Posts by Rob Salmond
Last ←Newer Page 1 2 3 4 5 Older→ First
-
Polity: Buying a fight with democracy, in reply to Matthew Poole,
Going back to 1996 (earliest complete data set) we have had precisely three instances where the winning margin was < 97:
Those results are, however, at the *electorate* level. The number of fraud cases is around 100 at the *nationwide* level in NZ. That means you're actually looking for electorate-level rates where the margin is less than [nationwide fraud] / [number of electorates], which is ~100 / 71, which is less than 2. Not many of them.
-
Polity: Buying a fight with democracy, in reply to Matthew Poole,
0.004% of the votes cast in 2014 (2,416,479) is 9,666.
Actually, it is 96.66. Which makes your "no impact" argument about 100 times stronger.
-
Polity: Buying a fight with democracy, in reply to Lilith __,
I think what Bart means is that it's a specious and irrelevant connection to make.
And I don't agree, for reasons I lay out at some length in the post. If someone wants to give some reasons why they disagree; great. But saying "I disgree because [reason withheld]" doesn't lead to productive discussion.
Invoking Basil Fawlty at him seems in poor taste and bad faith.
I'd say something similar about invoking the Nazi Party at me.
-
Polity: Buying a fight with democracy, in reply to Bart Janssen,
Invoking the US Republican party as an equivalence to the NZ National party is effectively godwinning your own post.
I'd put it differently. I'd say "Invoking Godwin's Law when nobody mentioned ze war is a good way to express moral outrage when you actually have nothing to say."
-
Polity: Buying a fight with democracy, in reply to izogi,
To what degree do political parties scrutinise the roll at present, and what examples are there of anything coming of it?
Political parties use the roll extensively at election time, including scrutinising the final printed rolls against the page and line numbers announced by clerks staffing the booths. That helps parties know whether their priority voters showed up or not. Allowing on the day registration wouldn't affect that at all, because it doesn't change any page/line number for previously enrolled voters.
In terms of sniffing out fraud and so on, my impression is that the Commission does much more of that than any party.
-
Polity: Buying a fight with democracy, in reply to Emma Hart,
I agree with you, Emma. Nobody can have it both ways.
In my view, the ban on election-day advertising is egregious, and has become even more egregious now that a third of the country chooses to vote with advertising all around them. I agree with David Farrar on this: those restrictions need to be wound back.
Update! I also agree with Edge on this (see his comment above).
-
Certianly my post wasn't intended to defend the insurance-based provision of healthcare, prevalent in the US. I think it has a lot of downsides, and the single-payer model we have in New Zealand is better. The bureaucracy, contents attempts to cut corners and deny coverage, and constant ripping off of insurance companies by doctor and hospitals, are all stains on US healthcare, not to mention the other issues of the uninsured being forced to use ERs as GPs and so on.
I think the part of the US system that forges ahead - world-leading care of the most complex cases - would forge ahead whether they had health insurance of a single payer. The most important drivers of their excellence in that area are (1) population size, leading to specialisation; and (2) country-level affluence, leading to purchasing the best talent.
-
Polity: Land of the brave little kids, in reply to Stephen Judd,
I read your story about your daughter Rob, and I teared up at work. I hope things are easier for you now.
Than you Stephen, for a really nice comment. Of course, the pain of losing a child never disappears, and no parent ever "gets over it." Put Sophie's struggle is more in the background of my life than it was, replaced in the foreground with other challenges and opportunities, wins and losses.
-
Polity: Land of the brave little kids, in reply to Rosemary McDonald,
How often, I wonder, are the outcomes for the child proportional to the Bolshie levels of the parent?
Sadly, quite a lot I think, and that means kids fortunate enough to have well-educated parents with flexible jobs have better outcomes. When the system relies on parents to advocate or make decisions, higher SES families are advantaged. I'm not sure there's any way fully around that, but health systems can work hard to provide advocacy support for parents and families where needed.
Here's what I wrote, in terms of advice, to other parents with complex kids:
Our health insurance provider denied us coverage several times for major aspects of Sophie’s treatment, including her 2V surgery in Boston, both medical flights, and various parts of her feeding kit. We got them to change their mind every time. We read the rules, interpreted the rules in our favor when we could, and were persistent. You may not be able to turn your insurance around every time, but with complex children it is always worth one or even two tries when they say no. If you feel you aren't up for that challenge while you are caring for your sick child, find a good friend or family member and make them your insurance advocate.
-
Polity: Too much to swallow on the TPP, in reply to Joe Boden,
If National and ACT are the only parties to support TPP, will it pass? I don’t have the numbers in front of me.
After Northland, National's 59 + ACT's 1 is not enough in a 121 seat Parliament. They need Dunne or the Maori Party, too.