On Mar 22, 2010, at 6:17 AM, Markus Schulze wrote:
here are some interesting videos on IRV in Burlington:
http://www.cctv.org/watch-tv/programs/instant-runoff-voting-interviews
http://www.cctv.org/watch-tv/programs/irv-or-down-instant-runoff-
voting-debate
i've seen them. if i had reacted more quickly, i would have appeared
in one of them. (i was one of the questioners in the debate, but
they "didn't understand [my] question" so neither side answered it.
it was very frustrating.)
I have the impression that there was no reasonable
debate on IRV.
there surely was little reasonable debate.
Most anti-IRV arguments were ridiculous or simply false.
they surely were either ridiculous or false. fueled by some good
analysis from Warren Smith, but they misused the result.
The anti-IRV campaign was a pure anti-Kiss campaign.
not purely, but the fact that Kiss is in so much trouble provided a
lot of fuel for the anti-IRV campaign.
in fact, if the election was decided with Condorcet
rules (doesn't matter which, since there was no cycle),
these same Republicans would have bitched all the more,
since the Condorcet candidate had only 23% and came
third in plurality. so the primary political motivation
behind the repeal was not due to that the Condorcet
winner was not elected.
I agree that the Republicans would also have attacked
Condorcet. But as Montroll was preferred to Wright with
56% against 44%, an anti-Condorcet/anti-Montroll campaign
wouldn't have been successful.
Markus, the main complaint (besides that Kiss, who was considered by
these Republicans to be such a bad mayor and he was elected via IRV)
was against the Ranked Ballot. their slogans were: "Keep Voting
Simple" and "One person, one vote". their main factual indictment
against IRV is that it elected someone whom 71% of the electorate
voted *against*. what would they say if it were Condorcet and the
candidate that 77% voted against was elected?
I don't know if an "anti-Condorcet/anti-Montroll campaign" would have
been successful or not, but I am not as confident that it would fail
as you Markus, and I live here in Burlington. I *do* know that the
oft cited pathologies noted by Smith (picked up locally by UVM Prof.
Anthony Gierzynsky) would not have applied, since there was
absolutely no cycle, all candidates were very well ordered from a
Condorcet POV.
I would like to think that if it were Condorcet from the very
beginning that Preferential Voting would survive, but these IRV
opponents were also rabid ranked-ballot opponents ("Keep Voting
Simple! One person, one vote! Keep Voting Simple! One person, one
vote!"). They believe that God Herself ordained the "traditional
ballot" (as well as Washington, Jefferson, and Madison) and that
changing from that is heresy in the religion of democracy.
--
r b-j r...@audioimagination.com
"Imagination is more important than knowledge."
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