Re: [EM] just to let you know ...
plurality leader in the initial tally ended up losing weak Condorcet compromise in third place if Burlington had used Condorcet rules ... there would be even more vociferous calls for repeal These are all semi-valid concerns in a country that is so used to plurality winners and single-party governments (winner without lots of / sufficient amount of of first preference support could be a weak single-party ruler). I note that also the spoiler effect is a quite well known problem in the USA and that the 33% plurality winner would have lost also with the old rules (the probability of electing a Republican might be bigger with the old rules though). All this together shows that the discussion and decision making is probably more abut who makes the best and most convincing claims at correct times than about who makes the correct and rational claims. There is no one making a rational summary of all the arguments. The discussion is more likely to hover around various simple claims (that may well be oversimplified, false, unclear, intentionally unclear and/or in conflict with each others just like the already mentioned claims are, no problem). Many voters may have interest but not sufficient knowledge and time/ interest to draw rational conclusions. Politicians may well drive only the short term interests of their own party and themselves (instead of the society as a whole) (big parties usually have even rational (selfish) reasons). Media may also be mostly interested in short term juicy stories. And experts too may have mixed interests. I however note that there is always some tendency to find solutions that are good in theory and in practice (and tendency to avoid solutions that have clearly been proven wrong). Decision making will go slightly in that (rational, sensible) direction if all the facts are made known and especially if clear descriptions and clear justification of them are available. That means that despite of the demagogic nature of the discussion also rational argumentation does have a place in the process. Better to throw the argumentation in although the discussion and its outcome may not fully follow the intended logic. Juho On Jan 7, 2010, at 1:49 AM, Terry Bouricius wrote: Juho, Actually, the opposition to IRV in Burlington is predominantly focused on the complaint that the plurality leader in the initial tally ended up losing in the runoff tally. This candidate was actually the Condorcet LOSER among the top three candidates (though a fringe candidate with only 35 votes was the technical Condorcet loser). The complaint from those circulating the IRV repeal petition is that there shouldn't be any ranked ballots, and that the plurality winner with 33% of the vote in the first round (and the essential Condorcet-loser) should have been declared elected. There is no momentum toward a Condorcet approach currently. I haven't heard more than a couple of people in Burlington suggest that the actual Condorcet winner should have won, because he was a weak Condorcet compromise in third place in the initial tally. I suspect that if Burlington had used Condorcet rules and the candidate in third place in the initial tally had been declared elected, there would be even more vociferous calls for repeal in favor of plurality or runoffs. Terry Bouricius - Original Message - From: Juho juho4...@yahoo.co.uk To: EM Methods election-methods@lists.electorama.com Sent: Wednesday, January 06, 2010 5:05 PM Subject: Re: [EM] just to let you know ... In Burlington at least the arguments for Condorcet should be straight forward. People are already ok with ranked ballot based voting. Many of them may feel that in the last election the Condorcet winner should have won. From this point of view Condorcet is just a small modification that fixes this problem. Many voters may support going back to the old system since that would (at least seem to) fix the problem of failing to elect the (beats all) Condorcet winner. It would make sense to make them aware that there are also other ways to solve the problem (= just fix the tabulation method). Juho On Jan 6, 2010, at 7:47 PM, robert bristow-johnson wrote: Terry and i agree on many things and I am convinced we have a common goal: fair elections that represent the will of the electorate and do not penalize voters for voting non-strategically. and we agree that the first-past-the-pole (with delayed runoff if no one exceeds 40%) is no good, worse than the IRV that was passed in 2005 and used twice since. Terry, we *do* disagree about some things. factually, it is *not* just Republicans. there are many, many Democrats that have joined that One Person, One Vote group and, Terry, if IRV is repealed this March, it's gonna be because the number of Democrats on that side have been underestimated and not taken seriously. I am against the repeal. I hope it loses, but only
Re: [EM] just to let you know ...
On Jan 6, 2010, at 6:49 PM, Terry Bouricius wrote: Actually, the opposition to IRV in Burlington is predominantly focused on the complaint that the plurality leader in the initial tally ended up losing in the runoff tally. That's stupid enough to get me a bit angry. They see a problem with IRV results. Going back to pick-one voting is sticking their heads in the sand and denying to see the problem. Because we have the full data dump from the rankings ballots we can do analysis and figure out what happened and how IRV was wrong (and how pick-one would have been wrong), but if they take that away then we just won't know again. Problem hidden! I really hope the forces of stupid don't win. Good luck up there guys. If there was going to be a big public meeting, I might even be tempted to drive up from Boston. Even if I didn't get to contribute much I'd be curious to see just how these things play out amongst real Americans who aren election theory wonks. Brian Olson http://bolson.org/ Election-Methods mailing list - see http://electorama.com/em for list info
Re: [EM] just to let you know ...
The key fact to understand about the situation in Burlington, is that the proposal for the repeal of IRV would replace it with a plurality system. A candidate could win with 40% of the vote. If no candidate reaches 40% there would be a runoff election. Robert Bristow-Johnson and I did a little poking around to see if we could spark any interest in Condorcet as a better way to go, but the folks pushing for repeal of IRV are mainly Republicans who believe that a 40% plurality rule is their best chance of winning the mayor's office, and have no interest in principles of majority, let alone Condorcet winners. Terry Bouricius - Original Message - From: robert bristow-johnson r...@audioimagination.com To: EM election-methods@lists.electorama.com Sent: Tuesday, January 05, 2010 11:28 PM Subject: [EM] just to let you know ... ... that the anti-IRV folks in Burlington Vermont have now officially submitted more than sufficient number of signatures to put an IRV repeal question on the Town Meeting ballot this coming March. Both sparks and a little bit of fecal matter is gonna fly in all directions now. One of blogs is at http://7d.blogs.com/blurt/2009/12/ burlington-residents-seek-repeal-of-instant-runoff-voting.html . Whereas the discussion here is largely academic, in the town of my residence, it's gonna get real. Feel free to jump in (hopefully with pertinent facts) even if you're outa town. -- r b-j r...@audioimagination.com Imagination is more important than knowledge. Election-Methods mailing list - see http://electorama.com/em for list info Election-Methods mailing list - see http://electorama.com/em for list info
Re: [EM] just to let you know ...
Terry and i agree on many things and I am convinced we have a common goal: fair elections that represent the will of the electorate and do not penalize voters for voting non-strategically. and we agree that the first-past-the-pole (with delayed runoff if no one exceeds 40%) is no good, worse than the IRV that was passed in 2005 and used twice since. Terry, we *do* disagree about some things. factually, it is *not* just Republicans. there are many, many Democrats that have joined that One Person, One Vote group and, Terry, if IRV is repealed this March, it's gonna be because the number of Democrats on that side have been underestimated and not taken seriously. I am against the repeal. I hope it loses, but only by a whisker. If IRV is retained by a great margin, that will reassure IRV proponents that there is nothing wrong with it and the pathologies will likely be repeated in future elections. but if it survives by just a hair, then maybe the IRV proponents will get the message. and maybe in 2011 we can replace it with Condorcet. -- r b-j r...@audioimagination.com Imagination is more important than knowledge. -Original Message- From: Terry Bouricius [ter...@burlingtontelecom.net] Date: 01/06/2010 10:24 To: EM election-methods@lists.electorama.com, robert bristow-johnson r...@audioimagination.com Subject: Re: [EM] just to let you know ... The key fact to understand about the situation in Burlington, is that the proposal for the repeal of IRV would replace it with a plurality system. A candidate could win with 40% of the vote. If no candidate reaches 40% there would be a runoff election. Robert Bristow-Johnson and I did a little poking around to see if we could spark any interest in Condorcet as a better way to go, but the folks pushing for repeal of IRV are mainly Republicans who believe that a 40% plurality rule is their best chance of winning the mayor's office, and have no interest in principles of majority, let alone Condorcet winners. Terry Bouricius - Original Message - From: robert bristow-johnson r...@audioimagination.com To: EM election-methods@lists.electorama.com Sent: Tuesday, January 05, 2010 11:28 PM Subject: [EM] just to let you know ... ... that the anti-IRV folks in Burlington Vermont have now officially submitted more than sufficient number of signatures to put an IRV repeal question on the Town Meeting ballot this coming March. Both sparks and a little bit of fecal matter is gonna fly in all directions now. One of blogs is at http://7d.blogs.com/blurt/2009/12/ burlington-residents-seek-repeal-of-instant-runoff-voting.html . Whereas the discussion here is largely academic, in the town of my residence, it's gonna get real. Feel free to jump in (hopefully with pertinent facts) even if you're outa town. -- r b-j r...@audioimagination.com Imagination is more important than knowledge. Election-Methods mailing list - see http://electorama.com/em for list info Election-Methods mailing list - see http://electorama.com/em for list info
Re: [EM] just to let you know ...
Juho wrote: In Burlington at least the arguments for Condorcet should be straight forward. People are already ok with ranked ballot based voting. Many of them may feel that in the last election the Condorcet winner should have won. From this point of view Condorcet is just a small modification that fixes this problem. Many voters may support going back to the old system since that would (at least seem to) fix the problem of failing to elect the (beats all) Condorcet winner. It would make sense to make them aware that there are also other ways to solve the problem (= just fix the tabulation method). There is another problem. Condorcet is *unknown*. Apart from Nanson (and perhaps Baldwin, I'm not certain), no Condorcet method has been used in a government context. Election-Methods mailing list - see http://electorama.com/em for list info
Re: [EM] just to let you know ...
One could say that Condorcet has by now been well tested in various non-governmental elections. Maybe they are credible enough?? There may be some additional problems too. I hope the already existing procedures of IRV to digitize the ballots and collect that data can be easily reused (or corresponding ones developed). Juho On Jan 7, 2010, at 12:59 AM, Kristofer Munsterhjelm wrote: Juho wrote: In Burlington at least the arguments for Condorcet should be straight forward. People are already ok with ranked ballot based voting. Many of them may feel that in the last election the Condorcet winner should have won. From this point of view Condorcet is just a small modification that fixes this problem. Many voters may support going back to the old system since that would (at least seem to) fix the problem of failing to elect the (beats all) Condorcet winner. It would make sense to make them aware that there are also other ways to solve the problem (= just fix the tabulation method). There is another problem. Condorcet is *unknown*. Apart from Nanson (and perhaps Baldwin, I'm not certain), no Condorcet method has been used in a government context. Election-Methods mailing list - see http://electorama.com/em for list info
Re: [EM] just to let you know ...
On Jan 6, 2010, at 6:49 PM, Terry Bouricius wrote: ... because [Montroll] was a weak Condorcet compromise in third place in the initial tally. I suspect that if Burlington had used Condorcet rules and the candidate in third place in the initial tally had been declared elected, there would be even more vociferous calls for repeal in favor of plurality or runoffs. i meant to say, Terry, that this whole issue is *only* about if the Condorcet winner is in the third place. we know that, when it boils down to three, the Condorcet candidate does not get second place in IRV, if the Condorcet candidate goes to the final IRV round, then he/ she wins IRV. so then the two methods don't differ; we can't complain about the other one. but my whole point is that even the third place by plurality Condorcet winner should be elected rather than the IRV winner. for the reasons stated in my previous post. and the vociferous calls for repeal of Condorcet would be against their enlightened self- interest. but who said that mouth-frothing reactionaries who call themselves One person, one vote (i wonder how many bought into the Death Panels canard?) will act in their enlightened self-interest rather than their immediate partisan self-interest? but, again Terry, i don't think that it's just Republican Wright supporters that are in the anti-IRV camp. there are quite a few Dems there, too. it might be dangerous to ignore the possibility that there are a number of Dems in that camp. -- r b-j r...@audioimagination.com Imagination is more important than knowledge. Election-Methods mailing list - see http://electorama.com/em for list info
[EM] just to let you know ...
... that the anti-IRV folks in Burlington Vermont have now officially submitted more than sufficient number of signatures to put an IRV repeal question on the Town Meeting ballot this coming March. Both sparks and a little bit of fecal matter is gonna fly in all directions now. One of blogs is at http://7d.blogs.com/blurt/2009/12/ burlington-residents-seek-repeal-of-instant-runoff-voting.html . Whereas the discussion here is largely academic, in the town of my residence, it's gonna get real. Feel free to jump in (hopefully with pertinent facts) even if you're outa town. -- r b-j r...@audioimagination.com Imagination is more important than knowledge. Election-Methods mailing list - see http://electorama.com/em for list info
