Referendums and abstention

[ALB]

Local elections took place in Brazil on Sunday. Voting is compulsory but here's what happened in Rio and Sao Paulo:

Quote:

In Rio de Janeiro, 25 percent of registered voters didn’t show up to cast their ballots. If we consider the 5 percent of “blank” and 13 percent of “invalid” votes, this means that 43 percent of Rio’s voters chose not to vote for mayor. In São Paulo, that rate was at almost 40 percent.

Spoilt voting lives, it seems. So, who says it's just an empty gesture. And prosecuting a quarter of the electorate for not voting is obviously out of the question.

[Anonymous]

alanjjohnstone wrote:

Two bits of news.http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2016/10/colombia-referendum-peace-accord-farc-rejected-161002220514696.htmlIn Columbia, the peace agreement was very narrowly defeated but the turn out was just 40%http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/hungary-referendum-eu-migrant-quotas-fails-low-turnout-a7342071.htmlIn Hungary, the anti-migrant referendum failed have not achieved the requisite turn-out of 44% I would have voted for peace in Columbia as i commented on the Socialist Standard article on the Farc. Peace at all costs, (that is why we applauded Lenin's decision)While arguing for abstention in the Hungary referendum as the best tactic to defeat it rather than a no. Four per cent of the votes were spoiled — twice as many as in any of the other four referenda held since 1997 — driving down the number of valid votes to just below 40 per cent. But a spoiled ballot would effectively made it easier for the 50% turn-out threshold to be met as they were counted in the turn-out. 

There are certain forces in Colombia and outside Colombia,  including the USA who do not want a real  peace accord in Colombia, as well, the USA do not want the end of the drug traffic, because they are not going to have any more excuse to sell weapons, and to send troops for trainings, and also the war against drugs, is the war in favor of the drug traffic.The followers of the Farc has denied that they were dealing with Cocaine and Marihuana, but it is known they were financing themselves to buy weapon with money from drugsn Afghanistan the drug  production increased to 300% after the US invasion, and in  Haiti the drugs traffic increased after the US invasion. Wherever the US dock  their warships the drugs and corruption increase.The brother of Hillary Clinton has a large investment in mining in Haiti. The UN is the watchdog of the Western empires, their peace is the peace of the cemeteries.The US is against the dealers of Marihuana in Latin America, but there are several states in the US who have approved the use of Marihuana, and the US has the biggest plantations of the miracle weedAfter the government of Zelaya  in Honduras was overthrown by the USA using Hillary Clinton as their little dog, the drugs traffic, violence,  and crimes have increased. Mining and route of commodities were the main purpose in the name of the so called Democracy.The coup was ordered by a guy who has received a Peace Nobel Prize.  Probably, the so called Peace Agreement might bring many violence, because the armed members of the FARC are going to be persecuted, jailed and killed, the same situation might take place with the Zapatistas in Mexico http://foreignpolicy.com/2016/09/30/why-colombias-government-compromised-for-peace-farc-deal/

[Anonymous]

It would be like eliminating all the extremists terrorists from the Middle east. They would not have any more excuses to invade or keep troops and military bases in that region. A tiger without fangs would become a vegetarian.The Japanese submitted several peace proposal through the Vatican, and none of them were accepted, and then, two atomic bombs were dropped in the name of peace and to save human beings.The war ended and still they keep military bases in Japan. It is not worth the papers the SPGB wrote in an article. Peace between capitalist  is only a jokePS The US government says that Iran is too dangerous, but they have a lot of military bases, warplanes and missiles surrounding Iran https://www.google.com/maps/d/viewer?mid=1XmUD73hHQVBbdm8UcIrRtAcCgTg&hl=en_US   Reality vs fairy tales 

[ALB]

This (scroll down to 2016 and ignoring the appeals to vote for the Democrats) mentions various referendums taking place this year in the US in which some socialists might not be inclined to write "Socialism" across the ballot paper and might even get some anarchists to abstain from abstaining:

Quote:

Of the various ballot measures, the one I’m most fervently supporting this time around is California’s Proposition 64, which will legalize recreational marijuana. Similar propositions are on the ballot in four other states (Arizona, Maine, Massachusetts, and Nevada) and the polls are looking favorable in all of them.

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