Bart Ingles wrote: > > [...] but what Runoff and Instant Runoff > supporters don't seem to grasp is that those systems also reinforce the > two-party system.
I didn't mean for this to sound condescending-- it took me a couple of years for this to sink in as well. And maybe Irving supporters do grasp this-- after all, even Plurality seems to avoid the kind of "turkey problem" being attributed to Condorcet methods. If you are a commited Demopublican, Irving does a good job of keeping those annoying third parties from influencing elections. But there are many who believe that the two big parties are the real turkeys, engaging in a sort of perpetual mock-battle for swing voters. In effect, one or the other is almost always the Condorcet winner in a restricted field of candidates. Eliminating third-party candidates via runoff rounds might make the outcome of the mock battle slightly more accurate (in favor of the biggest "turkey"), it but wouldn't change the contestants. ---- Election-methods mailing list - see http://electorama.com/em for list info
