[fvc-wat-disc] Record article today (letters neded!)

[Alida and George]

The limit on words to THe Record used to be 200 words, and I believe still 
is.
George B
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Alida and George" <burrettga at golden.net>
To: "FVC Waterloo Region Discussion" <fvc-wat-disc at listserv.thinkers.org>
Sent: Saturday, September 08, 2007 1:49 PM
Subject: Re: [fvc-wat-disc] Record article today (letters neded!)


> Phil Jalsevac is a life member of the PC party , and probably straight 
> Conservative nationally (unless he has done the Damascus trip recently)
>
> George
> ----- Original Message ----- 
> From: "Brian Tanguay" <btanguay at wlu.ca>
> To: <fvc-wat-disc at listserv.thinkers.org>
> Sent: Saturday, September 08, 2007 1:00 PM
> Subject: Re: [fvc-wat-disc] Record article today (letters neded!)
>
>
>> Phil Jalsevac has had a heck of a time getting his head around MMP. He's
>> describing a parallel system and I distinctly, explicitly outlined the
>> differences between MMP and MMM to him.
>>
>> For what it's worth, I don't think it's intentional on Phil's part. I
>> have spoken at length with Phil and tried to walk him through the
>> proposed system. But MMP IS too difficult for some people to grasp, it
>> seems!
>> Brian
>>
>>>>> paul_nijjar at yahoo.ca 9/8/2007 12:38 PM >>>
>> The good news: the Record article made the front page, above the
>> fold.
>> You can read it online here:
>>
>> http://news.therecord.com/News/CanadaWorld/article/239133
>>
>> The not-so-good news: The article is misleading with respect to the
>> role of the party vote:
>>
>> "Thirty-nine seats would be filled proportionately according to the
>> votes parties get from the parties portion of the ballot. These MPPs
>> would come from a list drafted by the parties before the election
>> campaign begins."
>>
>> and in the sidebar:
>>
>> "In other words, voters would see a two-pronged ballot. They would
>> vote for a candidate the traditional way in each riding. They would
>> also show a party preference by voting for a party. Percentages of
>> party vote determine how the 39 seats are divided up."
>>
>> These statements are totally misleading, and verging on incorrect.
>> They make it sound as if the list seats are allocated proportionally
>> to party vote, so if a party gets 30% of the party vote they get 30%
>> of the list seats. This is WRONG. If a party gets 30% of the party
>> vote they get 30% of the TOTAL seats (so if they won 24% of the
>> legislature via ridings they get another 6% of their seats through
>> the list).
>>
>> This is a subtle difference but it is very important, and LOTS of
>> people are getting the two confused. Worse, the Referendum Ontario
>> brochure also uses misleading wording that makes the same mistake.
>> The Record article does get the details right at one point (their
>> three step process of how the ballot works) but I think people will
>> still be confused.
>>
>> Please submit some letters to the editor clarifying this point. You
>> can submit them to letters at therecord.ca . They should be no longer
>> than 300 words, and should include your name, address and telephone
>> number. Most of the article is okay, so we should congratulate them
>> for finally giving the referendum some priority coverage.
>>
>> (If you are still confused about the difference, I wrote a longer
>> explanation on my lousy blog:
>>
>> http://pnijjar.livejournal.com/22127.html)
>>
>> - Paul
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> Paul Nijjar  http://www.fairvotecanada.org/WaterlooRegion
>> Next Referendum Info Session: Sept 11, 7pm
>> (Please use this Yahoo! account for future correspondence.)
>>
>>
>>      Be smarter than spam. See how smart SpamGuard is at giving junk
>> email the boot with the All-new Yahoo! Mail at
>> http://mrd.mail.yahoo.com/try_beta?.intl=ca
>>
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>