Election Time(!) and Green Ham

On May 12th in BC we are having a provincial election and referendum. In this referendum the legal voters of BC (the ones who show up anyway) will cast their ballots to decide if we will continue using our old method of voting (commonly known as first past the post) or make the leap to a form of STV (single transferable vote) created especially for BC.

In 2005 BC-STV was proposed to the people of British Columbia and apparently won majorities in 77 out of 79 constituencies. Unfortunately they still did not have the required 60% (only 58%) so it did not get passed.

But we have another chance! I'm not going to try and explain the concept of single transferable vote, because it's a bit involved and I don't completely understand it myself. If you're interested I will direct you to the STV Wikipedia page, which is extremely useful and informative. 

The problem with our current system is that it cheats the voters, makes the government unaccountable and favours parties over people. BC-STV will provide fairer elections, effective representation and a responsive government.

40% of voters can elect 60% of government seats, giving that government 100% of the power. It just doesn't make sense.

How STV works is that there are larger electoral districts and multiple MLAs (Members of Legislative Assembly) per district. On the ballot there will be more names than usual and instead of marking one with a check, you vote for as many as you like using numbers. Your first choice would be one, second two, etc. You get it, because you are a genius.*

Instead of the system working for the government, helping secure party's "safe seats", BC-STV works for the voters, helping them elect a government that they can hold accountable. STV really works, too! People in Ireland love it, despite the fact that their government has asked them to get rid of it. Twice. Ireland turned them down. Twice. It's downright usurious.

I'm telling you, people, STV is the answer to all of our issues. Technically, I'm not eligible to vote, but I will be some day, in three years and thirteen days in fact. Hopefully when I get to the voters booth I will be able to mark my ballot with numbers, not check marks, because it's more efficient and just sensible.

If you live in BC and are of voting eligibility I have a message for you: Choose BC-STV in the referendum on May 12 and power up your vote!

--none exhistant segue--

This is where I answer my buddies question. This is an attempt at "group blogging". This question is from Dr. Rena:

What is the most eventful (scary, exciting, interesting, whatever) breakfast you've ever had?

I have to say, this question kind of puzzled me. At first I couldn't think of any interesting breakfasts. What I came up with was a breakfast of leftovers, some of which included hot dogs/veggie dogs.

This breakfast was eaten at camp. I don't know why I felt the need to explain that because I can't think of any other place where such a breakfast might be eaten. But yes, camp. We had originally planned to eat Eggos, I believe, but we decided that since we had to carry the remaining food all the way back the the car and then use GAS to get it home, thus wasting finite resources, it would be more prudent to just eat whatever we could. We brought out the hot dogs. They were really good. Better than usual, I might even venture. If you've ever had a veggie dog, you'll know that tasting good is not one of their strengths. You really have to mask the lack of good taste in exhorbanent (spl?) amounts of ketchup. That was pretty weird.

After that trip down memory lane (or is it Memory Lane--is that an actual place? Google maps to the rescue... yes! there are 10 Memory Lanes in Google's database and Google knows everything. onwards...) I thought that hot dog breakfast weren't really that exciting. Sure it's a bit odd, but there had to be something else.

I then realized that I had overlooked my spirited parents' attempt at special holidays. The most memorable are Valentine's Day when we ate heart shaped pancakes, dyed pink and St. Patrick's Day when, I believe, my father might have made green eggs and ham.** I must admit that these breakfasts are quite special. Thank you for being such amazing Nerdfighters, parents, before you even knew what you really were. You guys are great.

*Don't laugh, it's true. You need to believe.

**The green eggs and ham are questionable because I don't actually remember the incident. I remember being told that the event had taken place, but this may have been a huge lie, constructed to distract me from something else that might have taken place in my childhood. I may never know the truth. {part of me hopes I never ate green ham, even though Sam-I-Am might find them quite delectable}

Note: All info in this blog comes from www.powerupyourvote.ca and www.stv.ca and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Single_transferable_vote