A friend of mine is doing his phd research on online discussion to solve this exact problem. Digg, HN & other up/down voting sites struggle to express the view

A friend of mine is doing his phd research on online discussion to solve this exact problem. Digg, HN & other up/down voting sites struggle to express the viewpoint of the minority. He is working on algorithms that basically let you vote on one side of an issue. Take for instance a political debate, where Digg and many other community sites lean to the left. Once you have expressed yourself as a "leftist" on a thread, it removes your downvotes from "rightist" comments. This gives the minority a voice, resulting in pluralism as opposed to "winner takes all". An interesting approach to a common problem.