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Why American Elections are Flawed, and How to Fix Them

67 points by Dowwie 10y ago

d--b 10y ago
it's not a very smart move to publish this right before the election. "Even Harvard says the election is rigged."
- skummetmaelk 10y ago
  It is probably the smartest move if you want it to be seen and taken seriously though.
  - lallysingh 10y ago
    Especially through your H-Index.
- pixl97 10y ago
  But Obama says the elections are not rigged, how can this be?
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
  - e1g 10y ago
    I just recently heard of Obama's position you're referring to, and I had a different interpretation. "Rigged" means a coordinated and malicious manipulation - this is something that before Trump no one had claimed (the GOP or otherwise). "Flawed", or even "fraud", is more subtle - for example, an electoral administrator miscounting votes due to strange patriotism, lack of training, indifference, or excessive partisanship. I saw Obama's point as being rooted in "Never ascribe to malice that which can be explained by incompetence", and that actually rigging the election in the US (and getting away with it) is a lot more complex than it seems on surface. Sort of like faking the moon landing.
    - TheGirondin 10y ago
      >"Rigged" means a coordinated and malicious manipulation - this is something that before Trump no one had claimed (the GOP or otherwise). There were (and still are) wide spread claims that Republicans outright stole the results of the 2004 election in Ohio, going all the way to John Kerry himself. http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2015/12/21/negotiating-the-whirlwind http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2015/12/21/negotiating-the... Refusing to accept election losses has been a hallmark of Democrats in the last 20 years. They refuse to accept the 2000 election, said that Republicans stole the state of OH in 2004, and even now claim that the current Republican majorities in both the House and Senate are the result of "gerrymandering."
    - camiller 10y ago
      "this is something that before Trump no one had claimed (the GOP or otherwise)" Except when Democrats claimed Bush stole the election. Otherwise no one has ever...
  - baldfat 10y ago
    PLEASE FOR THE LOVE OF EVERYTHING: We are on Hacker News where we should care about data. Show some kind of data of this happening in a national campaign in America???? Show one election at a state or national level where this has happened. Also show how this happens? The only place this would even matter for President is in swing states. Show data and process then we can talk. Right now your doing the best North Korean Propaganda ever and undercutting democracy with no data to show anything is rigged. I prefer democracy and don't prefer a dictator. Why is it okay to destroy the American system to make it great again?
    - coldpie 10y ago
      > Show some kind of data of this happening in a national campaign in America???? Show one election at a state or national level where this has happened. There are no such examples. Voter fraud and election rigging is not an issue in the United States.
    - pixl97 10y ago
      Whatever happened to the Diebold voting machine company anyway?
      - camiller 10y ago
        Diebold changed the name then sold the voting machine division to ES&S, which later sold it off due to monopoly charges to Dominion. "As of August 2010, Dominion voting machines are used in 600 jurisdictions in 22 states" - wikipedia
- Taek 10y ago
  This is when people care about elections. Right now pretty much everybody, even non-Americans, is desperate for something sane to happen. Everyone is saying to themselves right now "surely there is a better way..." This is the perfect time for a name like Harvard to say "yes, there is a better way, here it is..."
  - CalChris 10y ago
    Similarly a lot of people are desperate for something insane to happen, particularly the media. The whole Trump spectacle has been an ad driving frenzy. This is the wrong time to propose anything reasonable. We can't even get a hearing on a Supreme Court nomination. Now is a time to be endured with some embarrassment until things quiet down. That'll be at least a year or two.
- onion2k 10y ago
  'Flawed' and 'rigged' are very different terms.
  - rhaps0dy 10y ago
    Good find. But I don't think this is going to matter.
  - Alex3917 10y ago
    They're both flawed and rigged. E.g. the electoral voting system is flawed. And the DNC purging 200,000 voters in Brooklyn makes it rigged.
Calcite 10y ago
Direct PDF link: https://research.hks.harvard.edu/publications/getFile.aspx?Id=1431 https://research.hks.harvard.edu/publications/getFile.aspx?I...
angry-hacker 10y ago
I would be surprised if anyone honestly believe they are are honest. It all depends on your narrative if you accept it or not.
sumosudo 10y ago
I could have a hundred fast foods for breakfast and unlimited cereal selections for brinner and you give me two presidential candidates.. ?!
- bbctol 10y ago
  You can vote for anyone you like. You can't get anyone you'd like, but that's expected when you're one part of a nation of hundreds of millions.
- Kristine1975 10y ago
  It's the illusion of choice: Choice where it doesn't matter, no choice where it does.
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
misja111 10y ago
Unfortunately, the ones that have to decide whether to implement the suggestions in this report, are the same people that were put into power by the failing mechanisms behind the US' election system. Their hands are tied by the powerful lobbies that have sponsored their campaigns.
- Svip 10y ago
  Would it not be possible to start gradually? I am just speculating a plan here, but start by implementing some of these suggestions that can be applied on a state level in some minor states first. It may be easier to lobby those local politicians for a change of rule. A successful 'trial' (one might even be able to convince them by saying it's going to be a trial at first) might convince other state politicians and/or people elsewhere to implement similar systems in their own state. Disclaimer: I am Danish and Denmark apparently ranks top in their PEI index.
  - rschuetzler 10y ago
    I think that's a big part of what needs to happen. Make these changes at the state and local level, and eventually we might see some diversity at those levels. Then we'll be able to have a conversation on the national level. Like the original comment here says, Democrats and Republicans have no incentive to push for this because they benefit from the First-Past-the-Post voting we currently have.
  - camiller 10y ago
    Sure, you want to come over and be the one to tell one of the states that they are "minor"? Joking aside... understand that we don't actually have a national election system, or even a state one. Each one of the United States 3,142 counties runs an mostly independent election managed by an elected county election commissioner. Tallies for higher elections are reported upward from there. In some states there may be some unification as far as selecting common voting hardware across the state but in most places, even that is at the discretion of the county. So, to your original question, The federal government simply does not have the power to choose a "minor" state to run a trial in.
- 10y ago
thex10 10y ago
Link to the author's website for the Electoral Integrity Project: https://sites.google.com/site/electoralintegrityproject4/ https://sites.google.com/site/electoralintegrityproject4/ It is an 'independent academic study.' What I want to know is, have these people been lobbying Congress to implement their suggested changes at all?
ludicast 10y ago
What do you folks make of this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hDc8PVCvfKs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hDc8PVCvfKs Against: O'Keefe is not a perfect journalist, as agenda-driven as anyone anywhere For: These people were on the payroll, fired right after it happened, and Bob Creamer met with Obama 300 times. https://www.reddit.com/r/the_donald https://www.reddit.com/r/the_donald has done a great job "following the money" even if they are massively biased. My vote is still up for grabs (tonight's debate might settle it), but a YUGE part of me does want to see an impartial investigation. The kind we won't get with Comey/Clinton/Lynch. Side note - very good PR of them to drop the video right after Obama criticized Trump for his rigging claims.
- sickbeard 10y ago
  If at this point you haven't made up your mind, I'm not sure what else you need bro
  - ludicast 10y ago
    The third debate most likely :). I have them at 1-1 so the winner of this debate will have won twice as many debates as the other. Small sample size I know. If he is idiotic and has all of his points torn apart, I will have a hard time pulling the lever for him. Intelligence matters. But if he wins, and then will have won 2 out of 3 debates against a person who spent a month home prepping for them and avoiding the people of this country, that would be very compelling. It all depends on him making a full heel-face-turn for tonight's rubbermatch.
    - sickbeard 10y ago
      I know it's your choice and everything but can I ask why you don't just look at their policies.. compared to who wins a debate?
      - ludicast 10y ago
        I have, and I am 50/50 split on those :). I sidewith.com had me at 1% point between bernie, hillary and trump. I 1 - am rabidly pro-choice 2 - think the second amendment is pretty good as is, maybe with a few additional checks. 3 - default pro-cop but think we have too many laws 4 - like the wall but not a fan of massive deportations 5 - would not like to have the migrant influx that europe has, even if the crisis is partly our fault 6 - anti-PC 7 - pro pot-legalization (that's actually more repub this go-round) 8 - believe in climate change 9 - pro-israel 10 - want liberal supreme court justices 11 - think we are taking a very naive approach to the risk of terrorism in order to avoid offending many groups 12 - massively turned on by this https://www.donaldjtrump.com/press-releases/donald-j.-trumps-five-point-plan-for-ethics-reform https://www.donaldjtrump.com/press-releases/donald-j.-trumps... 13 - have to admit if you put them in a box and made them play jeopardy with only geographic/polysci questions, he would get killed. 14 - want less of the typical pro-jesus anti-gay slant the old guard GOP has had (admittedly that's not him but is the Silver Fox at his side)
pjc50 10y ago
From the abstract: > deepening party polarization over electoral procedures, the vulnerability of electronic records to hacking, and the impact of deregulating campaign spending, compounding the lack of professional standards of electoral management. All of these things people have rightly been complaining about for years. It would be good to get some recognition of them. > Section 4 considers pragmatic reforms designed to strengthen U.S. electoral laws and procedures, recommending expanding secure and convenient registration and balloting facilities, [...] and strengthening impartial dispute resolution mechanisms. .. but here we hit the problem: too many Americans no longer really believe in "impartiality". This is the guiding theme of the Trump campaign, that anyone who disagrees with them is a lying partisan. Not to mention that the Republican party have spent years working against "convenient registration", instead preferring partisan disenfranchisement through voter ID and similar measures.
- 3princip 10y ago
  As a European I don't understand how requiring an ID to vote is disenfranchising voters? It just stinks of voter fraud, and in light of the latest Project Veritas videos I can only conclude that the establishment parties and democrats in this case are engaged in massive electoral fraud and fight these initiatives not on principle but to maintain mechanisms by which they can influence the result. It's just weird, especially since the US has been very vocal in judging others with regards to their electoral processes. Pot calling the kettle black it seems.
  - evgen 10y ago
    If you believe the project veritas videos you should look harder at the source and his history of creating misleading videos. The problem is that in the US it is quite possible to get along just fine without a government-issued ID; mandating such ID can be considered a barrier to voting since it is actually inconvenient to get such an ID in the first place. Your assumption that there is massive electoral fraud in the US is simply incorrect and in fact there is far more voter fraud across Europe than there is in the US. Most voting in the US occurs in-person, and in such cases voter fraud is incredibly rare (as in less than 100 known cases over billions of ballots cast.)
MichaelApproved 10y ago
Maine has "Ranked Choice Voting Initiative" (Question 5) on the ballot this election. If their citizens vote for it, they'll be able to cast first, second and third choice ballots. In theory, that should prevent the 3rd party spoiler effect from happening while allowing them to vote their conscious. In the last two election cycles, they split the "left" vote and allowed a far right governor to get elected. With Ranked Choice, you get to pick your first choice. If that person didn't get enough votes, your second choice will have your vote instead. I think they're the first one in the country to do this. I hope they enact this and we can watch the States truly be laboratories for election improvements.
- sickbeard 10y ago
  Ranked choice voting is not good enough, it has far too many flaws like not amounting to majority rule. In fact it only encourages fringe candidates who have more to gain and end up getting disproportionately represented in when voting ends
  - matthewmacleod 10y ago
    This system is used for many elections globally, and my understanding is that it's widely considered to be quite fair. I'm struggling to understand your specific objections.
    - mojuba 10y ago
      I think the problem (at least theoretically) is that second-choice votes are not weighted. It could've been e.g. 1 for first choice, 0.5 for second and so on. Because obviously your second choice candidate is not as good to you as the first one, but some not-so-good candidates can get more votes. In fact I can even see some potential patterns for manipulation here.
      - matthewmacleod 10y ago
        That isn't a problem; the impact of your vote is inherent in the ranking, so lower preferences are automatically "worth less" than higher ones. I don't see a particular pattern that would allow for manipulation. AFAIK it's fairly resistant to tactical voting and manipulation by withdrawal.
zzzeek 10y ago
was hoping to see some mention of the "third party problem", that is, voters can't express their preference for a so-called "alternate" candidate without taking votes away from their second preferred choice. IMO allowing some form of ranked voting, while this is completely politically untenable in the near future, should at least be part of the discussion. Because it also clarifies how without such a system (given the electoral college system in place as well, which I think is a good thing), voting for an "alternate" candidate really does help the opponent of your second choice.
- Dowwie 10y ago
  Hey Zzzeek! Ranked choice is on the ballot for Maine voters next month. Maybe more states will adopt it in the future..
phkahler 10y ago
For all offices except the president, I believe all public advertising/campaigning should be restricted to people who reside in the state. No PACs, no national parties, no outside financing. The candidates are supposed to represent the people of their state, to take money or other influence from anyone else is inappropriate. I suppose this could be implemented at the state level.
Hermel 10y ago
I find the American rule of having one representative per district flawed, as it gives an unfair advantage to large parties. In the Swiss system, I can cast 20 votes if my state has 20 representatives. This allows a party who get 5% of the votes to win a seat. Also, voters are free to vote across party lines as they like, but one can vote at most twice for the same candidate. That allows to influence the ranking of candidates within parties, which is for example not possible in Germany, where the voters can only choose between pre-arranged lists provided by the parties. The Swiss voting system allows for much more elaborate voting strategies than any other. I, for example, usually start with the list of my preferred party and then remove all lawyers and career politicians, because I think they are over-represented. I wonder why there aren't many countries that copy the Swiss system of electing the parliament. Maybe because it gives more power to the voters than typical politicians feel comfortable with?
losteverything 10y ago
Ok. I read the entire pdf. My take. Academia affords one to spend a lifetime on an issue. Author had '99 citing. If your thing is elections then you have to write about this. Only a revolt by the people will change the election process significantly - or Lawmakers vote ++ if they think they will get more votes/representation. I do not believe this report or 100 others will impact elected officials. Sure, having a leading university will get quotes but not action. I do not believe our system is in peril. I do not believe our system needs to be fixed. I do not believe this election is rigged. I trust the outcome. I do hope there are more "normal" people in the political pipeline in future years so our choices can be better. Life has so many choices. The choice to vote for president is only one.
- snarf21 10y ago
  I agree with your one comment. Only true revolt will cause a change. People don't really care in the end. As long as they have an iPhone and Netflix and a 50" Samsung, who really cares? Everyone complains a little but there is no real movement. As bad as things are (and could get), the fact is that they are objectively pretty freaking great.

67 points by Dowwie 10y ago

d--b 10y ago

it's not a very smart move to publish this right before the election. "Even Harvard says the election is rigged."

skummetmaelk 10y ago
It is probably the smartest move if you want it to be seen and taken seriously though.
- lallysingh 10y ago
  Especially through your H-Index.
pixl97 10y ago
But Obama says the elections are not rigged, how can this be?
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- e1g 10y ago
  I just recently heard of Obama's position you're referring to, and I had a different interpretation. "Rigged" means a coordinated and malicious manipulation - this is something that before Trump no one had claimed (the GOP or otherwise). "Flawed", or even "fraud", is more subtle - for example, an electoral administrator miscounting votes due to strange patriotism, lack of training, indifference, or excessive partisanship. I saw Obama's point as being rooted in "Never ascribe to malice that which can be explained by incompetence", and that actually rigging the election in the US (and getting away with it) is a lot more complex than it seems on surface. Sort of like faking the moon landing.
  - TheGirondin 10y ago
    >"Rigged" means a coordinated and malicious manipulation - this is something that before Trump no one had claimed (the GOP or otherwise). There were (and still are) wide spread claims that Republicans outright stole the results of the 2004 election in Ohio, going all the way to John Kerry himself. http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2015/12/21/negotiating-the-whirlwind http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2015/12/21/negotiating-the... Refusing to accept election losses has been a hallmark of Democrats in the last 20 years. They refuse to accept the 2000 election, said that Republicans stole the state of OH in 2004, and even now claim that the current Republican majorities in both the House and Senate are the result of "gerrymandering."
  - camiller 10y ago
    "this is something that before Trump no one had claimed (the GOP or otherwise)" Except when Democrats claimed Bush stole the election. Otherwise no one has ever...
- baldfat 10y ago
  PLEASE FOR THE LOVE OF EVERYTHING: We are on Hacker News where we should care about data. Show some kind of data of this happening in a national campaign in America???? Show one election at a state or national level where this has happened. Also show how this happens? The only place this would even matter for President is in swing states. Show data and process then we can talk. Right now your doing the best North Korean Propaganda ever and undercutting democracy with no data to show anything is rigged. I prefer democracy and don't prefer a dictator. Why is it okay to destroy the American system to make it great again?
  - coldpie 10y ago
    > Show some kind of data of this happening in a national campaign in America???? Show one election at a state or national level where this has happened. There are no such examples. Voter fraud and election rigging is not an issue in the United States.
  - pixl97 10y ago
    Whatever happened to the Diebold voting machine company anyway?
    - camiller 10y ago
      Diebold changed the name then sold the voting machine division to ES&S, which later sold it off due to monopoly charges to Dominion. "As of August 2010, Dominion voting machines are used in 600 jurisdictions in 22 states" - wikipedia
Taek 10y ago
This is when people care about elections. Right now pretty much everybody, even non-Americans, is desperate for something sane to happen. Everyone is saying to themselves right now "surely there is a better way..." This is the perfect time for a name like Harvard to say "yes, there is a better way, here it is..."
- CalChris 10y ago
  Similarly a lot of people are desperate for something insane to happen, particularly the media. The whole Trump spectacle has been an ad driving frenzy. This is the wrong time to propose anything reasonable. We can't even get a hearing on a Supreme Court nomination. Now is a time to be endured with some embarrassment until things quiet down. That'll be at least a year or two.
onion2k 10y ago
'Flawed' and 'rigged' are very different terms.
- rhaps0dy 10y ago
  Good find. But I don't think this is going to matter.
- Alex3917 10y ago
  They're both flawed and rigged. E.g. the electoral voting system is flawed. And the DNC purging 200,000 voters in Brooklyn makes it rigged.

Calcite 10y ago

Direct PDF link: https://research.hks.harvard.edu/publications/getFile.aspx?Id=1431 https://research.hks.harvard.edu/publications/getFile.aspx?I...

angry-hacker 10y ago

I would be surprised if anyone honestly believe they are are honest. It all depends on your narrative if you accept it or not.

sumosudo 10y ago

I could have a hundred fast foods for breakfast and unlimited cereal selections for brinner and you give me two presidential candidates.. ?!

bbctol 10y ago
You can vote for anyone you like. You can't get anyone you'd like, but that's expected when you're one part of a nation of hundreds of millions.
Kristine1975 10y ago
It's the illusion of choice: Choice where it doesn't matter, no choice where it does.

deleted 10y ago

[deleted]

misja111 10y ago

Unfortunately, the ones that have to decide whether to implement the suggestions in this report, are the same people that were put into power by the failing mechanisms behind the US' election system. Their hands are tied by the powerful lobbies that have sponsored their campaigns.

Svip 10y ago
Would it not be possible to start gradually? I am just speculating a plan here, but start by implementing some of these suggestions that can be applied on a state level in some minor states first. It may be easier to lobby those local politicians for a change of rule. A successful 'trial' (one might even be able to convince them by saying it's going to be a trial at first) might convince other state politicians and/or people elsewhere to implement similar systems in their own state. Disclaimer: I am Danish and Denmark apparently ranks top in their PEI index.
- rschuetzler 10y ago
  I think that's a big part of what needs to happen. Make these changes at the state and local level, and eventually we might see some diversity at those levels. Then we'll be able to have a conversation on the national level. Like the original comment here says, Democrats and Republicans have no incentive to push for this because they benefit from the First-Past-the-Post voting we currently have.
- camiller 10y ago
  Sure, you want to come over and be the one to tell one of the states that they are "minor"? Joking aside... understand that we don't actually have a national election system, or even a state one. Each one of the United States 3,142 counties runs an mostly independent election managed by an elected county election commissioner. Tallies for higher elections are reported upward from there. In some states there may be some unification as far as selecting common voting hardware across the state but in most places, even that is at the discretion of the county. So, to your original question, The federal government simply does not have the power to choose a "minor" state to run a trial in.
10y ago

thex10 10y ago

Link to the author's website for the Electoral Integrity Project: https://sites.google.com/site/electoralintegrityproject4/ https://sites.google.com/site/electoralintegrityproject4/ It is an 'independent academic study.' What I want to know is, have these people been lobbying Congress to implement their suggested changes at all?

ludicast 10y ago

What do you folks make of this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hDc8PVCvfKs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hDc8PVCvfKs Against: O'Keefe is not a perfect journalist, as agenda-driven as anyone anywhere For: These people were on the payroll, fired right after it happened, and Bob Creamer met with Obama 300 times. https://www.reddit.com/r/the_donald https://www.reddit.com/r/the_donald has done a great job "following the money" even if they are massively biased. My vote is still up for grabs (tonight's debate might settle it), but a YUGE part of me does want to see an impartial investigation. The kind we won't get with Comey/Clinton/Lynch. Side note - very good PR of them to drop the video right after Obama criticized Trump for his rigging claims.

sickbeard 10y ago
If at this point you haven't made up your mind, I'm not sure what else you need bro
- ludicast 10y ago
  The third debate most likely :). I have them at 1-1 so the winner of this debate will have won twice as many debates as the other. Small sample size I know. If he is idiotic and has all of his points torn apart, I will have a hard time pulling the lever for him. Intelligence matters. But if he wins, and then will have won 2 out of 3 debates against a person who spent a month home prepping for them and avoiding the people of this country, that would be very compelling. It all depends on him making a full heel-face-turn for tonight's rubbermatch.
  - sickbeard 10y ago
    I know it's your choice and everything but can I ask why you don't just look at their policies.. compared to who wins a debate?
    - ludicast 10y ago
      I have, and I am 50/50 split on those :). I sidewith.com had me at 1% point between bernie, hillary and trump. I 1 - am rabidly pro-choice 2 - think the second amendment is pretty good as is, maybe with a few additional checks. 3 - default pro-cop but think we have too many laws 4 - like the wall but not a fan of massive deportations 5 - would not like to have the migrant influx that europe has, even if the crisis is partly our fault 6 - anti-PC 7 - pro pot-legalization (that's actually more repub this go-round) 8 - believe in climate change 9 - pro-israel 10 - want liberal supreme court justices 11 - think we are taking a very naive approach to the risk of terrorism in order to avoid offending many groups 12 - massively turned on by this https://www.donaldjtrump.com/press-releases/donald-j.-trumps-five-point-plan-for-ethics-reform https://www.donaldjtrump.com/press-releases/donald-j.-trumps... 13 - have to admit if you put them in a box and made them play jeopardy with only geographic/polysci questions, he would get killed. 14 - want less of the typical pro-jesus anti-gay slant the old guard GOP has had (admittedly that's not him but is the Silver Fox at his side)

pjc50 10y ago

From the abstract: > deepening party polarization over electoral procedures, the vulnerability of electronic records to hacking, and the impact of deregulating campaign spending, compounding the lack of professional standards of electoral management. All of these things people have rightly been complaining about for years. It would be good to get some recognition of them. > Section 4 considers pragmatic reforms designed to strengthen U.S. electoral laws and procedures, recommending expanding secure and convenient registration and balloting facilities, [...] and strengthening impartial dispute resolution mechanisms. .. but here we hit the problem: too many Americans no longer really believe in "impartiality". This is the guiding theme of the Trump campaign, that anyone who disagrees with them is a lying partisan. Not to mention that the Republican party have spent years working against "convenient registration", instead preferring partisan disenfranchisement through voter ID and similar measures.

3princip 10y ago
As a European I don't understand how requiring an ID to vote is disenfranchising voters? It just stinks of voter fraud, and in light of the latest Project Veritas videos I can only conclude that the establishment parties and democrats in this case are engaged in massive electoral fraud and fight these initiatives not on principle but to maintain mechanisms by which they can influence the result. It's just weird, especially since the US has been very vocal in judging others with regards to their electoral processes. Pot calling the kettle black it seems.
- evgen 10y ago
  If you believe the project veritas videos you should look harder at the source and his history of creating misleading videos. The problem is that in the US it is quite possible to get along just fine without a government-issued ID; mandating such ID can be considered a barrier to voting since it is actually inconvenient to get such an ID in the first place. Your assumption that there is massive electoral fraud in the US is simply incorrect and in fact there is far more voter fraud across Europe than there is in the US. Most voting in the US occurs in-person, and in such cases voter fraud is incredibly rare (as in less than 100 known cases over billions of ballots cast.)

MichaelApproved 10y ago

Maine has "Ranked Choice Voting Initiative" (Question 5) on the ballot this election. If their citizens vote for it, they'll be able to cast first, second and third choice ballots. In theory, that should prevent the 3rd party spoiler effect from happening while allowing them to vote their conscious. In the last two election cycles, they split the "left" vote and allowed a far right governor to get elected. With Ranked Choice, you get to pick your first choice. If that person didn't get enough votes, your second choice will have your vote instead. I think they're the first one in the country to do this. I hope they enact this and we can watch the States truly be laboratories for election improvements.

sickbeard 10y ago
Ranked choice voting is not good enough, it has far too many flaws like not amounting to majority rule. In fact it only encourages fringe candidates who have more to gain and end up getting disproportionately represented in when voting ends
- matthewmacleod 10y ago
  This system is used for many elections globally, and my understanding is that it's widely considered to be quite fair. I'm struggling to understand your specific objections.
  - mojuba 10y ago
    I think the problem (at least theoretically) is that second-choice votes are not weighted. It could've been e.g. 1 for first choice, 0.5 for second and so on. Because obviously your second choice candidate is not as good to you as the first one, but some not-so-good candidates can get more votes. In fact I can even see some potential patterns for manipulation here.
    - matthewmacleod 10y ago
      That isn't a problem; the impact of your vote is inherent in the ranking, so lower preferences are automatically "worth less" than higher ones. I don't see a particular pattern that would allow for manipulation. AFAIK it's fairly resistant to tactical voting and manipulation by withdrawal.

zzzeek 10y ago

was hoping to see some mention of the "third party problem", that is, voters can't express their preference for a so-called "alternate" candidate without taking votes away from their second preferred choice. IMO allowing some form of ranked voting, while this is completely politically untenable in the near future, should at least be part of the discussion. Because it also clarifies how without such a system (given the electoral college system in place as well, which I think is a good thing), voting for an "alternate" candidate really does help the opponent of your second choice.

Dowwie 10y ago
Hey Zzzeek! Ranked choice is on the ballot for Maine voters next month. Maybe more states will adopt it in the future..

phkahler 10y ago

For all offices except the president, I believe all public advertising/campaigning should be restricted to people who reside in the state. No PACs, no national parties, no outside financing. The candidates are supposed to represent the people of their state, to take money or other influence from anyone else is inappropriate. I suppose this could be implemented at the state level.

Hermel 10y ago

I find the American rule of having one representative per district flawed, as it gives an unfair advantage to large parties. In the Swiss system, I can cast 20 votes if my state has 20 representatives. This allows a party who get 5% of the votes to win a seat. Also, voters are free to vote across party lines as they like, but one can vote at most twice for the same candidate. That allows to influence the ranking of candidates within parties, which is for example not possible in Germany, where the voters can only choose between pre-arranged lists provided by the parties. The Swiss voting system allows for much more elaborate voting strategies than any other. I, for example, usually start with the list of my preferred party and then remove all lawyers and career politicians, because I think they are over-represented. I wonder why there aren't many countries that copy the Swiss system of electing the parliament. Maybe because it gives more power to the voters than typical politicians feel comfortable with?

losteverything 10y ago

Ok. I read the entire pdf. My take. Academia affords one to spend a lifetime on an issue. Author had '99 citing. If your thing is elections then you have to write about this. Only a revolt by the people will change the election process significantly - or Lawmakers vote ++ if they think they will get more votes/representation. I do not believe this report or 100 others will impact elected officials. Sure, having a leading university will get quotes but not action. I do not believe our system is in peril. I do not believe our system needs to be fixed. I do not believe this election is rigged. I trust the outcome. I do hope there are more "normal" people in the political pipeline in future years so our choices can be better. Life has so many choices. The choice to vote for president is only one.

snarf21 10y ago
I agree with your one comment. Only true revolt will cause a change. People don't really care in the end. As long as they have an iPhone and Netflix and a 50" Samsung, who really cares? Everyone complains a little but there is no real movement. As bad as things are (and could get), the fact is that they are objectively pretty freaking great.