Wednesday, January 28, 2009

Jeremy Wood- must we really resort to these tactics?

As a member of Jeremy Wood's facebook support group (and please note: I support everyone in the elections if they have a facebook group and invite me to join it), I have received a message with the following excerpt in my facebook inbox:

Just a note: I've heard a lot of you saying that after me you would put Johannes Rebane as a second choice. Given the new condorcet system of ranked voting this is a dangerous choice! Johannes has a lot of his own support and unless you guys put him as your 4th preference, you'll only be helping him out.

Now, I understand that this is an election, and that it's being run somewhat differently. However, I fully do not support these sorts of statements. Dubbing someone a 'dangerous choice' simply because you don't believe in his ideas is a bit extreme. It also makes his seem afraid of a the candidate, which I feel is a weakness- I want someone who won't resort to these kinds of tactics in an election. For shame. Yes, there may be strategic voting involved, but what happens if you put someone competent fourth just because you're afraid they're your biggest competition? Biggest competition often (although not always) means that they're a competent, capable candidate- and putting them fourth only messes up the system. Not that I think it will matter in this race.


Also, this is coming from a candidate who pulled out of the race to then come back in. I know that Kerry was a flip-flopper, but even he didn't go to these lengths. It doesn't say too many good things about a candidate's motivation if they only re-enter a race because their friends/supporters told him to- it means, despite what he may say, that he lost the will to do the job and had to be encourage by people who were ideologically aligned with him to convince him to go back. I think it means that he wasn't that firm in his stance, and that he wasn't doing it to improve the system or represent students. If a candidate is dedicated to his/her cause, it means that they want to change the system, and their ideas are important to them, even if they're not important to others. Someone who can't hold his own and relies on others to persuade him to continue to run makes me worried about how he'll react if everyone else is opposed to his ideas if he is elected- in this case, I'd be worried that he'd give up on his plans. And by "he", I don't necessarily mean Jeremy- I mean any candidate who is elected into a position. But it applies in this case as well.