In 2000, the nation collectively and clearly preferred Gore to Nader.
The point remains, though, regarding system of values. People like to circle the wagons and don't like to be wrong. Their preferences can change due to knowledge of how others have voted. Just look at the Democratic Primary - a close race before Iowa, but then due to the widely reported results of two states, it was Kerry all the way, even when it was still possible for others to win the nomination. It's negative in some ways (it's as if some people believe they get a prize for voting for the winner), but the concern remains of a population feeling cheated after the fact. There can be a collective sense of injustice even if everyone was individually enfranchised.
Honestly, though, I don't believe the 3/49/48 scenario would ever happen in a political election. For a candidate to have gathered enough support to even compete in an election, he or she would have to have a significant amount of first-place supporters.
On May 15, 2004, at 11:42 PM, James Gilmour wrote:
Imagine a "real-life" scenario: Bush, Gore, Nader. Would we really have had four years of
President Nader? This is about more than voting arithmetic and measures for identifying "the most
representative candidate". It brings in systems of values which are expressed in different
dimensions from those used to measure representivity.
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