Interesting and informative post, and it touches on something I'm fairly adamant about. Politicians react to being smacked on the nose. Telling them "Oh, we really want you to do this" when they don't think there are direct political consequences for it will accomplish nothing. Voting against them, and putting their political position in jeopardy, will motivate them. If all you can do is implore a party you're not wiling to vote directly against, you are contributing to their degradation.
This is why the "Vote blue no matter who" and its inverse (is there a catchy slogan for this?) is a genuine threat to the country. Politicians who have a base locked in that will reliably vote for them, whatever they do, will continue to enact shittier and shittier policy and they don't have that corrective back pressure of the threat of losing to keep
When the strategy that works switches from "I'll do things that are good for you" to "Oooohh, you don't want the bad men getting in do you? Vote for me or ooohh, scary bad man!" that's a dangerous milestone that has been crossed. Not just bad - dangerous.
I've been telling this to my local Albertans for years. Here people have voted reliably Conservatives for decades until recently (around 8 years ago) and the Conservatives kept getting worse. Corrupt, self interested, disconnected from their voters, etc. But, of course, as long as they knew they had the vote locked in, they had no incentive to cater to the voters. Then, around 8 years ago, the NDP (farthest left major party in the country) won the vote. They stayed in for one term, did a mixture of some good stuff and some utter garbage, then got booted out. Now, one of the biggest problems in Alberta was related to its biggest strengths - it has oil. Alberta's economy has, historically, been a one trick pony and people have been clamoring for diversifying the economy for a while. This was not made a real priority prior to the NDP getting in for that one term. When the Conservatives got back in though they started to put in all sorts of business and tax credits, and other incentives, for other businesses beyond oil and gas. Now, a few years later, stuff like this is popping up:
Rosenberg: Alberta economic turnaround is about more than just energy | Financial Post
Our tech industry is growing, our film industry too, we're courting a wider variety of non-energy businesses to come here through aggressive tax and incentive plans, and we're leveraging our strengths (a bunch of young, educated, unemployed or sick of the boom-bust cycle workers) to make businesses think this is a place to set up shop. It took a consistently Conservative province voting against the Conservatives to kick them in the pants and affect some change in their focus. The best thing Conservative Albertans did in the last several decades for the Conservative party was let their opposition win one. Voting across party lines is a vital correction mechanism in the type of democratic environment we inhabit.
Also,
@Madmick , you don't know what the hell you're talking about. Go get some sales numbers wrong in the video game forum or something.
