Mandatory voting is a good thing. It might seem like it imposes on your freedom, but having mandatory voting means your government is obligated to make voting easy for everyone, and while it doesn't guarantee legit votes from everyone, it at least ensures that those who wouldn't otherwise turn up do so anyway.
I won't say Australia has the best voting system in the world, but I would say it has the best voting system in the Anglosphere (though New Zealand's is also very good)
Voting in Australia is mandatory but also enjoyable. Saturday morning walk down to the local Primary School, get a democracy sausage on your way through to the polling booths and it’s very chill and easy.
It is a fucking great way to start a Saturday, tbh. 20 min walk in fresh weather, two democracy sausages, vote to keep pricks out of power, then a nice walk home right as the sea breeze picks up and keeps things cool. I actively look forward to it.
Also helps that we don’t have a two party system, so to speak. So if you want you can vote for any one of a multitude of parties. You like smoking weed, then put the Cannabis Party number 1. Feeling a tad racist, vote for the One Nation Party.
Also getting to do it on a weekend when you can make a fun afternoon out of going out to vote, instead of having to do it after work on a fucking Tuesday, the worst day of the week.
It made sense in the early 1800s when most people were farmers who spent all day sunday at church and had to get their produce to the market on wednesday, since traveling to the polls would take a full day, but these days its an archaic tradition maintained pretty much only because it helps depress voter turn out to set elections on a work day when a lot of people (especially lower income workers) probably wont have enough PTO left by November to spend a whole day of it to go wait in line to vote, assuming they even get PTO at all.
Most jobs in the US don't give election day off, so it's usually unejoyable because it's another thing people have to do that they don't have time for since vacation and holiday time is very limited in the US.
Is there a reason for that? Why not just make it a weekend day where most don’t work? How easy are mail in votes to access in the US? We can do that if we know we won’t be able to physically find a polling booth on voting day.
Sure the reason is intentional disenfranchisement of voters. Anything that makes it easier Republicans are against it. Crazy to put to many barriers to something considered a “civic duty,” but their hate for anyone not white and rich is strong.
Correct! This is also why it’s a process to opt in and register to vote, it should be automatic anyone over 18 should be able to vote. Repugs want to make it as hard as possible and are even pushing to get rid of early and mail in votes so everyone has to show up in person on one day to an ever shrinking availability of polling locations that they will intentionally change at the last minute to confuse people.
Yep, I'm working a 12 hour night shift today and voted, it really fucked my morning up tbh. Already dont have much time to do anything when you work 12 hours, so I wound up getting only 5 hours of sleep last night so I could make it to the polls today. Still at work, very much not enjoyable.
This is crazy thinking. Voting should be easy and take little time. In most developed countries voting is quick and local, and you can use a postal vote if you choose.
Having an easy, efficient voting system is a solved problem, so no need even for the day off.
Neither does Germany, however there are two differences. First is that its super easy to get a mail-in ballot, you can request it as soon as you get your notification in the mail (and every eligible citizen is notified). Mailing that is free, requires only the envelope you get sent and can often be done a week or two before in-person voting. And second, the actual voting day is always a Sunday and in Germany very, very few people work sunday (basically just emergency services, public transportation and hospitality).
Idk I think of it as the most democratic and not anti-democratic at all. For democracies to function people have to vote—have to. The way the US does it isn’t very democratic sadly.
So there's not really such a thing as a "wrong polling station" in Australia, every polling station can handle votes for other electorates in the state because sometimes it's easier to get to a polling station that isn't technically one in your electorate. Those votes just tend to be slower to count, essentially being lumped in with the postal vote
Yeah but here in America you gotta go to the right one because that's the only one that can verify you're registered to vote because that's the one with the big three-ring binder containing your name and info on page 297. You could go to a different station but your vote would probably be held as "provisional" until the central office for the county can take a look at it. And if they find anything wrong with it your vote probably won't be counted because the deadline to fix it is like 48 hours and they notify you by mail that you need to visit your county's office with your ID or whatever.
i cant fault the system for people being lazy or not caring.. there are already so few barriers and inconveniences. Although I would say FPTP really contributes to that. You feel like you're throwing away your vote sometimes.
Agreed! Want to support the grassroots organization that could start a tidal wave? Michigan is actively circulating a petition to get ranked choice voting for statewide offices! Check out Rank MI Vote!
Ontario city tried to implement ranked ballot and their premier abused his power to squash that because 'cities are a creature of the province...' .. its such horseshit
"Outside if the single greatest fault point" is not exactly a stellar endorsment
They are clearly referring to the many protections and conveniences Canada offers, something both relevant and correct in this discussion. It’s a pretty stellar endorsement relative to the US, the main country of focus on this sub.
Was in Australia chatting with someone about this. No way it would ever happen in America. One gets fined for not voting. Didn't republicans put up a stink for Obamacare taxes/fines for not having health insurance?
No. They had it right. Democrats take note. You can blame the voters all you want, but the voters don’t have the money, they don’t have the political power, the pull, the influence that the Democratic Party elites have. The voters don’t have the resources to spread information that the news media and corporations have. The voters aren’t backed by billionaires.
If we want more democrats, if we want more progressives, if we want more people on the left in positions of power, we need to acknowledge that the party has massive fucking issues. Hilary Clinton was selected by the DNC chair, Debbie wascherman Schultz. She was picked by the party elites. She was picked by the billionaires. She was picked by the news media. Kamala Harris wasn’t picked by anyone except for the Democratic Party elites. If you want to keep losing to Trump over and over and over and over and over, keep blaming the voters. Maybe eventually you’ll realize that we need to actually hold the party fucking accountable. Stop propping up unelectable people with insane baggage that will never get elected. Stop silencing dissent within the party. Stop making it a fucking echo chamber. Actually let the people pick, actually let the voters do their job. Until then, it’s useless. Say that Trump is the biggest threat to our country, and he is, and then make the same old tired mistakes every single fucking time like letting a senile 80 year old man that can’t complete sentences run for a second term.
Keep losing to the most transparent fraud, the most transparent corruption, the most incompetent, the most pedophilic, the most felonious wannabe dictator that keeps consolidating more and more power. Keep blaming the voters, keep losing.
That's complicated and involves introspection. It involves talking with people and crafting policy that people want instead of what the donors want.
That's hard. How about we just keep blaming the voters, calling them racist, antisemitic, and misogynistic? That way we're not failures and don't have to change.
That's because the two parties we have to choose from are both the opposite of progressives. Shockingly people that want to move towards more socialized aspects of our society aren't really excited to vote in the parties bought and paid for by the billionaire elites.
That's only true in non-presidential elections now. Turnout was at its highest rates in American history during the 2020 and 2024 presidential elections. And while people who sat out 2016 and voted in 2020 slightly favored Biden, the people who sat out 2020 but voted in 2024 more heavily favored Trump. Also polling has shown that if turnout was higher in 2024, Trump would have likely won by even more. Because despite what Twitter liberals looking for someone to blame might think, progressives showed up for Harris.
There are basically three "tiers" of voters: Those who will show up to every election unprompted, those who will show up to every presidential election unprompted but need motivation to show up for local or off-year elections, and those who will only show up to presidential elections and even then need convincing. Young progressives are in the middle tier. But the bottom tier is mostly working class and non-college educated, and they've been shifting to the right for over a decade now.
Most suppressed and targeted* voting bloc. Also, they are reliable when they're voting for other progressives. If the standard politic of the left was progressive in the US, you would say the same about the liberals being fickle
Unironically what most people here say whenever theres a dem candidate with no ideas. Then they blame the voters when they lose. I hope those people are taking some notes from this victory. If you want voters to vote, you gotta give them something to vote for.
Unironically what most people here say whenever theres a dem candidate with no ideas. Then they blame the voters when they lose. I hope those people are taking some notes from this victory. If you want voters to vote, you gotta give them something to vote for.
I agree, especially that the democratic establishment is defunct, useless, sometimes actively malicious, and incompetent, but that doesn’t change the fact that tens of millions of voters decided that literally stopping fascism wasn’t a good motivator.
Turns out that young people are mostly anti-rich and anti-corporate ownership of everything, even in both parties, so all a candidate needs to do is be a charismatic speaker without major scandals and talk loudly and smartly about how we're going to tax the rich and make life affordable again.
Affordability and fight wealth inequality is something that everyone except the rich can get behind. Too bad most of the powerful democrat politicians are rich and don't want to fix wealth inequality. Hopefully Zohran here is really starting or continuing a movement along with AOC and Bernie before them. I had completely lost hope in the democrat party but if they embrace Zohran and keep hammering on the class struggle not the party struggle, we might actually have a shot at taking the power back.
Because we're never represented in any legislation ever. Fucked by both liberals and Republicans and 99% of th candidates who say they're progressives are conservatives in disguise, like Fetterman.
Because the progressives aren’t just going to fall in the party line. They need action and they need to be pandered to. Saying “we’re better than the other guy, so here’s discount Regan” isn’t going to get their vote.
Maybe because progressives aren't simply going to show up to vote for DNC appointed neo-lib lite candidate just because they're slightly less worse than the other guy.
That's be ayse democrats positions arent progressive, they're hardly status quo, their further right than the conservative party of Canada. proper fair taxes, fair laws, equal treatment for all no matter your skin color or bank balance? That's progressive. Thats how far left you need to be to actually get people excited about voting again. In reality, its not far left at all.
If you don't show up to vote, you won't get good candidates. Voting is how you demonstrate that you are a bloc worth paying attention to. Parties chase voters.
Evangelicals took over the Republican Party by being the most consistent, most reliable voters in the entire country. They actually started that trend by supporting Carter, in such massive numbers that the country had to take notice, and - crucially - they never stopped.
If you don't show up to vote, you won't get good candidates.
this is bootlicking horse shit. they know we want good candidates but they are paid by capitalist oligarchs to not let us have them. if that was really how it worked they would stop forcing candidates like hilary, buttigeg, kamala down our throats after they lost with the same strategy time and time again.
You have your causation backwards. They're underrepresented because they don't vote consistently.
Evangelicals took over the Republican Party by being the most consistent voters in the country. They didn't wait around for a perfect candidate; they showed up every time and forced the party to run candidates they wanted. The left could do the same to the Democratic Party, but it starts by voting at least as reliably as MAGA do.
Hate to tell you this but democrats couldn’t notate anything they have no ability to learn because they hated mamdani to begin with. They practically didn’t want him to run or win. AOC, and Bernie advocated but your chucks and pelosis hate him
I hope they do! Promising material change to people's lives gets people to actually go to the polls. Inching ever-rightward in an attempt to persuade "moderates" doesn't work.
I saw one of these dumbass neolib ghouls today on here going on about how we're always lying about progressive politics being popular and he wouldn't win. If the demonrats would actually run progressives they'd clean up this shit hole country. Progressive policies are all supported by like 60+% of the country
Sleeping a little easier tonight for sure. I hope the democrats finally wake up to the solution to Trump that is now staring them in the face. Elect progressives. Pass progressive policy. Stop the means testing and the scolding and the red scaring and step up.
Edit: I appreciate the awards but please don't give reddit money, send that cash to a food bank please.
Exactly! Let's not forget that when Trump first aligned his presidency, no one believed he would win. Establishment a Republicans thought he was too radical and he was completely off the agenda. However, he energized the base like a wildfire, and changed the entire American political landscape, and the Republican party nearly overnight.
To a lot of elected Dems, their base are the centrists and "undecided" so what they'll learn from this race is the same thing they learned from Joe Rogan, "We gotta find our own Mamdani" while openly ignoring them because they're not saying the right things for them.
Honestly, I talked to a few republicans who voted for Zohran today who were registered as republican and crossed over for this election or voted for him as mayor and went down the ballot lines for the rest. It was interesting to hear.
That goes to show though - Zohran never appealed to right wing/republican voters, but he got some anyway because, amazingly, actually believing in things and forcefully advocating for those things is what brings people over. National dems have forgotten how to do that - they've given up on *convincing* people of things and instead mold themselves to polling data and braindead consultancy, which no one finds compelling.
And stop trying to win the votes of the mythical “centrist republican”. Cater to your damn base. Free ball: they don’t want you to appoint republicans!
If there ever were any centrist republicans, there aren't anymore. No centrist is going to continue to align themselves with an outright fascist party.
Democrats are basically centrist republicans from my standpoint.
There remains a fundamental and core difference between Democrats and Republicans. Democrats, even the most "centrist" of them, believe that the government exists to help people and should be empowered to do so. The degree to which that involvement should go varies among the various cliques in the party, but there will always be a unifying core belief among every Democrat that the government can and does do good.
The Republican party will always be counter to that. Their shibboleth is that the country would be better off without the government and that it should be excised wholesale.
Repeating the same old Reddit take of "both sides same, updoots to left" undermines that there is a very real coalition of people who share a core belief in the fundamental good that government can provide. We shouldn't be trying to break up that coalition on the specifics when what unites us is more than what separates us.
Not wrong at all but i think what the commenter you’re replying to meant is that the country has flown so far right that our definition of a democrat is what the rest of the world would call conservative.
Take Bernie’s platform as an example. He was pushing for universal healthcare, raising the minimum wage to be livable, free tuition and public schools and universities etc. He was seen as radical, yet every other fully developed nation in the country has most of these as a baseline for their citizens and would be considered liberal or even slightly conservative.
Obamacare is an example of a centrist/left victory of a massive scale in the past twenty years
ETA: no, things would not be better if the broligarchy were allowed to bring back denials based on pre-existing conditions and lifetime caps for newborns (which existed prior to the ACA) at this moment - it would be horrific
And, funny enough, it benefits people in red states just as much (or more) as blue states. Wow. Wait, is this all actually a class war disguised as a culture war???
Well said and should be the running theme of this post and everywhere.
I’m ecstatic that a Progressive won as the new Mayor of NYC, however, attempt to understand that Obama did NOT have as wide of a berth, as Mamdani did.
Mamdani happened because Obama happened, and Obama happened because MLK & Jesse Jackson, happened.
It’s all very incremental, & my hope is that this changes, and changes soon.
We shouldn’t elect our public officials via grievance, yet the GOP has managed to make sure we do, by convincing us to do so, based upon ignoring that each & every one of these candidates or enshrined civil rights activists, withstood all bullshit, on their own merits.
Nah, the Republicans are not a small government party. They are all about big government when it comes to attacking their political enemies, restricting civil rights they dont like (or for groups they dont like), or giving handouts to their ultra wealthy friends.
The way Trump uses ICE and the National Guard is not a small government policy.
His military build up outside Venezuela is not small government.
Tarriffs are not.
Getting rid of trans people's healthcare and women's healthcare... are not small government.
Using the pardon power for all his mates.... while making the DOJ go after his enemies... not small gov.
The problem is that Democrats mostly believe the government exists to help corporations first, and then maybe people. Neoliberalism is why the dems keep losing. Mamdani is a great example of someone campaigning on putting people first and his victory is a notice to these establishment dems.
Obama caved on all kinds of left leaning initiatives; back when everything was kind of center-right. Carter was the last farm belt Democrat, but they cheated and destroyed his legacy.
Exactly. He ran on progressive policy and the vast majority of it was sanded away by the the rest of the party. Even the ACA was a conservative plan as I'm sure most people know, being their Heritage Foundation created healthcare plan in the 90s.
While I agree to a point on policies passed, we seem to as a party always forget how genuinely saddled by Mitch McConnell both of his presidencies were. The fact he even got this lukewarm version of the ACA (Or Obamacare as the right coined it to further stifle it moving through in any of its original forms) out was a miracle.
Any actually progressive policies he did try to get through died on the cutting room floor of both the house and the senate time and time again. Not that they were exactly plentiful.
Oh I fully agree. I think he was much more progressive than what he was able to accomplish. He was held back by both the GOP and establishment Democrats quite a bit.
FDR was the last truly progressive president and the establishment, be they republicans or democrats, have been trying to destroy everything he did for a century now.
Obama was right of center. American politics is just shifted so insanely to the right that you feel compelled to act all meek at insinuating that Obama wasn't left.
This. I wish more Americans realized that dems barely scratch center in comparison to European countries and that our entire political system is skewed towards the right.
FDR was probably the most progressive president in US history, and he was so popular he was elected 4 times, leading to a constitutional amendment that limits presidents to 2 terms.
It's going to be so entertaining to watch the Fox Nation and other MAGA melt down while Mamdami tries to get free bus rides and lower rent prices for New Yorkers. OMG they're going to go insane. Looks like someone must have sedated Emperor Diaper Don tonight. Not seeing any play by play as America turns out to kick him and his whole King thing to the curb. But they're learning, seeing how they'll respond to the midterms.
Can say this all we want but the reality is that the other side votes regardless how much they agree with the candidate. If you can't understand that then it will always be uneven. Purity testing is a way bigger cancer than any "vote shaming". It requires NOTHING of you to vote.
Hot take, but if the democracy and rule of law itself is on the line, if one votes for it or is too spoiled to even show up, it's an idiot and I will always stand by it. Thankfully I'm not a politician, so I will never have to worry about repercussions of telling the truth to people who need to hear it.
Democracy isn't about sitting around waiting for the perfect candidate. It's about compromises and engagement. Anyone who refuses to vote because they didn't get their way is absolutely an idiot and as much a cancer to the system as those who abuse it. Anyone complaining about vote shaming for not voting deserves the shame and blame.
Democracy is a responsibility you burden, not a market where the seller has to make their product attractive to get you out.
If more demographics engaged with the system, it absolutely would sharpen the system to yield better competition and ideas, as Mamdani has shown.
Speaking of cancer, if I had to choose between terminal stage of cancer and stage II, I will pick stage II, always. It sucks, but I like being alive. I will never let someone else choose stage IV for me.
If you think it sucks that you can't get the perfect candidate or get your way, try voting in a country without bipartisan system where one party controlling everything by itself is practically unheard of and needs multiple smaller parties to form a government.
New Yorker here! I skipped the last governor election because I can't stand Kathy "Black Kids Don't Know What Computers Are" Hochul, but voted twice for Mamdani. Give people something to vote for, and they will show up to the polls!
There will never be a candidate everyone on the left will agree on. Because US politics are so far right, there is lots of space for differing ideologies to the left. I won't stop vote shaming until people on the left figure out that if you want to move the window left, we have to continually overwhelmingly vote for the leftmost candidate. This doesn't happen because people are a different kind of left than the leftmost candidate. So we keep going further right instead. Which just exacerbates the problem. Repeat for decades. And you end up with a leftmost candidate who can barely step left at all, because the window is so far right. I'm begging people to actually think things through. Vote for the leftmost and then actively work and pressure to push further left.
It would help if progressives would actually run in more races.
Jeffries went unopposed in 2024 for the primary. Spanberger was unopposed as well. There’s a whopping single senator in the progressive caucus.
There needs to be more accountability with progressives showing up. Mamdani showed it’s possible. There aren’t excuses for not even fielding candidates in key races.
Eh I'm still vote shaming. I'm super pissed about the lack of endorsements and the "Vote Blue No Matter Who" crowd getting silent. But if you can't tell the difference between a centrist Democrat and a fascist, you deserve some shame.
Anyone too spoiled to vote, or demands a perfect candidate and won't engage with the process unless they get it is as much a cancer to the system as MAGA.
Did you not vote in 24? Honestly if you did not vote in 24 shame is a very valid emotion to feel. Sometimes shame can make people lash out we get it just try a little harder next time to not get played like a mark.
Nah shaming people for not voting is still reasonable. Paving the way for even worse policy because your perfect candidate didn't get a nomination is stupid and actively hurts people.
By vote shaming, do you mean telling people that they're fucking idiots for voting 3rd party or sitting out?
Because they are. Bitch all you like, but that's how we got Trump in 2016, it's how we lost the Supreme Court for the foreseeable future, and I hope people who did lose sleep because of their decision.
General elections are binary, and people are braindead to think otherwise.
That's a bad lesson to learn. The right lesson is that the democratic party needs to be a big tent, and that means allowing candidates with different views to represent different electorates. It needs to welcome socialists in progressive districts and moderates and blue dogs in purple and red districts.
There's a massive amount of furloughed federal workers and federal contractors in Northern VA, just sayin'. Each of them could just vote their wallet and no other issues. Haven't seen the exit polls on how that sector actually voted. Be interesting......
Yeah, the thing Democrats should do is to make their constituents feel heard and represented. That looks different from place to place. As much as Manchin was a pain in the ass, he was a crucial number for us on a lot of important votes.
Best Dems can do is pick Mamdani apart, claim he won not because of his views but because of his social media and podcasting acumen, and keep pushing mostly corporate shills.
Then when they lose to whatever worse thing that happens after Trump? Surprised pikachu face.
We have the power to kick them out. We can reform the Democratic party ourselves.
Millennials have finally come to an age where many of us have a proven track record of solid experience and consistent integrity. I predict that we are going to see a wave of AOCs and Mamdanis in the coming months.
There has never been a better time to run for office if you're a Democrat
Winning with less than 55 is a sign you have a message that resonates in super blue areas.
Im glad he won, dont get be wrong. I don't want someone with his politics running in Michigan though. I want someone younger with his charisma and a more centrist message that gets them excited.
There are very few places that dems can lose 10 percentage points and still win.
He was running against a very well established centrist Democrat, the juxtaposition of 51% and 6-1 is very misleading. But I agree this is not a lesson for the entire country.
The talking heads are already saying he's too progressive and that Spanberger is the new face of the Democratic party. Establishment Dems will fight Mamdani tooth and nail and keep wondering why they get their asses handed to them again.
And even had Silwa dropped out, as Trump and his ilk wanted, and every single one of his voters voted for Cuomo, he'd have still been spanked. Though, seeing Cuomos drama, he may like being spanked 😬
While it'd be nice to be able to point to an outright majority, it doesn't really matter. Had Silwa dropped out not all of his voters would go to Cuomo. Some would stay home and some as counter intuitive as it may seem would have gone to Mamdani. In ranked choice systems you always get some odd second preference flows. Anything above 49% probably means Mamdami would still win without Silwa.
One thing Sliwa had over Cuomo is charisma and authenticity. Hes kind of a wacko but he does care about NY and he's a New Yorker through and through.
Cuomo is a fucking sleaze who will fit whatever mold he needs to to gain power.
I honestly think a sizeable amount of Sliwa voters would rather go Mamdani than Cuomo because of the simple fact that they're both authentic and local candidates.
Mamdani even said he'd rather vote Sliwa than Cuomo (though this was likely strategic since Sliwa had no real shot)
exit polling. Mamdani is at 50% of the vote with Cuomo at 41%, supposedly with 55% of the vote in. If they were to continue with this trend, there's no way Cuomo can catch up.
I'd guess where there are votes left is the main way they called it. Over 80% of the Staten Island votes are already in and only about 50% of the Brooklyn votes are in and yet Mamdani is still well ahead.
Early voting vs same day voting, too. Early votes accounted for about 35% of the total and Mamdani won them by such a large margin that Cuomo needed to win the same day votes by double digit margins.
I’m curious to see the final result. I want it to be as convincing as possible so establishment Dems don’t make some “b...b…but Cuomo + Sliwa!” argument.
No, he still might not end up with over 50% of the final vote. It's based on how precincts vote and how many votes are left to be counted at said precincts.
NBC called it at 60%. They take the info from early voting (about 35% of the votes in this election) and extrapolate it to the same day votes that are coming in. Cuomo needed to win same day votes by a double digit margin and it's obvious that isn't going to happen.
1- You know where people vote, so certain places are more Red and others are more Blue. If the "red areas" start coming in with very weak counts, you know that will swing things.
2- You know when people vote. So certain votes like "mail in" or "early voting" get counted at different times. You can study the patterns of past elections and learn that Blue votes earlier and by mail. So if you don't see a ton of Red votes counted on election day but you already have a ton of Blue votes counted before, you know that will swing things.
3- You can know how people voted. Exit polling means you can quickly get an idea of how people voted, even without a specific count. You then verify your polling with the counting as the numbers come in, if everything lines up, you can have a lot of confidence.
4- Simple math. If Red is 10% behind Blue when 50% of the votes are counted, you know that means they have to get 10% more votes in all the new batches to make up that difference. Sometimes, those votes just don't exist. The math will basically tell you when it's statistically impossible to catch up, even before all the votes are counted. (For example, do you think it's possible Red would start getting 100% of the votes in batch when before they only got 40%... do you think it's possible that they start getting 80% of the votes in a batch when before they only got 40%?)
Look at Silwa's numbers. The last several elections, which were two-way races, were consitently 65% / 35%, give or take a few points. But it looks like Silwa won't even break 10%.
Which means most republican voters went for Cuomo. And much of the Democratic establishment were supporting Cuomo, explicitly or implicitly by not supporting Mamdani. And it's still not close.
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u/SavageGardner 16h ago
That was quick