Australians Running On-Line Poll Based Senators

exeme writes "The 2007 Australian election was recently announced and a new completely on-line based political party is running for election to the Australian Senate. Senator On-Line will give Australian residents eligible to vote a chance to vote in on-line polls for every piece of legislation that comes to the Senate. The senator will then blindly vote in accordance with the majority. The party has no position on anything until it is voted on and has been approved by the Australian Electoral Commission as a legitimate party. The party will be running two candidates in each Australian state." I imagine this could have a huge impact on CowboyNeal related legislation down under.

Re:Interesting approach

[kcbnac]

Per their FAQ:

http://senatoronline.com.au/faq [senatoronline.com.au]

2. Who can vote on each Bill or Issue?

Every person recorded on the Australian Electoral roll is entitled to join SOL, without any membership fees, as a 'poll member'.

Re:Nice one...

[thelamecamel]

No, actually! According to their FAQ they're only running for the Senate, our house of review. So they won't be proposing any bills and effectively give the public a veto. Looks surprisingly well done

Re:Interesting approach

[teslar]

The next step? Come on, the Swiss have been doing this for centuries. They may do it the old-fashioned pen and paper way but it is more sophisticated since a referendum is only strictly required for constitutional changes but optional for changes in law unless at least 50.000 (I think) people request a referendum on this change in law. So they only ask the entire population if at least a sizeable minority actually cares about the topic under discussion.

This is not new and definitely not a new step in democracy - if anything it's a step backwards from the representative democracies we have now to direct democracies the Athenians (I think) had when they invented the entire thing ages ago.

Re:Depends on definition of majority

[thelamecamel]

their FAQ says 70%. And they'll be on the watch for lobby groups manipulating results, unless there are over 100,000 votes cast for that piece of legislation (which will almost never happen). There's some space for them to stuff it up in the implementation, but this could be a lot worse.

Re:Digital Divide

[munrom]

Every Library afaik has internet access these days

Re:Nice one...

[Anonymous Coward]

Before you debate about this, clear up your vocabulary. Democracy is everyone votes on everything. A Republic is where everyone votes to put Senators, Republicans etc, in power and then they vote on the issues.

No, I think you need to clear up your vocabulary.

Your definition of democracy is correct.

What you call a "republic" is actually "representative democracy [wikipedia.org]". A representative democracy is where we elect people to vote on bills for us instead of us voting on everything.

The real definition of "republic [wikipedia.org]" is an entity where the head of state is not a monarch and the people have input into their government.

wtf mate?

[belg4mit]

What the hell is that subject supposed to mean?

Here's a better title:
New Australian Party Backs Internet Opinion-poll Driven Candidates

Now, internet aside, how is that any different from business as usual?

Re:Nice one...

[2short]

Your definitions are not the ones in the dictionarNor are they in common usage by anyone but internet trolls who love to say "Gotcha! The US is a Republic, not a Democracy!". It is both.

A Democracy can be direct, as you describe, or representative, as the US and every one of significant size is.

A Republic is a nation whose head of state is not a monarch; a useful distinction a few hundred years ago, not so much today.

Re:Democracy?

[Anonymous Coward]

All that glitters ...
http://www.aec.gov.au/Parties_and_Representatives/Party_Registration/Registered_parties/sol.htm [aec.gov.au]
http://www.asic.gov.au/asic/asic.nsf/byheadline/02%2F377+ASIC+accepts+enforceable+undertaking+from+Mr+Berge+Der+Sarkissian?openDocument [asic.gov.au]

Australian Senate != US Senate

[Eskarel]

Just wanted to make that one clear. The Senate down here is much more about moderating bills that are already going to go through as opposed to being directly involved with legislation. For the most part its role tends to be to bicker continuously and moderate the really terrible stuff. Folks here tend to vote pragmatically for parliament and then vote their conscience for the senate.

Most of the time it works pretty well(though the current government is sort of suffering quite a bit because in the last election they took the senate too and there's no one there to buffer their own stupidity), but it's not composed of the same sorts of people as the US Senate and an on-line senator would fit in pretty well there.

Add the fact that most politicians tend to just vote the way of the polls anyway.