I suggest, therefore, that you stay home election day.
The two large parties have made it illegal to write in candidates where I live.
You need to meet several legal requirement to get on the ballot here. Requirement that are extremely expensive to meet, which often get changed without warning, and the associated events are often sabotaged. How do the major parties deal with this? Easy: those rules only apply for new parties, not the old ones.
Kind of a weird Jim Crow kind of thing; instead of erecting legal barriers to obstruct minorities from voting, we have erected legal barriers to obstruct people’s access to the ballot.
In my country, not so much imo.
There are two major parties. One of them always forms government,albeit sometimes in coalition with a minor party and/or independents.
Liberal ; conservative right wing. Traditionally the party for silver tails. Good at managing the economy, but wanting in social justice.
Labor; began as the political arm of the trade union movement. Left wing/socialist. not so good with the economy but good with social justice. Today centrist /left.
The party chooses its candidates. The elected member in my area is meant to serve the people who elect him/her. This is seldom apparent.
Under our system, an elected member MUST vote on party lines,whether or not it is in the best interest of his/her electorate. If he/she does not, there can be severe consequences. The member may lose his preselection. IE He/she will not be the party’s candidate in the next election. The person may also be immediately thrown out of his/her party, becoming an independent member.
Our Prime Minister is simply the leader of the party which forms government.He /she can be removed as leader and hence as Prime Minister at any time by the party. This has happened in Australia six time in the last decade or so. One wakes up to find one has a new Prime Minister.
Imo the concept of representative governemnt doesn’t quite live up to its name in Australia.
I vote on local issues on election day.
Interesting.
I always vote according to party platforms. I haven’t voted FOR a political party since 1975***
These days I vote against the most offensive shower of incompetents on offer. So far,since 1975 the most offensive bunch have been the Liberals (Conservatives)
I tend to vote independent for the senate ; I don’t like having one party controlling both houses. It happens sometimes and imo is not good for the country.
****1975 is politically significant in Australia.It was the time of the greatest constitutional crisis in Oz since federation
"The 1975 Australian constitutional crisis , also known simply as the Dismissal , has been described as the greatest political and constitutional crisis in Australian history. It culminated on 11 November 1975 with the dismissal from office of the Prime Minister, Gough Whitlam of the Australian Labor Party (ALP), by Governor-General Sir John Kerr, who then commissioned the Leader of the Opposition, Malcolm Fraser of the Liberal Party, as caretaker Prime Minister.
Whitlam’s Labor government had been elected in 1972 with a small majority in the House of Representatives, but with the balance of power in the Senate held by the Democratic Labor Party, who usually supported the Liberal-Country Opposition. The 1974 election resulted in little change. While the Whitlam Government introduced many new policies and programmes, it was also rocked by scandals and political miscalculations. In October 1975, the Opposition used its control of the Senate to defer passage of appropriation bills needed to finance government expenditure, which had already been passed by the House of Representatives. The Opposition stated that they would continue to block supply unless Whitlam called an election for the House of Representatives, and urged Kerr to dismiss Whitlam unless he—"
OK…I will bite…
In what strange place to you live ?
I typically do not vote for the major parties if I can help it, however, Sanders drew my interest, of course he got defeated in the democratic primaries, (another clue that the people do not really get to “choose.”) Sanders had huge popular support, getting huge amounts of small donation/individual support, where Clinton got more total dollars, but from a far smaller “pool” of supporters. (Less donors but more dollars per donor.)
I agree, except in the US, the split party system quite often means not much gets done. A huge reason why US got hit so hard with covid is simply because the country and political system is so bitterly divided. It was not able to unify and take the problem head on, against an invisible enemy that could care less what people’s political ideals were.
The very idea of an upper house is to have a system of checks and balances. Here an opposition senate will usually add amendments to a bill before they will pass it. Seems to work fairly well in that the country is governed,albeit seldom as well as it could be. Of course we differ from the US in that senators MUST vote on party lines. If that doesn’t sound very democratic, that’s because it ain’t.
Our elections are usually announced about 6 weeks in advance. There are term limits, but a government may call an election at any time. (and usually does) Campaigning is pretty much restricted to that period. There are no limits for holding office, including that of Prime Minister.
The amounts being spent on campaigning have gradually increased over the years.
Clive Palmer (a kind of down market Donald Trump, if you can imagine it) broke records for spending on an election in 2019; AU50 million. Didn’t get in. There are regular calls to place a legal limit on the money spent on elections,. It my happen eventually.
Thanks for sharing that, learned a couple new things about a country I want to travel and maybe live at one day.
Believing that is part of the problem.
Medicine is / was doing just fine.
Then the media told you what it wanted you to believe.
Why…I will let you guess.
Now, everyone is scared shitless…WHY ?..because everyone else is.
Barnum was correct.
Not sure what you mean? Clarify?
Believing what? You made a reply to the post where I talked about Mrs Clinton and Mr Sanders fundraising. Is that what you are talking about?
Do you not believe the data about the average Bernie Sanders donation numbers VS Mrs. Clinton donation numbers?
I have never been aware of this aspect of federal elections in the US but I learn from Wikipedia and from some correspondents on Quora that 9 states do not allow write-ins at all, as in ‘never’.
Nevada, New Mexico, South Dakota, Oklahoma, Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, South Carolina, and Hawaii.
Comments?
My apologies…
I was responding to…
" A huge reason why US got hit so hard with covid is simply because the country and political system is so bitterly divided."
…in that…
Those are excused invented by media, pushed by media, and SCREAMED by media, for their own reasons.
Our alleged “division” is unrelated to the fight against the plague.
Right, the only sure way to get on the ballot here, is for you (or your party) to have received a certain percentage of the vote in the previous election. But since we aren’t allowed to write in candidates on our ballots; it means to effectively get on the ballot, you (or your party) must have already been on the ballot. When I was an mover and shaker in the local Libetarian party (I’m a recovered Libertarian); almost 100% of our resources were expended in trying to just get on the ballot. The status quo has been frozen into place, essentially by law.
As I’ve said before, it is eerily similar to the old Jim Crow laws organized to prevent black people and immigrants from voting. They passed laws making it extremely expensive to register/vote; then made an exceptions if your grandfather had been registered to vote. Ensuring that people of African descent will be blocked from voting; their predecessors were slaves and couldn’t register to vote so they were typically forced to pay enormous sums to vote. Caucasians typically didn’t have this problem.
Our system is being heavily gamed; and it has been that way long before any of us were even born. So much so that I blush when people refer to the US as a democracy or republic. Perhaps on paper; in practice it is neither.
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So…being Canadian and all - had no idea who the SCOTUS nominee was, did a little googling.
Interesting to stumble onto this…
her religious affiliation. Call her “Catholic” (of course) - then via Notre Dame, she’s actually more “Charismatic” (let the Holy Spirit lead you type) and via her small elite religious affiliation…
Christians in Commerce
Christians in Commerce (CIC) is a movement of business and professional men and women that is dedicated to helping members grow in the Christian life and to influence the world of commerce with the gospel. Although CIC operates independently from the People of Praise, the People of Praise helped form CIC[40] and is actively engaged in its work. CIC is organized into over 35 local Men’s Chapters, Women’s Chapters and Campus Clubs. These chapters have held retreats (Challenge Weekends) that have been attended by over 14,000 men and women.[41]
So, I’ve always maintained that “secret societies” are really just groups of similar people with similar agendas in similar “social standings” - all out to influence or change the world (usually for the “better” as they see it)…
So these Christians help other Christians to influence the world of commerce… translation - belong to this club and you get the contracts, promotions, insider info…
See!!! Too many secret societies running around the world to actually have one group run things…
I wonder 
…do they dress up special or have special hand signals or wear “white hats” when they are in conflict with “Illuminati” (or maybe - just maybe - Illuminati doesn’t exist the way these groups and the average Christian would like people to believe)
According to a former member, Adrian Reimers, “all one’s decisions and dealings become the concern of one’s ‘head’, and in turn potentially become known to the leadership”.
So if Amy is a good Christian wife, hmmmm…who is her husband? Most likely she’ll be seeking “spiritual guidance from her head”…
After graduating from the University of Notre Dame in 1996 with a bachelor’s degree in political science and government, Jesse Barrett received his Juris Doctor degree from the same school in 1999. He has had a lengthy legal career, focusing primarily on white collar crimes.
Press releases from the Department of Justice show that many of the cases Barrett prosecuted involved felonies’ possession of firearms, drug trafficking and distribution of illegal substances.
In one notable case Barrett prosecuted in 2015, a judge sentenced the former director of an Indiana public library to 20 months imprisonment for wire fraud. The man had used library funds to pay for personal expense like his health club membership or hotel rooms, according to a DOJ press release.
Ahhhh - he’s out for Justice! Someone to catch the bad “white-collar” guys…he took down a head librarian! (must have been Protestant)
Barrett returned to the private sector in 2018, and is currently a partner at SouthBank Legal in South Bend, his LinkedIn profile notes. Barrett’s practice focuses on complex commercial litigation, internal investigations and white collar criminal defense,
Uh oh 
. All that expertise he gained working in the DA office is now put to “good use” defending the real big white-collar criminals…
Tenets of their small religious community???
They believe in prophecy, speaking in tongues and divine healing, and that homosexual activity is sinful, the Tribune reported in 2018.
Hey!!! Maybe gay marriage won’t be on the “table”, I mean after all, other “sinful people” are allowed to marry…
Hey!!! Trump should have used her hubby when faced with his Trump University shit (hahahaha and he has the gall to make comments on education)…
https://southbank.legal/team/jesse-barrett
- Represented an individual in a month-long federal trial concerning allegations of financial crimes and election fraud;
- Defended pharmaceutical companies in investigations concerning alleged violations of anti-kickback and other statutes;
- Counseled healthcare companies in internal audits and external investigations regarding manufacturing practices;
Hahaha 
they know how to “butter their bread”. New power couple as corrupt as the rest …shiny gold shit with a touch of color and empathy/moral superiority (Haitian adoption and down-syndrome child amongst the 7…no mention of the nannies that raised the kids)
A charismatic catholic? Pickle me grandmother! I went out with one of them once. Strange girl, with a completely incongruous attitude towards sex. Fair dinkum I thought all my birthdays had come at once***. 
***This was in 1975. You need to realise that the sexual revolution of the 1960’s didn’t reach Aunty Adelaide until 1987. (we’re very isolated)