The Angry Exile: PR is not the answer.

The Hangman

Into our town the Hangman came,
Smelling of gold and blood and flame.
And he paced our bricks with a diffident air,
And built his frame in the courthouse square.
The scaffold stood by the courthouse side,
Only as wide as the door was wide;
A frame as tall, or little more,
Than the capping sill of the courthouse door.
And we wondered, whenever we had the time,
Who the criminal, what the crime
That the Hangman judged with the yellow twist
of knotted hemp in his busy fist.
And innocent though we were, with dread,
We passed those eyes of buckshot lead --
Till one cried: "Hangman, who is he
For whom you raised the gallows-tree?"
Then a twinkle grew in the buckshot eye,
And he gave us a riddle instead of reply:
"He who serves me best," said he,
"Shall earn the rope of the gallows-tree."
And he stepped down, and laid his hand
On a man who came from another land.
And we breathed again, for another's grief
At the Hangman's hand was our relief
And the gallows-frame on the courthouse lawn
By tomorrow's sun would be struck and gone.
So we gave him way, and no one spoke,
Out of respect for his Hangman's cloak.
The next day's sun looked mildly down
On roof and street in our quiet town,
And stark and black in the morning air
Was the gallows-tree in the courthouse square.
And the Hangman stood at his usual stand
With the yellow hemp in his busy hand;
With his buckshot eye and his jaw like a pike
And his air so knowing and business-like.
And we cried, "Hangman, have you not done
Yesterday, with the foreign one?"
Then we fell silent, and stood amazed,
"Oh, not for him was the gallows raised."
He laughed a laugh as he looked at us:
"Did you think I'd gone to all this fuss
To hang one man? That's a thing I do
To stretch a rope when the rope is new."
Then one cried "Murder!" and one cried "Shame!"
And into our midst the Hangman came
To that man's place. "Do you hold," said he,
"with him that was meant for the gallows-tree?"
And he laid his hand on that one's arm.
And we shrank back in quick alarm!
And we gave him way, and no one spoke
Out of fear of his Hangman's cloak.
That night we saw with dread surprise
The Hangman's scaffold had grown in size.
Fed by the blood beneath the chute,
The gallows-tree had taken root;
Now as wide, or a little more,
Than the steps that led to the courthouse door,
As tall as the writing, or nearly as tall,
Halfway up on the courthouse wall.
The third he took -- we had all heard tell --
Was a usurer, and an infidel.
"What," said the Hangman "have you to do
With the gallows-bound, and he a Jew?"
And we cried out, "Is this one he
Who has served you well and faithfully?"
The Hangman smiled: "It's a clever scheme
to try the strength of the gallows-beam."
The fourth man's dark, accusing song
Had scratched our comfort hard and long;
"And what concern," he gave us back.
"Have you for the doomed -- the doomed and Black?"
The fifth. The sixth. And we cried again,
"Hangman, Hangman, is this the man?"
"It's a trick," he said. "that we hangmen know
For easing the trap when the trap springs slow."
And so we ceased, and asked no more,
As the Hangman tallied his bloody score.
And sun by sun, and night by night,
The gallows grew to monstrous height.
The wings of the scaffold opened wide
Till they covered the square from side to side;
And the monster cross-beam, looking down,
Cast its shadow across the town.
Then through the town the Hangman came,
Through the empty streets, and called my name --
And I looked at the gallows soaring tall,
And thought, "There is no one left at all
For hanging, and so he calls to me
To help pull down the gallows-tree."
So I went out with right good hope
To the Hangman's tree and the Hangman's rope.
He smiled at me as I came down
To the courthouse square through the silent town.
And supple and stretched in his busy hand
Was the yellow twist of the hempen strand.
And he whistled his tune as he tried the trap,
And it sprang down with a ready snap --
And then with a smile of awful command
He laid his hand upon my hand.
"You tricked me. Hangman!," I shouted then,
"That your scaffold was built for other men...
And I no henchman of yours," I cried,
"You lied to me, Hangman. Foully lied!"
Then a twinkle grew in the buckshot eye,
"Lied to you? Tricked you?" he said. "Not I.
For I answered straight and I told you true --
The scaffold was raised for none but you.
For who has served me more faithfully
Then you with your coward's hope?" said he,
"And where are the others who might have stood
Side by your side in the common good?"
"Dead," I whispered. And amiably
"Murdered," the Hangman corrected me:
"First the foreigner, then the Jew...
I did no more than you let me do."
Beneath the beam that blocked the sky
None had stood so alone as I.
The Hangman noosed me, and no voice there
Cried "Stop!" for me in the empty square.

Maurice Ogden

Saturday 8 May 2010

PR is not the answer.

First Past The Post is looking increasingly obsolete so naturally thoughts are turning to the Liberal Democrats' personal wet dream, Proportional Representation. It's going to be talked about quite a lot because in Britain, thanks to the LibDems, it's the only other one that a lot of people have heard of. And to give PR its due it is a fundamentally more fair system than the current one that has allowed government after government after government to be formed by parties claiming a mandate despite nobody actually winning the popular vote. I've talked at some length about electoral reform (here, here and here if you've got a while) and gone into the pros and cons of PR, so in the interests of not repeating myself to much and keeping it quick I'm just going to repost a comment I left on Old Holborn.

As someone who lives with it let me explain what PR will give you.

Yes, it will give seats to the BNP, Commies, Greens etc, and on that I agree with Old Holborn. So what if it does? It'll also give seats to UKIP, probably a few independents and maybe nascent parties like LPUK. Goose and gander stuff, not a problem. The problem, or at least the first one, is that it will do precisely fuck all about the cronyism of the main parties and the unaccountability of their MPs.

Let me introduce Senator Stephen Conroy, a tool of the worst ordure, whose policy baby is government filtering of the internet to the entire fucking country. How do we get rid of the authoritarian prick? Answer: we can't because PR makes him at least as safe - probably more so - as any British MP in a reliably safe seat for their party. For a start he's a Victorian Senator so most of the country get no say anyway, but it's PR that keeps us here in Victoria from getting rid of the bastard. PR means party lists, and as long as Conroy is in the good books of the Australian Labor Party (please send spare vowels to Canberra) he'll be at or near the top of their list and absolutely guaranteed his Senate seat even if the ALP lose the popular vote in the Senate election here. The guy is literally fireproof since only the ALP has the power to fire him. We voters certainly don't.

Do you want that for the House of Commons? Do you want to give the Labial Conservocrats even more power to impose a collection of yes men, lobby fodder, fuckwits, spivs, tools and chancers on the electorate? If so then PR is just what you want. If not then look for something else.

The second problem is representation. Who is my Senator? Is it Conroy? Or is it one of the other five ALP Senators? Or one of the half dozen Liberals? Or the microparty madman from Family First? Because there are no constituencies the answer is none and all of them. Even if you consider the state of Victoria as a large multi-member constituency PR has weakens the link between representatives and constituents, particularly since nearly all serve at the pleasure of their parties rather than Victorian voters. That's not a huge problem here because we have constituency MPs in the House of Representatives for that - the Senators are there to represent the states and the role of the Senate is more or less what the House of Lords is for. For that PR is just fine, though party lists preventing easy dismissal of crap Senators is still a problem.

If you want to get rid of the Lords and have an elected chamber PR is a fantastic idea. But as a replacement for FPTP? If it happens I think many will soon be bitterly disappointed that the chance to replace the busted FPTP system with something that works was instead squandered on PR. You'll get your minor parties in but in the main parties, the ones that will actually form governments, you'll get even less accountability than you have now. FPTP has certainly got to go but don't jump from the frying pan to the fire.

So don't get all starry eyed and in love with the idea of PR. Supporting a new electoral system simply because it's less bad than the one you have is a bit like voting for a candidate who is less awful than the incumbent.