Senator Assange?

[Aractus]

Nick Xenophon was elected to the Senate for South Australia in 2007 and is facing re-election this year. Although in 2007 he won 14.8% of the popular vote in South Australia, as far as I know nobody is doubting he will be re-elected in September.

Nick Xenophon has the safest independent Senate seat in the country. What I was pointing out to you is that Assange putting his ticket into some random senate seat would not be enough to win him his seat - most Australians vote for the Major Parties, and you'd have to mount a massive AND successful campaign to win one of the Major Party seats. Winning one of the seats already held by an independent or minor party is much much easier and more realistic.

Bob Katter's Australia Party I reckon have a reasonable chance of winning a Senate seat in Queensland. Those chances would be boosted if they can get favorable preference flows from other parties.

Yes they do, but they're a far-right party. If Assange runs candidates in QLD they have little to no chance of winning a Senate Seat for his leftwing party.

Also while the Greens vote in the opinion polls is down compared to the last election, however it is not down by much. The Newspolls over the last several months had the Greens federally at between 8% and 11%, compared to 12% at the last election. Greens support is more stable than declining.

The Greens have four major demographics that vote for them, I identified most of them in the previous post, they are: 1. first time voters, 2. environmentalists with little idea about politics, 3. politically-left aligned people and 4. ALP voters. They have consistently shown their inability to be the responsible party who can hold the balance of power and bring negotiation and compromise to the table which is what people want from minor parties and from independent candidates.

Actually I believe Assange would be fighting a Senate election campaign on issues such as censorship, freedom of speech and copyright laws. These are not inconsiderable issues to a sizable slice of the electorate.

We don't have a huge problem in Australia with censorship (we're now getting the long-overdue R18+ rating for games) or freedom of speech. Copyright laws are a moot point because we're under international treaties which determine the laws we must pass. The last change to Australian copyright was the Copyright Amendment Act 2006 which enacted the changes required under the 1996 WIPO treaty. Until the next treaty is signed and ratified by enough countries, there is absolutely no reason to touch copyright law, and given how long it takes to legislate changes following treaties (Canada only legislated their changes for the same treaty last year), it isn't a prospective point of interest for the next term.

Also in ordinary half-senate elections a candidate or party needs around 14% of the vote to be guaranteed a senate seat. Although you can still get elected with a lot less of the vote, if you can get a favorable preference flow from the other parties. There have been occasions where Senators have been elected with as little as 2% of the vote. However got really good preference flows.

That's right. Assange can expect Green preferences to flow his way, for instance.

So if Assange were to run for the Senate, he would easily get much more than 2% of the vote. More near the 14% of the vote needed to be guaranteed a Senate spot. He would get some of that support from those who currently support the Greens, who aren't radical environmentalists (which is a sizable slice of their current supporters and even membership).

I think you overestimate his popularity, and the fact that even if people like you, if they have no idea about your policies they'll probably vote for someone that makes them feel more comfortable.

I have to disagree about your assessment that Australians are a 'center-right' nation, certainly not by American standards.

You're free to disagree, but I assure you we Australians are typically centre-right.

To many Americans if they were familiar enough with Australian politics, they would consider us a nation of pinko liberals, if not socialists. In America for example our industrial relations laws would be condemned as anti-competitive, because they put severe restrictions on employers firing their employees.

Yes but America is a different country, and we look at their fiscal irresponsibility and do not see conservative politics even though it supposedly comes from extreme conservative policies!

Finally personally I believe Assange wants to become a Senator in order to make it extremely difficult for him to be extradited to Sweden. Because imagine the Scandal if an Australian Senator were to be extradited.

Agreed, he believes he will be allowed to freely leave England if he gets elected. But let's not forget that I for one think it's a scandal to try and extradite a refugee who is currently taking asylum in an embassy! England doesn't have to agree with Ecuador's decision to grant him the status of "refugee", but should recognize people that have been assessed and recognized as refugees by foreign nations and cooperate by extending asylum while a person leaves their country.