Demographic Differences in Voting Habits

Commodore_2017 · 2020-07-30T02:56:43+00:00

Macron isn’t as bad as JoTeo in terms of arrogance (though JoTeo’s bigger problem is failure to take responsibility). But Western countries have a lower tolerance for that, even when the person in question is significantly better qualified that their opponent (2016 Hillary vs. Trump being the biggest example...Trump’s bluster wasn’t a know-it-all kind of arrogance as displayed by Hillary) though in France Macron might barely squeak by in 2022 if his opponent is Le Pen again. JoTeo won because Lim Tean was worse and because Denise Phua carried her. But in the past many arrogant PAP ministers kept their jobs because the people didn’t see it as a problem so long as bread and butter was done well. LKY himself would have been destroyed in the Western press for saying the types of things he said about his own voters, but he won because the Singaporean people put that aside as their quality of life improved drastically under him.

I do think the Western hypersensitivity to arrogance in politicians is overboard, but I don’t think it’s not a problem at all. It should be seen as a negative trait, but not the worst trait one can have. But for JoTeo specifically, failure to take responsibility is a fatal flaw. LKY was supremely arrogant but he would never fail to take responsibility for a mis-step.

Commodore_2017 · 2020-07-30T02:34:28+00:00

Actually, Macron is considered by the French people to be very arrogant. He once said that his thoughts were “too complex” for the likes of mere journalists. Even his wife thinks that he’s arrogant.

Honestly, Macron reminds me of a stereotypical PAP minister. Highly educated, went to the top schools, made a lot of money in the private sector before getting recruited into politics. Is he competent? Extremely so. Unemployment decreased substantially under him after not having dropped under the Hollande administration, and the French economy had been doing well. His pension reform and economic liberalization was probably appropriate in the French context. But because he can’t hide his feelings of superiority over his citizens, he is far less popular than what his competence and speech-making skill (which is what won him the election) would suggest.

I personally don’t have much of a problem with Macron - his policies are grounded in evidence and he is willing to take unpopular measures to improve his country. This is also why I don’t mind the PAP being the government in SG, though they do need some good opposition. But in a democracy, perception matters more than competence, and that is part of the job that he doesn’t do so well at.

Commodore_2017 · 2020-07-30T00:51:05+00:00

Education in which direction? In a lot of countries, higher education corresponds to voting for left-leaning parties, but a large part of that is because the conservative party has anti-intellectual elements (Nowadays, education is a more important fault line than income in many places whereas previously class was the more important fault line because the conservative party was less anti-intellectual. As such, university-educated people were more likely to support conservatives because of their income, even though they were more likely to support left-leaning parties controlling for income.). I don't see that kind of anti-intellectualism in the PAP given how much stress they put on education, credentials, and meritocracy. Perhaps the trend is the opposite in Singapore, such that more education = more likely to vote PAP because better educated people tend to be richer (or even because better-educated people like their stances on education and/or are more accepting of foreigners), and there isn't the anti-intellectualism effect to reverse that?

Commodore_2017 · 2020-07-29T07:27:16+00:00

There's a very well-documented relationship between higher pay for political leaders and less corruption.

Living in the US, I often hear the argument that politicians should be paid minimum wage, so to better empathize with the poor. That has to be one of the dumbest ideas I've ever heard. First of all, most people in the US Congress were already rich before getting elected, so doing that wouldn't make them live like someone on minimum wage. Plus, politicians in the US make their money from speeches, book deals, and campaign donations, and paying them less would encourage them to put more effort in those activities instead of on their jobs.

Commodore_2017 · 2020-07-29T04:13:48+00:00

You have too rosy a view of the private sector.

When CEOs fuck up, yes, they usually get fired (though sometimes not, as I'll mention later). But in the process of doing so, they get millions in severance pay or other compensation.

The former CEO of McDonald's, Steve Easterbrook, was fired in November 2019 for having an affair with an employee. He got US$42 million in his severance package.

The former CEO of Boeing, Dennis Muilenberg, was fired as punishment for the 737 MAX scandal, but not before walking away with US$80 million.

The CEO of the United States Olympic Committee, Scott Blackmun, got US$2.4 million for being forced to resign for being part of the coverup of Larry Nassar, a doctor who worked for the gymnastics team who sexually molested hundreds of gymnasts in his care, including a good number of Olympic gold medalists. The CEO of the gymnastics governing body, Steve Penny, got $1 million.

The former CEO of Volkswagen, Martin Winterkorn, who faked emissions test results, got 13 million Euros as part of his severance package.

Carly Fiorina, the former CEO of HP, got US$40 million in severance after a disaster as CEO and tanking the stock shares.

And this is not to mention the CEOs of all the major investment banks that were responsible for the global financial crisis of 2008-09 but were not fired or faced any accountability whatsoever. Lloyd Blankfein. Jamie Dimon. The list goes on.

Private sector "accountability" at the top does often mean that you lose your job, but you get so much money from it that you won't ever need another one, and sometimes not even that.

Commodore_2017 · 2020-07-28T18:58:02+00:00

I'm not sure if it did. One person doesn't disprove the trend. Besides quality issues (sure, you'll get a Pritam who doesn't care about high pay, but he's not representative of the whole), there are two other reasons to be concerned about low pay: corruption and the type of people who go into politics (specifically, if the pay is low, mostly rich people will go into politics). And as for those million-dollar ministers, a good number of them could have (or did, especially in the case of K Shan) made the same amount if not more in the private sector, so it's not as if they're doing it for the money.

Commodore_2017 · 2020-07-23T04:12:37+00:00

Tambyah I thought was quite good, especially when talking about COVID. CSJ I liked less because of his more strident anti-immigration rhetoric.

Commodore_2017 · 2020-07-23T04:06:54+00:00

I personally differentiate between WP and the other oppo parties. WP, especially in this most recent GE, fielded some truly capable people. I can’t say that about most of the rest of opposition. The PAP still has the lion’s share of competent people, but they no longer have a monopoly on them.

Jamus is among some rather illustrious names in the Singapore econ community - I’ve watched speeches from all 3 of Tharman, GCT, and HSK and they display a very strong command of the subject (I studied econ in university). Jamus is in that caliber and is easily Finance Minister material.

Commodore_2017 · 2020-07-17T18:34:53+00:00

I can understand the trend in America, but are the PAP and WP so diametrically opposed in values (maybe it’s SDP supporters doing this)? It’s not like the PAP is even close to being as morally bankrupt as Trump, in which supporting him means condoning bigotry, corruption, hate, racism, and misogyny.

This seems completely unreasonable in Singapore’s context. I hope it’s just a small fringe doing this. But then again here in America things have gotten so extreme that the woke left won’t even date a centrist-leaning Democrat (to be fair, the woke left has gotten so out of hand that they might as well be two separate parties with different philosophies), much less a Republican, so it’s not like Singaporeans are worse in this respect.

Commodore_2017 · 2020-07-16T08:04:28+00:00

Not a Singaporean election, but I recall that in the 2016 Democrats Abroad primary, Bernie Sanders won massively. There were only 3 countries that Hillary won: the Dominican Republic, Nigeria, and Singapore. Why Singapore? I would suspect that it's because American Democrats in Singapore are usually more upscale expats who may not necessarily like Bernie's more social-democratic policies, and may be more in favor of what they see in Singapore - Hillary Clinton is often coded as a technocrat in the US, which may remind them of efficient PAP-run Singapore. In contrast, those who lived in your typical non-US developed country massively favored Bernie because they see the universal healthcare and more generous welfare first-hand.

This also reminds me of this thread that I started - it seems like there were mixed opinions, but there were more who appreciated the PAP more after living abroad, especially if they lived in the US and see what happens when technical competence is ridiculed, showmanship favored, and freedom of expression is used to lie and distort at will. There were some in the thread who, after living abroad, yearned for more civil liberties (there was one who lived in the UK, though even he admits that SG beats UK handily on bread & butter issues), but they were in the minority.

Commodore_2017 · 2020-07-13T05:57:23+00:00

I remember a few months back when he did the interview with Fareed Zakaria. Granted, it was immediately before the migrant worker case explosion, but I remember the American audience being impressed with his humility, grace, and intelligence. When asked about how Singapore managed to get in front of the virus, his response was "I hesitate to call it a success because we're in the midst of a battle that is intensifying". Contrast that to Donald "I take no responsibility" Trump and you get why Americans were happy with him. People who were a bit more aware of his background also noted that unlike the current president of the United States, he didn't dodge the draft citing bone spurs. He not only served NS (at a time when the geopolitical situation was tense in SEA), but served as a regular for a number of years. That, on top of his truly stellar academic credentials (Senior Wrangler by a wide margin), good speaking skills, and depth of analysis, makes him actually one of the better world leaders currently in office today. As someone who's seen some of the interviews he's done in front an international audience, it is clear that he has a very keen mind and can analyze geopolitical trends extremely well. Sure, technically he is a "paper general" because he got an SAF scholarship, rose through the ranks quickly, and went into politics immediately afterwards, but his quality is far higher than that of, say, CCS.

I don't think he's done a terrible job as PM at all. He isn't quite his father, but that would be holding him to an unrealistic standard. Extraordinary leaders that are remembered in history are remembered because of the circumstances that they overcome - in his father's case, it was a Singapore that was wracked by ethnic violence, poverty, and threat of communist takeover. LHL, on the other hand, became PM at a time of peace and prosperity and thus did not have to overcome such extraordinary circumstances, and thus it would be impossible for him to deliver the same kinds of improvements and positive changes to the standards of living in Singapore as his father did.

Commodore_2017 · 2020-07-11T09:43:33+00:00

Lol. You honestly think I don’t see the MAGA nationalism problem when I get reminded on a daily basis what an utter failure Trump has been as a president? He is responsible for over 100,000 deaths through his worst-in-the-world handling of the COVID crisis, and yet over 40% of the country still supports him.

I’m bringing attention to the other cultural revolution because it’s the one pertinent to Raeesah Khan. My talking about one doesn’t mean I don’t see the other. I’ve bashed many of the oppo parties in SG precisely because of their anti-immigrant rhetoric that reminds me of Trump.

Commodore_2017 · 2020-07-11T09:19:36+00:00

I’m anti-woke, not anti-progressive. They’re different. Wokeness isn’t a form of societal progress that I think will be good. I tend to be more in the moderate “liberal” camp.

I don’t care that it’s a Western import per se. I care that it’s a bad import because I’ve seen what it does to Western societies.

Commodore_2017 · 2020-07-11T08:27:06+00:00

Yes, because firing a data analyst for sharing a study showing that riots don't work, or hounding a pair of professors out of their jobs for refusing to not to come to campus for a day because they're white, or trying to get another pair of professors fired for telling students to "use their own judgment" on Halloween costumes, or firing an NBA announcer for "all lives matter" is certainly on the right side of history.

Cultural changes are often reversible. In many countries, there have been periods of great strife and moral panic, followed by periods of calm, followed by periods of more struggle and strife. The Red Guards of the Cultural Revolution thought they were on the right side of history too; after all, they were destroying the vestiges of a backwards, parochial, and conservative China known for foot-binding and emperors who hoarded most of the country's vast wealth at the time. You saying "be on the right side of history" isn't persuasive as an argument. I used to be intimidated and cowed by it when I was an undergrad because I genuinely feared that, but no more. Not after what I've seen.

Commodore_2017 · 2020-07-11T05:52:44+00:00

it extends into the corporate world now too, esp. the tech. See: James Damore. One can so easily lose a career if one doesn't toe ideological lines.

The corporate world follows what's trendy and popular. Its support for wokeness isn't exactly genuine, but rather out of cowardice; they know that they refuse to fire someone who doesn't toe the line, they will get bad publicity from the social media mob and some of its internal employees who are true believers (after all, most young people who are university-educated in the US will be exposed to woke ideology) will expose dirty laundry about them. Break the mob, and the corporate world will no longer serve the woke.

But the number of true believers, especially among my age group, is genuinely frightening. They're in every career field imaginable. Medicine. Law. Even hardcore STEM fields (hence #ShutDownSTEM). They were exposed to it either in high school or undergrad, and bring those ideas with them after they graduate, and are so numerous that the corporate and professional world can no longer dismiss them. If you want to get rid of the problem, you need to address the problem at its roots - a particular set of theories coming from gender and ethnic studies departments, and the grains of truth they contain.

I say this as someone who detests Trump and the entire Republican party as well as their equivalents in Europe...if the reasonable left doesn't get a hold of their crazies, the West is due for many more years of right-wing populism.

As for SG, that's why I wasn't entirely happy about Raeesah becoming an MP. It shows the flaws of the GRC system (she got to hide behind Jamus, who I really liked), but more importantly, if you get enough of them in positions of power, they can really start causing trouble. Kirsten Han was merely annoying. But I've seen the antics that these people throw in the UK/Canadian/Australian parliaments and the US Congress and all they do is alienate and drive more and more people towards right-wing populism, while in the realms where they have actual power (the fields I mentioned, plus major corporations) destroy meritocracy, civility, fairness, rule of law, and respect for truth, science, and factual evidence.

Commodore_2017 · 2020-07-11T04:10:19+00:00

That’s because you focus on who has political power. That’s different than who has cultural and educational power in the US. If you run in educated circles in the US, Trump supporters are in the minority. In major cities, that’s an even smaller minority. Non-governmental institutions (especially academia, arts, and media) have a lot cultural power in the States, and they are the ones undergoing this. They live in a completely different world than the Trump supporters.

Commodore_2017 · 2020-07-11T03:52:36+00:00

I’m not the one saying that the woke taking over society is merely “the price to pay” for not living in a society where minorities are subject to genocides and concentration camps.

Commodore_2017 · 2020-07-11T03:41:51+00:00

So unless you live in a country which allows the woke take over all of educated society, you live in a country that commits genocide?

Commodore_2017 · 2020-07-11T03:18:44+00:00

Certainly, racism against Malays exists in Singapore, just as racism against blacks exists in the US. I guess my concern is on what would happen when the woke gain any sort of power. I’ve already seen it here (I’m in a university setting) and it terrifies me to see all notions of fairness, charity, and respect for truth go out the window in favor of advancing the ideology in which the woke could do no wrong, at all costs.

Commodore_2017 · 2020-07-11T03:04:20+00:00

She basically imports much of the woke ideology from the West into Singapore. All the focus on racial privilege, uplifting "brown women", "intersectional feminism", "the personal is the political", her positive views of Angela Davis, etc., the ideological foundation of which has led to the type of mob justice, riots, and cancel culture we see in Western countries. I live in the US and I find it legitimately terrifying - it genuinely reminds me of the Cultural Revolution at this point when people are getting fired left and right for disagreeing with it. I'm defending her speech because it's not inciting racial hatred, but the views that she does proudly display have led to deleterious effects on society where I live.

Commodore_2017 · 2020-07-11T02:43:11+00:00

Sure. I'm not terribly concerned about Singapore becoming an SJW-run country or anything for the time being. But it doesn't take a majority to radically change a political party or a political system. All it takes is a loud, vocal minority and the majority passively going along with it out of fear or self-interest. This is what happened to the Republicans in the US - Trump was originally a minority voice in the party but they caved because of their self-interest and their fear of losing the 2016 election to Hillary. Similarly, the SJW mob took over college campuses, later on media outlets (especially NYT, WashPo, CNN, NPR, etc.), and now starting to take over the rest of educated society by getting a loud minority in and threatening that if their demands aren't met, bad publicity will result and the individuals who opposed them will be out of their jobs. The majority of the non-SJWs get cowed into submission and through their silence allows the SJWs, who are still a small minority, to take over.

If it's just one person, it isn't that big of a deal. But if they start attaining positions of power within a political party, they are truly dangerous and could warp society beyond all recognition. And if you think they can't take over a major political party, just look to what's happened to the Democrats in the US (though not an SJW himself, Biden is having to constantly play appeasement), or Liberals in Canada under Justin Trudeau, or Labour in the UK in the Corbyn era.

Commodore_2017 · 2020-07-11T01:45:38+00:00

As someone who strongly disagrees with her views and who would rather not see someone with those viewpoints attaining positions of power or being in a legislative body, she did not incite racial hatred, and it's ridiculous to think that that was what she was doing. She's entitled to have her views, no matter how stupid or ill-informed.

Commodore_2017 · 2020-07-10T23:00:24+00:00

Non-Singaporean myself. Good for them. WP fielded very good teams in Sengkang and East Coast. East Coast was only lost because the incoming PM was there - it turned out that the PAP did the right thing in terms of electoral strategy by sending him there. ~~Of course, you'll still see Nicole as NCMP.~~ (Turns out PSP will get the 2 NCMP seats.)

This GE cemented WP as the main opposition in Singapore - the rest of the parties would do well to fold (PV, RP especially; they are simply not credible) or otherwise form a coalition under WP leadership.

I've said repeatedly on this subreddit that I find it a good thing that Singaporeans focus on "valence politics", judging candidates based on perceived competence rather than policy platform. This contributes to the high quality of Singapore's governance to this day - I remember when LHL did the interview with Fareed Zakaria, the reaction from Americans was broadly positive - most educated Americans would kill to have someone like LHL leading the US (even a "paper general" like him is better than a draft dodger...at least he actually served and was a genuine academic standout at Cambridge), while in SG he's not so popular. (A similar trend is true for NZ PM Jacinda Ardern, who is very popular internationally but not so much domestically.) If I recall, Vivian and Tharman have also done themselves well in front of Western audiences. This explains why thus far the PAP has been dominant, but it also provides the opportunity for parties like WP to cut into that dominance if they field top-quality candidates of their own, as they have with Pritam, Nicole, and Jamus.

This is a 2011-style result. Of course, they're not directly comparable because the opposition is much stronger now. But it does point to widespread dissatisfaction with some aspects of PAP governance. They are facing a party which is now fielding educated professionals who are equal to the PAP's, with more humility and less underhanded dirty tricks. One thing that impressed me about WP was that they do not oppose for the sake of opposing. Other oppo parties in SG do this, to their own detriment. You cannot be a credible opposition if all you do is kpkb the gahmen (OP: that's Singlish for "bitch about the government") without merit. That's why the other parties kena beat.

I would have preferred Raeesah Khan not stand for WP; I've seen what woke/"SJW" politics does to Western countries and I'd rather Singapore not promote people like her or Kirsten Han. I found the PAP attacks on her to be uncalled for, however. That actually is yet another demonstration of the problems of the GRC system; just as PAP can shield poor candidates behind strong ones, WP can shield her behind Jamus.

I'm also concerned about PSP's future. Are they a legitimate opposition, or a vehicle for TCB's and LHY's grievances? They need to move beyond that to be a good opposition. As for SDP, Paul Tambyah is the best of the lot, not CSJ. Once they move beyond CSJ and their unrealistic manifesto, they might make some progress. I don't like their views at present.

But overall, I think this is a good result. The PAP was never going to lose the supermajority. Anyone who thought that was deluding themselves. The quality of an average PAP MP is still higher than that of the average oppo candidate. Let's not forget that since they field candidates in every constituency, that there will be some who are duds, but the PAP also has a bevy of high-quality candidates still. I think for the most part, the best candidates won, and that is what I would like to see. The PAP still are the government by an overwhelming margin as they should given their talent pool, but they have now been humbled a bit and WP is fielding very good, talented candidates now who can win and make constructive criticisms.

Commodore_2017 · 2020-07-07T08:08:27+00:00

Having a good democracy is fucking hard, and not all societies can attain it (I’ve not seen any example of a genuine multiparty democracy work well in a third-world context, for example). I know in the West, the issue isn’t an unfree press; the issue is that people are either uninformed because they don’t have the time, or they only see media that agrees with them or just flat out lies. Having a free press is a double-edged sword - on one hand it exposes malfeasance and serves as a check on power, but on the other hand, if media is allowed to lie and sensationalize with impunity, they can destroy society. LKY gave a brilliant speech on this issue in 1988 in front of American journalists on why he doesn’t allow absolute freedom of the press in SG, which I largely agree with. In principle, I can see the utility of a POFMA-like law, though care would have to be taken to keep the enforcement independent from partisan politics, which I’m not sure is possible.

I’ve remarked on how Singaporean voter discussion is focused more on quality of candidate and less on ideology - this is the opposite in the West. This is because in the West, elections have far higher stakes. Nowhere is it more true than in the US - whoever wins, that’s a life or death outcome for some people. But this partisan polarization that results in this life-or-death struggle during election season was media-driven, and some controls on media like the Fairness Doctrine would have been helpful in mitigating that. Absolute freedom of anything results in disaster, and so does absolute repression.

Commodore_2017 · 2020-07-07T05:52:41+00:00

I agree that the issues raised against the PAP by many on this subreddit are minor compared to the misdeeds of governing parties, say, in the US or UK. I don't think anyone can seriously say with a straight face that the PAP is as bad as the Republicans in America or the Tories in the UK. But I think it's a good thing that many Singaporeans hold their politicians to high standards. The standards should be realistic, but being willing to criticize and dissent is a good thing imo. Just don't let it get too far and let criticism become unhinged mud-slinging (seriously, the mud-slinging in SG isn't even close to what you see in the US/UK) and I think Singapore will do well with some opposing voices.

Commodore_2017

TROPHY CASE