[LINK] Conroy re-commits to filter, slams Lundy amendments

Craig Sanders cas at taz.net.au
Wed Jun 30 13:10:01 AEST 2010


On Wed, Jun 30, 2010 at 12:23:58PM +1000, Marghanita da Cruz wrote:
> Does the following mean Conroy is facing election?

yes.

that's why this site exists:

http://filter-conroy.org/

essentially, they're encouraging Victorians to vote below the line for
the Senate *exactly* as they would otherwise, with the sole exception of
putting Conroy last.

when candidates etc are announced and published, they say they intend to
produce how to vote documents for every one of the above-the-line votes
to create that effect.

seems like a good idea to me. too bad it can only work against one
candiate per election.


ordinarily, there's far worse loonies (some worse even than
Fielding...who, fortunately, is quite likely to be tossed out of the
senate this year, he only won his seat by a fluke last time) that i'd
normally put last but:

a) this is a clever (and hopefully effective) campaign that may or may
not work but will definitely remind politicians not to piss off the
electorate too much, they're vulnerable to organised voter backlash
regardless of the inter- and intra- party deals crafted to give them a
safe seat.

b) the worse loonies don't have a statistically signficant greater
chance of being elected if they're put 2nd (or 10th) last than if i
vote them exactly last. but a significant number of people putting
Conroy last could unseat him (or whoever is next in line for one of the
victorian senate seats that usually go to labor).  Getting rid of Conroy
would be the ideal and much preferred outcome, but i'd be reasonably
content to settle for punishing labor by losing them any one of their
senate seats.

buckling to the copyright lobby[1] by continuing with the internet
filter against near-universal opposition deserves punishment.

c) it'll be an interesting experiment to find out if voters actually
do have any power to decide who gets elected in the face of party
power-brokers.....one of the flaws of a democracy like ours is that a
choice between the Hon. Mr Scumbag and the Hon. Mr Vermin isn't much of
a choice at all.


craig

[1] you didn't think the filter was about child porn did you? no, it's
about monitoring the internet so that copyright infringements can be
detected and blocked. the fact that it won't work against any but the
most casual and unsophisticated methods doesn't matter much, it'll have
a chilling effect all the same (at least until the technological arms
race makes it irrelevant). it'll be very useful when ACTA is forced
on the world by the US copyright lobby. their game is a huge delaying
tactic, anyway - they know that they're as obsolete as blacksmiths and
that their business model is unsustainable in anything outside of tiny
niche markets...they just want to survive long enough to latch on to the
next gravy train.

it's also supported by Law'N'Order types, religious nutcases, and those
who want even more police-state (and secret-police) powers than they've
got since 2001. but primarily it serves the interests of the copyright
industry.


-- 
craig sanders <cas at taz.net.au>



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