provide a setting of which it appears that several people are “gambling”—some are winning, some are loosing.  Most if not all of these players are part of the con and called “shills.”  Their job is to assist in the con.  Get the picture.  Obama has several shills working the game for him.

In the context of Obama politics, much presented by the preening operator is a shell game and most particularly, the President’s Afghanistan play.  Let me try and lay it out.  It is difficult because of the slight of hand in Obama’s rhetoric.  Going back to July of 2008, Candidate Obama appeared on CBS Face the Nation.  There he referred to the situation in Afghanistan as “precarious and urgent.”  While on that CBS program Obama also said that he had been advocating for more than a year an increase in troop levels in Afghanistan of at least two, maybe three brigades (15,000 troops).  The shuffle is on. . . Obama also was quoted as saying, “he has made Afghanistan a key focus of his foreign policy, and that he he would make it the central front in the “war on terror” if elected. Keep you eye on the pea.

After the election, in November, 2008 Obama spoke with at least 15 world leaders in the first three days of being elected, however, it was two weeks following before Obama spoke with the President of Afghanistan Karzai.1  The pea is moving around.  Of course during the conversation with Kazari, Obama promised more “assistance” to Afghanistan.  After all, the situtation in Afghanistan has been precarious and urgent for more than a year.  Several times Obama has said to the citizens that the war in Afghanistan had been getting worse.  I am mindful that he referred to the situation as urgent more than 18 months ago.

Everyone is aware of the “several months” of deliberations that Obama engaged in to determine the perfect Afghan strategy.  Quite frankly, honest and objective observers are usually convinced, such as I am, that these past several months of deliberations (one year since the election) were just Obama shuffling the shells not quite sure what to do.  If this is how our President and Commander in Chief responds to a precarious and urgent matter, I scared for all my family living in the U.S. as to how Obama will shuffle shells in the face of other urgent security matters.  We can discuss the shell game Obama is playing with the American people on Iran and health-care later.

After these many months of arduous deliberations, Obama finally announced “his” strategy for “winning the war in Afghanistan on Dec 1, 2009.  His solution, send more troops.  Brilliant.  I like the way Presidents and military people refer to sending troops overseas–they use the word, “deploy.”  Obama’s solution to win the war is for the most part to deploy 30,000 more troops and to carry out a mission much like the U.S. did during the surge in Iraq.  Okay, let’s assume that this brilliant strategy that Obama has laid out more than a year and half after he called the situation urgent, is the correct strategy to “win the war.”  By the way, no one in the media appears to want to ask Obama, “What took so long?”  Probably because the answer would be more Obama pea shuffling meaningless rhetoric.  Obama’s speech could have been two short sentences, i.e. honest and without his self-adoration and self-serving remarks.  ”I am sending more troops to Afghanistan.  I should have issued the orders months ago.”  End of speech.

Keep your eye on the pea!

In the speech Obama made at West Point wherein he unvieled his long awaited strategy for finishing the job against terrorists, Obama advised the world that these 30,000 additional troops would begin deploying as soon as possible–in January 2010.  Obviously, we can not send more troops before January 2010; after all, it is Christmas month–no one wants to fight a war just before Christmas.  So, beginning sometime in January, more troops will be deployed.  What Obama does to the American people and the citizens of our NATO allies is to deliberately mislead them by failing to talk about how long it will take to get these additional troops deployed who are urgently needed.  Hey America, the Obama hand is apparently quicker than your eyes!  In his West Point speech, Obama promised the citizens that we would ” . .begin the transfer of our forces out of Afghanistan in July of 2011!” (emphasis added).  The illusion was presented to the citizens that the troops would be deployed in January 2010 and would be coming home in July 2011 (basically an 18 month execution of the Obama strategy to win the war in Afghanistan).  Obama obviously takes the citizens as being complete fools, if not idiots.  In summary, you might say it took Obama one year of intense deliberations to come up with a strategy to win the war in 18 months or less.  Wow, Obama is super-dawg.  The actual illusion of the shuffling of the pea under one of the shells is even worse than you think.  Recently, the second-ranking general in Afghanistan, Lt. General David Rodriguez, made the not so popular statement recently that it might take up to 11 months or longer to deploy the additional 30,000 troops.   Quoting here an article published at WCCO2, “Military officials had already been hinting broadly in recent weeks that the escalation might take longer, but Rodriguez’ comments indicated that the notion of a six-month rapid escalation was not realistic and that reality is now setting in.” Assuming Lt. General Rodriguez might know what he is talking about, then Obama is promising the citizens that winning the war will take one year or less after the additional troops arrive.  As you might expect, the statement by Rodriguez is not consistent with what the White House said earlier this month.   At Riehl World View, you can read where White House press secretary, Robert Gibbs said the troop build up will be accelerated. We’re going to get in there quickly and transfer responsibility for security to the Afghans quickly.   Obviously, during the months of deliberations Obama was surely informed as to how long it would take to get 30,000 troops into Afghanistan, he just failed to mention it to the citizens.  Which shell is the pea under?

Congress; a Shill or a Mark?

Last night I heard on the radio that Congress is not necessarily supportive of deploying more troops—well, at least for paying for them!  What? Are you kidding me?  There is no question whatsoever that in every shell game Obama is simultaneously playing–and there are many–we know that the number one shill in the bunch is Nancy Pelosi.  Notwithstanding that fact, I am stunned to learn that she just recently said:

It will be up to Obama to convince members of Congress to approve the money he needs to send extra troops to Afghanistan. Members of Congress will have to base their votes on their “consciences and constituents, . . .”3

In effect the Democratic leader of the House is telling Obama he is on his own with selling his plan to Congress to send more troops to Afghanistan!  Does he have congressional support or not?  You must have congressional support to fund the troops!  Never mind which shell is the pea under, there’s not even a pea on the table!  Doesn’t this blow your mind?  During these months of deliberations, Obama failed to gather the support of the House leadership in support of deploying more troops to Afghanistan, uh?  Unbelievable.  I can only conclude that Congress must be, at least in part, a mark in shell game along with the American public.  Even if this was not bad enough for Obama, a democrat representative from Ohio, Rep. Dennis Kucinich says he will be proposing a resolution in Congress in early January to pull all troops out of Afghanistan!  Obama would probably have more success with some of his foreign policy if his own party did not control both the House and Senate.  The country is no longer teetering on the precipice of total leadership failure–it is already there.

New Political Hard-Ball Begins.

Did you seen this “Wanted Poster” referencing Chamber of Commerce President Tom Donohue?  Outrageous.  A liberal activist group, called Velvet Revolution (cute eh?) has put a de facto bounty of $200,000 on Tom Donohue.  The offer is real and it seeks to flush out any criminal wrong doing in Donohue’s past.  The headline at Fox News is “Liberal Group Puts Bounty on Head of Chamber of Commerce CEO.” The story advises us that the mouth piece for Velvet Revolution is an attorney (surprise!) named Kevin Zeese.  According to Fox News, the group originally offered a mere $100,000 but recently increased the reward to its current amount thanks to a group of large donors.  There are several aspects of this that are disturbing.   This new example of political hardball serves as the impetus for me to start writing posts again after many months vacation.  Thank you for coming by.

Velvet Revolution is the term given to  a non-violent revolution in Czechoslovakia in 1989 when the Communist government was overthrown.  My inference is that this group, Velvet Revolution believes that the U.S. Government is akin to the Communist Party and is looking for a non-violent overthrow of something. . . the Government?  In any event, the idea is, if Velvet Revolution can act as a clearing house for any potential skeleton in Donohue’s closet then the leads will be forward to the Justice Department or the like.  The wording on the wanted poster itself indicates that the skeleton in the closet must be large enough to rise to the level of a criminal conviction in order for a reward to be paid.  Zeese calls the national Chamber of Commerce a right-wing extremist group that is primarily a mouth piece for corporate America.  One might describe Kevin Zeese as a left-wing zealot.  Earlier this year Zeese stated in an article he wrote that he was one of eight people arrested for disrupting Congress.  Of course he has his own agenda thus his involvement, if not outright leadership in Velvet.  However, that is not the point here.

The point is that this represents a new open level of hostility between domestic people and groups with different agendas.  It could very well explode into an atomic bomb of direct financial nastiness while giving fundraising a new 21st century meaning.  If it hasn’t jumped out at you yet, let me explain.  When people or groups look to personally disparage others with viewpoints different than their own, it obviously generates all kinds of heat.  Here we have a group with an agenda that has decided to solicit allegations of criminal wrongdoing from the general public because apparently the group has been unsuccessful in finding any on its own.  Where will this slippery slope bottom out?  I see this opening the door for other groups to counter-attack.  Perhaps Donohue might sit as one of the board of directors of an organization that now wishes to solicit information of criminal wrongdoing on Kevin Reese.  Does the charge of “disrupting Congress” rise to a sufficient level so as to properly disparage Zeese?  You decide.
The organizations themselves do not have to pay the reward money from their own coffers, they just has to do private fundraising from the “public” and there you go, reward money sitting in some attorney’s trust account.  On a positive note this may create a few jobs.   Someone has to sit at the computers receiving emails or answering the hot-line telephones thus fielding the leads.  In response to being asked about leads coming in regarding Donohue, Zeese said, Velvet has received a “handful of leads.”  What else is he going to say?

Political Bounty is out in the open.

Something else that concerns me about the fact that political bounty is now out in the open is that it will encourage more invasion of privacy.  Reporters routinely “vet” political candidates which is a nice way of saying they’re also looking for dirt on the candidates.  I doubt reporters receive rewards from organizations for their successes–at least not above the table.  Political opponents obviously search for dirt on one another for the purpose of disparagement but not likely for financial bounty purposes.  This process of offering money for information of criminal wrongdoing by persons of influence will likely escalate.  If so, then just a bit further down the slope will be the reward for information leading to the conviction of criminal wrongdoing of politicians as I have opined here.  Is that a good or bad thing?  Where will it stop?  No doubt the political process in the United States is already a shameless disgrace however, I say the polarization of political agendas is definitely Going Rouge. Can you imagine the reward amount a liberal organization will try to raise to attempt to obtain information on Sarah Palin?  I predict that if Governor Palin is a presidential nominee in 2012, the reward will be in the millions!  Lots of jobs created though i.e. people will be needed to answer that hot-line.   Once this gets going, it will spread like a pandemic to state and local politics.

Anyway, the organization supporting Donohue might offer $300,000 for information leading to the conviction of someone say, for example, Nancy Pelosi, or Harry Reid. Next thing you know, we have some other group or organization looking for information leading to a criminal conviction on say, Michael Steele, the leader of the Republican National Committee. Suppose you wanted an organization to offer a $10,000 reward for information leading to a conviction of any criminal wrongdoing by a politician opposing your candidate in the local city counsel election?  Is that good for the people, or is it bad?  It would not stop there either.

My other concern is that the offering a financial reward will expand beyond the concept of information leading to a conviction of a criminal act.  I am unable to think of anything of substance that would stop people or groups from using this same process for information leading to the disparagement of someone, i.e., where’s the dirt?  Talk about going rouge!  I can envision it now–ABC liberal left-wing organization offers $50,000 for any credible dirt on the right-wing conservative candidate in a state representative’s election race.  In today’s economy, there would be many people out there scouring for dirt on the candidate notwithstanding their political views.

I see this reward thing as bad news.  What do you think?  Post a comment or email me.

A Most Important Lawsuit!

Quitely behind the scenes without fanfare and media attention, the Thomas Moore Law Center and its team of attorneys go about the serious business of defending conservative values in the courts.  On December 15, 2008 the Thomas Moore Law Center, on behalf of its client, Kevin J. Murray filed his Complaint against the United States government in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan.  Specificially, the named defendants are the Secretary of Treasury, and the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System.  The Complaint seeks relief from the government’s illegal action of owning and funding a religious organization/business/institution in violation of the Establishment Clause of the U.S. Constitution.  This lawsuit seeks to force the divesture of billions of taxpayer monies from a business organization that owns/operates and perpetuates religious extremeism.  Without writing another sentence, whether you are a Liberal, Conservative, Independent, Republican, Libertarian, Democrat, or Green, I should now have your attention.  Like it or not, your government is now unconstitutionally entangled with Islam!

Background:

“Plaintiff Kevin J. Murray is a United States citizen, a resident of Washtenaw County, Michigan, a federal taxpayer, and a devout Catholic. Plaintiff is also a former U.S. Marine who served honorably in harm’s way to defend our country (the United States) against Islamic terrorists.”  See  paragraph 11 of Complaint.  The designated federal judge on the case is the Hon.  Lawrence P. Zatkoff.  The magistrate judge assigned to the case is Mona K. Majzoub.1  Federal District Judges are appointed to the bench by the President for life by authority of federal statute.  Federal Magistrate Judges are appointed by the District Court Judges for eight year renewable terms.  Magistrate Judges have about as much power and authority as the District Judges want them to have including that which is conferred upon them by 28 U.S.C. § 636.  The Magistrate can often be the “decision maker” on any number of dispositive procedings or issues in a case notwithstanding that there is a “District” Judge assigned to the case.  The idea behind district judges being appointed for life by authority of a Congressional statute is that judges appointed for life would be free from influence based upon a fear of not being reelected because of how they may decide a case or controversy.  This is not the case for magistrate judges.  Obstensibly because of an overwhelming case load, Congress passed 28 U.S.C. § 631 et seq. which authorized the hiring of magistrates to assist the district court judges in handling their case loads.2

Murray complains that the U.S. Government’s involvement with AIG violates the Establishment Clause of the U.S. Constitution because it allows the government to be directly, and indirecly involved with religious activities, specificially, the Islamic Religion by and through Shariah-based Islamic religious practices and activities.  In simpler terms, AIG is directly and indirectly involved with anti-American and anti-Jewish activities—which violates the Constitution and it offends that which is right, just, and moral under the standards and principles that the U.S. was founded. An aside is that if AIG were controlling, funding, and directly or indirectly involved with a Christian organization, the a/k/a  “right-wing” conservative extremistism, I would not likely be writing this article because it would be all over the mainstream media and the Liberals would be screaming daily until it ceased.  Even with that said, which is irrefutable in fact, I am still amazed that Liberals do not appear to be concerned or upset by the funding of AIG by and through their own tax dollars.  After all, there are Liberal taxpayers, right?

Procedure:

A defendant normally has 20 days in Federal Court in which to file and serve and file an answer to a complaint in federal court.  If the defendant is the United States (or one of its agencies), the defendant has 60 days in which to file its answer.  In this case, the Defendants’ Answer was required to be filed and served on Murray in February of this year however, that time line is interrupted if the defendant files a certain type of motion prior to answering the complaint; which is what has taken place in this lawsuit.  Treasury Secretary Geithner and the Federal Reserve have not filed an answer to the complaint but have instead filed a Motion to Dismiss.3  The Defendants’ Motion to Dismiss was filed February 27, 2009.  Murray filed his Response to the Motion on March 18, 2009.  The disposition of the Motion by the court is pending.  Of course, we will not know whether the Magistrate Majzoub will rule on the defendants’ motion or whether Judge Zatkoff, himself will rule on the issue.  If Geithner and the Board of Governors’ motion is denied, then obstensibly the defendants’ answer to the complaint will have to be filed with the court within a few days.  If the motion is granted, then I suspect the plaintiff here will appeal the decision to the Federal Court of Appeals (Sixth Circuit).  In any event, we await the court’s decision on the motion to dismiss.  Although this case is extremely important to all Americans, it is likely that the main stream media will not cover the court’s ruling on the motion therefore, I plan to monitor this case and report on the court’s ruling when it comes out.

One Reason You Should Care:

The first reason you care is that AIG (American International Group)  has received about $170 billion in government bailout funds (so far), from which it paid $454 million in retention awards and bonuses since March,  That’s approximately $2,300 per U.S. family of their tax dollars being invested in AIG and its subsidiaries.4  The U.S. Government owns a controlling interest in AIG.   If you were being asked to stroke a check for $2,300 right now; wouldn’t you want to know who, what, and how the money was going to be spent?   Of course you would.   It is sad that most Americans still have not woke up and smelled the coffee to the fact that they (the U.S. people) now own the majority and controlling interest in AIG and have a right to know, and control how and where their invested funds are being used.  Regardless of what your political or religious beliefs are, you should care how $170 billion dollars of taxes are being spent just from the veritble amount of $ involved.

Second Reason You Care, or Should Care:

AIG engages in activities that are “antithetical to our Nation’s values.”5   Given the fact that most U.S. citizens are “infidels” as defined by Islamic tenants; the activities that the $2,300 per family is earmarked for are directly against that which the taxpayers themselves believe in and stand for.  How ironic is that?   And of course, I assume that infidels care about the$450 million paid out in bonuses to AIG employees since they became majority owners.  Because taxpayer funds were expended by the U.S. Government to acquire a majority ownership interest in AIG, the Plaintiff here and you are being forced to contribute to offensive anti-American activities not to mention the direct anti-Christian and anti-Jewish purpose of the activities.  You have no choice whatsoever unless you stand up and demand accountability by Congress as to where and how your tax dollars are spent.  Perhaps, in reality, today’s taxpayers are apathetic because it is not this generation that will truly suffer i.e., actually have to pay for the Congressional indiscretion to the degree of pain the next two generations will suffer.  I suspect that you would really give a damm if you truly understood that the money invested is directly supporting Islamic extremeist’ activities whose chickens may come home to roost in your front yard–soon.

Third Reason You Care, or Should Care:

The law passed by Congress that respects the establishment of religion was the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008 (12 U.S.C Sec 5201 et seq.).  The EESA was/is an express mandate by Congress for the appropriation of your funds to be used to purchase troubled assets from any fiancial institution including any insurance company established under the laws of the United States.  Murray v. Geithner seeks to protect one of our most fundamental constitutional rights.  In the First Amendment, therein lies the Establishment Clause; “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion.”   How can anyone argue with this issue which slaps you in the face.  Congress authorized billions of dollars earmarked for the purchase of controlling interest in a business enterprise i.e., AIG.  It is irrefutable that AIG owns subsidiaries, divisions, or whatever which are engaged in Shariah supportive activities.  Moreover, AIG has insurance products that are fully and completely designed to be Shariah compliant.  For a more in-depth description of AIG’s Shariah compliant insurance products see my January post on AIG.   Murray is standing up for your right to demand that your tax dollars are not spent supporting Islamic terrorism.  On one hand we are spending billions in the “war on terror,” yet on the other hand, we are allowing our public owned entity–”AIG” to propagate Islamic beliefs and practices predicated upon Shariah law and/or through its own Shariah compliant financial products offered to the public.

Fourth Reason You Care, or Should Care:

There is a second component to the First Amendment; Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof... is referred to as the Free Exercise Clause.  Stately simply, the argument should also be made that because the Government is now directly and indirectly supporting Islamic principles, by and through its funding and controlling ownership interest in AIG, it is in effect violating the Free Exercise Clause as well.  Islam and its attendant principles divide the world into two groups diametrically opposed to each other.  One group is the house of Islam where Islamic law rules.  The other group is the Dar Al Harb, the house of war–infidels (huffars, non-believers) which includes Christians and Jews.  The basic fact of the matter is that Islam is comprised of inseparable political and religious dogma which condemns other religions.  Through such condemnation, Islam is blatantly against the very core of both First Amendment clauses.  If you are supporting Islam, you necessarily are prohibiting the free exercise of other religion.  The logic is straight forward.  The Government owns AIG.  AIG owns business enterprises and merchandises Shariah compliant financial products which are specifically supporting Islamic organizations.  Islam and its Shariah compliant organizations and enterprises are anti-American, anti-Jewish and anti-Christian.  Simple logic dictates that if you invest in Shariah compliant companies your investment dollars are being directly used to prohibit the free expression and free exercise of religion. This is a violent attack on the First Amendment.

The Fifth Reason You Care, or Should Care:

The fifth reason you care, or should care, about Murray v. Geithner is that the Government is of course, fighting the lawsuit.  The Government is not yet fighting the lawsuit on the facts or “merits” of the case yet.  Rather than answer the complaint with written admissions or denials, the Government has chosen to date to fight the lawsuit on the basis of procedural arguments i.e., the principles of “standing,” and jurisdiction.  The last thing you should want to see happen here is that a court decides that Kevin Murray does not have standing to sue.  ’Standing” is the legal principle which a plaintiff must have suffered some direct or substantial injury or be likely to suffer such an injury if a particular wrong is not redressed. A defendant must be the party responsible for perpetrating the alleged legal wrong.7  The United States Supreme Court has historically made it extremely difficult for a taxpayer to challenge the expenditure of funds in support of policies or programs that he is forced to support.  However, in a very important case, Flast v. Cohen, 392 U.S. 83, 88 S. Ct. 1942, 20 L. Ed. 2d 947 (1968) a taxpayer was granted standing to challenge expenditures that would benefit parochial schools.

Geithner’s Motion to Dismiss the lawsuit and its attendant arguments are included here .   The Plaintiff’s Response to the U.S.’s Motion to Dismiss the case is available from the Thomas Moor Law Center for your download.  In the meantime at You Tube, The Future of Western Civilization gives you plenty to think about as your tax dollars assist the expansion of culture that wages a Jihad against you.

Leave a comment please and I invite you to Digg it, leave a Kudo, or a give me a Technorati vote even if you disagree with my position. Thanks for coming by.

Tasmania, Malta, and Ireland have one thing in common.

These countries use a voting system referred to as STV (Single Transferrable Vote).  For the second time in less than a decade, the proponents of STV here in British Columbia have been successful in getting a Referendum on the ballot.  There are less than 11 days remaining before the polls close on the issue and we find out how STV did the second time around.  By the way, advance voting for the 39th Provincial Election begins on May 6th.  The voters of B.C. will decide again whether to keep the current one vote person per candidate system or change it (I did not say “improve” it) to a system called STV.  I know how impressed all of the readers will be with STV simply by noting the impressive list of locations in which STV is currently used.  I’m just saying–whatever electoral system Malta is using is reason enough for many people to believe a “reform” is overdue.  What is really interesting here is that the push for STV to become the law of the land in B.C. did not first originate in California!  We have all grown accustomed to the fact that the really great new reform ideas come from California.  I’m thinking that if STV is successful here in B.C.; maybe we can export it to the U.S.!  Might be some tariffs attached though.  Okay, enough with the tongue and cheek stuff, let’s talk about STV and FPTP (First Past The Post).  However, I have to say this.  I’m a little disappointed, if not peaved, about the fact that the Government website, which is supposed to be neutral with respect to the referendum, uses the word “REFORM” at the top of the page designed to inform the B.C. citizens of what is going on.  The simple definition of reform is to “make changes in something in order to improve it.”  Does the Government’s use of the word “reform” in and of itself present a clear case of bias?  Who says that by going to STV, the current system will be improved?  The answer is the proponents of STV say so but our Government should not be validating the referendum by calling it a 2009 Referendum on Electoral Reform. What say you?

What is STV?

It’s sort of simple, but sort of complicated.  The idea is this.  Rather than have a one vote per person going only to one candidate, you could have your vote split up and help elect other candidates whom were not your first choice.  In effect, your one “transferrable” vote could help elect a second, third, fourth, and so on, choice.  The whole concept is designed to minimize, if not eliminate, the principle of “majority rule.”  Proponents of STV would like say, “Why should someone who obtains a majority of the vote in an election district (called “ridings” in B.C.) be the single elected representative for that district?  My only answer to that question is self-evident; “Because he or she received the majority of the votes, duh!”  However, the STV people will counter and say, “Yes, but what about the 49% of the folks that did not vote for the majority candidate?  They receive no representation at all.”  Their solution is this.  Let’s expand the geographical size of the election district and increase the number of people to be elected (to at least a minimum of two) and then we can have two people elected to more proportionately represent the district.  One reply I have to that argument is this.  Why not simply allow the folks in the enlarged geographical area to elect their own candidate by a majority vote in the first place.  In that situation (using the current FPTP voting system), the person elected in that geographical area becomes the representative for the folks that the STV people were trying to merge into the a different district.  See what I mean.  It’s simple but sort of complicated.  Let me confuse you more.  Here’s how the transfer of your vote system works.  Let’s say there are 10,000 “valid votes” cast in a district.  The legal formula promulgates that this number is divided by the number of “positions” to be elected plus one.  Three positions to be filled would require that the 10,000 valid votes be divided by 4.  Add one vote to the result of that division and the sum is the magic number a candidate is striving for.  This first mathematical exercise is necessary to determine the “quota” of votes necessary for a candidate to be elected.  In other words, any candidate that receives 2501 in our example would be elected.  Say one person received at least 2501 “first choice” votes.  All of the votes the winning candidate received above the quota are deemed to be “surplus” votes.  A whole new mathematical formula now kicks in to find out who the second elected candidate is.  After that, we do more math to determine who the third elected candidate is.  Here’s the link to see how this other math is crunched.  Or, alternatively if you would rather just see a simple example in pdf format, click here.

After you study both sides of the issue, you will be confronted with an important question.   If the referendum passes, the number of electoral geographical districts in B.C. will be reduced from 85 ridings to 20. The total number of elected officials will remain the same at 85.    Here’s good example of how that might impact the folks.  Let’s say STV is the system used in the U.S.  The electoral district that now includes New Mexico for Congressional representation is now merged with Texas.  The total number of elected representatives will stay the same but the process to determine who wins the election is STV.  Let’s say there are 32 representatives in the House of Representatives from Texas (which is correct).  Let’s also say New Mexico has 3 representatives in the House of Representatives (which is correct).  Based upon STV, all 35 representatives could come from Dallas, Houston, San Antonio, El Paso, Austin, Fort Worth, Wichita Falls and so on.  The folks in Santa Fe, or Clovis, New Mexico now have no representation.  You think that wouldn’t happen; you’re wrong.  Just because the folks in New Mexico cast their vote in order of choice, i.e., first choice, second choice and so on does not mean that any of the candidates located in the heretofore New Mexico geographical area received enough votes to meet the quota nor does it mean that after all the “transfer math” is done a candidate from that geographical area will be elected.  Study the examples provided by the B.C. Government or go to NOSTV.org to see exactly how this type of elected representation can, and likely will happen in B.C.  If you live in an area outside of Vancouver, you could likely end up with a representative or group of representatives all from within the greater Vancouver area.  How many more MLA’s do you think the Vancouver area needs?  There are now several from Surrey, several from Vancouver, a couple from North Vancouver, seven MLA’s from Langley, three from Richmond, a few from Delta, White Rock and so on.

An STV Prediction — Who has the better marketing plan?

No doubt about it.  The pro-STV people have the better marketing plan this time; hands down.  If you go to both websites you will see what I mean.  Here’s the Pro STV site enlarged. OR Here’s the No to STV site enlarged. Everyone knows that when it gets down to the nitty gritty it’s the marketing of an issue or candidate that makes the difference, not necessarily the facts.  I’m just saying; look at the Senate race in Minnesota for crying out loud!  Marketing, text-messaging and donations is where it’s at.  You can’t expect to just present facts and expect to win.  I’m really disappointed in Norman Grdina, the financial contact with the No BC-STV Campaign Society.  Unfortunately, Mr. Grdina is a forensic accountant—not a marketing expert.  It is kinda cool that he is a Notre Dame alum but he should have studied marketing instead of accounting.  In the event you missed it when you were at the B.C. Elections Government website, the taxpayers contributed $1,000,000 to the funding of the marketing campaigns.  I have no idea why yet, but according to the website, B.C. Elections was required by law to give each organization $500,000 in cool cash to get the word out.  In these tough economic times, doesn’t that piss you off?  Does me.  Heck, if we were going to throw some money away; we could have simply gave it to GM or Chrysler.  In any event, we’ve paid for much of the marketing hype on the Pro STV vs. No STV campaigns.  Unfortunately, I believe the Pro STV got a much bigger bang for their buck and will likely win.  I’m clearly against changing the current FPTP (First Past The Post) system we are using but I do believe Jamie Deith and  STV folks have done a much better job of marketing their “non-message.”  It reminds me a lot of the “Change you can believe in” slogan that was so very successful for obama.

We’ll all decide here in a few days.  I just hope the folks that have a inkling for change will do some research before they cast their vote to STV.  Please vote No on the STV referendum.  Please leave me a comment, a Digg, a Kudo, or a Technorati vote even if you disagree with my position.  Thanks for coming by.