7 ms·

Hey, I'm also from Maine! There's at least two of us here! I voted against the initiative, mostly because as I understand it, it still doesn't necessarily crea

by r_smart 10y ago

Hey, I'm also from Maine! There's at least two of us here! I voted against the initiative, mostly because as I understand it, it still doesn't necessarily create majority candidates and because there's a good chance it's in violation of the state constitution. I don't mind that it passed though.

citizenkeen 10y ago
> it still doesn't necessarily create majority candidates How could it not? Genuinely asking.
- SamBam 10y ago
  Ranked voting could still produce a simple plurality, not a majority, if no candidate is ranked by more than 50% of the population. E.g. in the extreme case, with three candidates, suppose everyone hated the other two options so much that they refused to even write in a #2 choice. Of course, this seems like a completely silly argument, because it's much more likely to generate majorities than the single-choice system.
  - r_smart 10y ago
    People just frequently complain when a candidate didn't get 50% of the popular vote in an election. I think it's silly, but it's common. Many people's argument in favor of this initiative is seeing that 50% number. If it doesn't actually produce that reliably, then it's not solving the problem people want solved. Personally, I don't mind if someone wins with 43% of the popular vote. I don't even mind FPTP much, and yes, I mostly vote third party. But from other people in the state, that 50% number was a concern, and I don't think this addressed that adequately.
    - vishvananda 10y ago
      If you tend to vote third party, You should consider being against FPTP voting, because it almost always leads to a two-party system[1]. [1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duverger%27s_law https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duverger%27s_law
- r_smart 10y ago
  There are some good comments critiquing ranked choice voting from people who seem much more informed / involved than I am. I suggest you just scroll through the comments a bit rather than get it from me (if you can't find them, I'm happy to dig some stuff up).
- jtbayly 10y ago
  Not quite what you're asking, but will feel like it to people, here's a quote from the linked article (quoting somebody else): "One problem of RCV is that especially with lots of candidates, a winner can be chosen with a relatively small number of first-place votes. This was exactly what happened in the city of Oakland, California, in 2010 when Jean Quan, who received only 24 percent of votes in the first round, ended up winning the election because she was the second and third choice of many voters. In Burlington, Vermont, after the leader in the first round did not win an election, RCV was repealed." It might be a technical majority, but when so few people actually preferred the candidate that won, it makes sense that they repealed it. The benefit of the simple plurality is that you've got to actually get people to want you. Not sure what I think about RCV, personally.
  - blackbagboys 10y ago
    I'm not sure why this is a flaw, to be honest - it seems like selecting a candidate who is at least acceptable to the greatest number of people is preferable to picking one who is preferred by a slight majority but possibly highly divisive.
    - r_smart 10y ago
      The heart of the problem is that what people think they're getting probably isn't going to match up with what they actually get. I don't think RCV is really any worse or better than FPTP (well it's probably a little better), but it behaves in a way that is going to offer weird results for people that they didn't expect. That's why it's bad. At the end of the day, no one cares how we decide our leaders so long as their candidate wins. And when their candidate loses, that's when there are suddenly massive flaws in the process.
    - ZeroGravitas 10y ago
      It's not a flaw. In two-party systems there's often a strong pushback on any system that would break the deadlock. Those arguments won't make any sense, but sadly they don't need to in order to convince people.
    - taco_emoji 10y ago
- ClayShentrup 10y ago
  http://scorevoting.net/CoreSupp.html http://scorevoting.net/CoreSupp.html
jaegerpicker 10y ago
at least three of us here!

by r_smart 10y ago

citizenkeen 10y ago

> it still doesn't necessarily create majority candidates How could it not? Genuinely asking.

SamBam 10y ago
Ranked voting could still produce a simple plurality, not a majority, if no candidate is ranked by more than 50% of the population. E.g. in the extreme case, with three candidates, suppose everyone hated the other two options so much that they refused to even write in a #2 choice. Of course, this seems like a completely silly argument, because it's much more likely to generate majorities than the single-choice system.
- r_smart 10y ago
  People just frequently complain when a candidate didn't get 50% of the popular vote in an election. I think it's silly, but it's common. Many people's argument in favor of this initiative is seeing that 50% number. If it doesn't actually produce that reliably, then it's not solving the problem people want solved. Personally, I don't mind if someone wins with 43% of the popular vote. I don't even mind FPTP much, and yes, I mostly vote third party. But from other people in the state, that 50% number was a concern, and I don't think this addressed that adequately.
  - vishvananda 10y ago
    If you tend to vote third party, You should consider being against FPTP voting, because it almost always leads to a two-party system[1]. [1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duverger%27s_law https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duverger%27s_law
r_smart 10y ago
There are some good comments critiquing ranked choice voting from people who seem much more informed / involved than I am. I suggest you just scroll through the comments a bit rather than get it from me (if you can't find them, I'm happy to dig some stuff up).
jtbayly 10y ago
Not quite what you're asking, but will feel like it to people, here's a quote from the linked article (quoting somebody else): "One problem of RCV is that especially with lots of candidates, a winner can be chosen with a relatively small number of first-place votes. This was exactly what happened in the city of Oakland, California, in 2010 when Jean Quan, who received only 24 percent of votes in the first round, ended up winning the election because she was the second and third choice of many voters. In Burlington, Vermont, after the leader in the first round did not win an election, RCV was repealed." It might be a technical majority, but when so few people actually preferred the candidate that won, it makes sense that they repealed it. The benefit of the simple plurality is that you've got to actually get people to want you. Not sure what I think about RCV, personally.
- blackbagboys 10y ago
  I'm not sure why this is a flaw, to be honest - it seems like selecting a candidate who is at least acceptable to the greatest number of people is preferable to picking one who is preferred by a slight majority but possibly highly divisive.
  - r_smart 10y ago
    The heart of the problem is that what people think they're getting probably isn't going to match up with what they actually get. I don't think RCV is really any worse or better than FPTP (well it's probably a little better), but it behaves in a way that is going to offer weird results for people that they didn't expect. That's why it's bad. At the end of the day, no one cares how we decide our leaders so long as their candidate wins. And when their candidate loses, that's when there are suddenly massive flaws in the process.
  - ZeroGravitas 10y ago
    It's not a flaw. In two-party systems there's often a strong pushback on any system that would break the deadlock. Those arguments won't make any sense, but sadly they don't need to in order to convince people.
  - taco_emoji 10y ago
ClayShentrup 10y ago
http://scorevoting.net/CoreSupp.html http://scorevoting.net/CoreSupp.html

jaegerpicker 10y ago

at least three of us here!