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> Instead, Nevada would have a nonpartisan primary, from which the top five candidates of any party would emerge to the general election. How useful is this? M

> Instead, Nevada would have a nonpartisan primary, from which the top five candidates of any party would emerge to the general election. How useful is this? My understanding in that in a fair number of elections there is no challenger to the incumbent party, or the challenge is token at best. That is the two parties have implied territories, sans a handful of areas that are up for grabs "battlegrounds". With traditional voting or with ranked voting, I'd like to see "None of the above" be provided as a candidate. The People should be provided a means to express that feeling if that's the case. Let be honest, low voter turnout is often a function of the products being offered. "Not of the above" provides important feedback that's currently lost.

landemva 4y ago
"None of the above" is already available by leaving blank that race. You can submit a ballot without marking any races.
- chiefalchemist 4y ago
  "Null" is not tracked. Also, it cannot be assumed to be intentional. It's the lack of a vote. NotA is a decision and actively communicates dissatisfaction with the choices offered. You can't show up, leave everyhing blank, and presume that void will be heard.
  - dane-pgp 4y ago
    Spoilt / informal ballots are counted in elections in many jurisdictions, with the number of such votes reported in the final results table. This means that there is at least an upper-bound known for the number of people who scribbled "none of the above" across their ballot. If the NotA campaign were more organized, and supporters of it were more motivated, then they could probably get the number of spoilt / informal ballots well above the margin of victory in multiple districts, which would be an effective way of bringing the legitimacy of the candidate's win into question, and pressuring politicians to make NotA an actual option on ballots. Once that goal was achieved, though, and NotA still got less than 5% of the vote, I think it would be very hard to convince the public that the winner was somehow hiding their true unpopularity by "forcing" voters to vote for someone they didn't like (and that the winner was disingenuously claiming that low turnout meant that the abstaining voters were confident they would be happy with the outcome).

landemva 4y ago

"None of the above" is already available by leaving blank that race. You can submit a ballot without marking any races.

chiefalchemist 4y ago
"Null" is not tracked. Also, it cannot be assumed to be intentional. It's the lack of a vote. NotA is a decision and actively communicates dissatisfaction with the choices offered. You can't show up, leave everyhing blank, and presume that void will be heard.
- dane-pgp 4y ago
  Spoilt / informal ballots are counted in elections in many jurisdictions, with the number of such votes reported in the final results table. This means that there is at least an upper-bound known for the number of people who scribbled "none of the above" across their ballot. If the NotA campaign were more organized, and supporters of it were more motivated, then they could probably get the number of spoilt / informal ballots well above the margin of victory in multiple districts, which would be an effective way of bringing the legitimacy of the candidate's win into question, and pressuring politicians to make NotA an actual option on ballots. Once that goal was achieved, though, and NotA still got less than 5% of the vote, I think it would be very hard to convince the public that the winner was somehow hiding their true unpopularity by "forcing" voters to vote for someone they didn't like (and that the winner was disingenuously claiming that low turnout meant that the abstaining voters were confident they would be happy with the outcome).