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Ranked choice voting

Should we switch over to alternative voting?

  • Total voters
    24
antiquity said:
Actually we have one citizen one vote system now...however that one vote counts for the electoral college and not the candidate. Its a simple system that keeps the larger voting block in the larger populated states from keeping the voice of the rest of the country mute. There is no way to change that except thru a change in the Constitution and that ain't going to happen because even if it got thru congress there is no way 2/3 of the states would agree to allow a few states to determine the elections.
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In practice, ranked voting would probably be the best way to make the electoral college irrelevant without a constitutional amendment.
 
IRV sounds right to me!

I support increased discussion on the topic, along with radical campaign finance reform.
 
Captain Adverse said:
Hmm...No.

One citizen, one vote.

I'd never want even the slightest possibility that my vote could be used to elect someone I didn't want to see in office.

What's more, I wouldn't want to increase that "greater evil" someone's chances of getting elected as the result of being a (edited for clarity: "OTHER voter's") second or third choice.

I prefer to pick the one I find the best choice out of the possible candidates, especially if the choice must be the lesser of two evils.

If my vote doesn't go to my first choice, then that's all she wrote.
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Let's say you voted for a republican. The republican gets less votes than the democrat and thanks to RTV, he also gets less votes than the libertarian candidate and is eliminated but their votes together outweigh the democrat's. Most republicans prefer libertarians to democrats so the libertarian would win. Under STV, you win by having stances closest to most voters, not by being better than the other guy.
 
Crovax said:
I'd have to see the way they do it but yeah, also I'm not sure that it would make any difference in the outcomes as its still a FPTP winner. In fact it could hurt 3rd parties since they have no chance to tip the scales of elections they aren't afforded any concessions (not that they have many now)
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more people would likely vote 3rd party because it won't be wasting your vote. The spoiler effect would go away but the green and libertarian parties would be a lot stronger than under fptp.
 
Moderate Right said:
I think it would be too confusing to the average voter and would decrease turnout. I would keep the current system but pre-election polling would be outlawed, straight party voting would be outlawed, and I would have voting places open across the country in virtual times.
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it's as simple as ranking the candidates from best to worst. Below is how I picture voters from these areas voting had 2016 used AV

average Utah voter:

1. Evan McMullin

2. Donald Trump

3. Gary Johnson

4. Hillary Clinton *

5. Jill Stein *

*4 and 5 might be switched or be completely absent

average California voter:

1. Jill Stein

2. Hillary Clinton

3. Gary Johnson

4. Donald Trump

Rust belt voter:

1. Donald Trump

2. Hillary CLinton

3. Gary Johnson

4. Jill Stein

Alaskan voter

1. Gary Johnson

2. Donald Trump

3. Hillary Clinton

4. Jill Stein

My vote:

1. Jill Stein

2. Gary Johnson

3. Hillary Clinton

4. Donald Trump
 
Masterhawk said:
more people would likely vote 3rd party because it won't be wasting your vote. The spoiler effect would go away but the green and libertarian parties would be a lot stronger than under fptp.
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Stronger in numbers but have no voice in policy whatsoever, doesn't seem like a very good trade off for those who would be into those parties
 
the system described in the OP would help third parties, and would lessen the effects of gerrymandering. that's a good thing. however, my preference is to eliminate gerrymandering nationwide first, and then address the system, with the goal being proportional representation and for candidates to have to compete for votes more than they have to now. in that case, the setup described in the video would probably accomplish this goal.
 
I am completely in favor of this kind of voting.
 
Masterhawk said:
Let's say you voted for a republican. The republican gets less votes than the democrat and thanks to RTV, he also gets less votes than the libertarian candidate and is eliminated but their votes together outweigh the democrat's. Most republicans prefer libertarians to democrats so the libertarian would win. Under STV, you win by having stances closest to most voters, not by being better than the other guy.
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Fantasy, at least in our current political clime.

As it stands now the two major parties will always get more votes than any third party candidate in a Presidential election. It will be one after another of the third party candidates who will be eliminated, and their second or third votes will eventually go towards either the Republican or Democratic candidate.

Take this current election. (Ignoring the tiny fraction that voted for small third-party candidates as they would be eliminated quickly and their votes passed up among the top four) Jill Stein got the least votes of any of the top four contenders. It is more likely than not anyone who voted Green would pick the Democratic candidate over the Republican in this race. Thus most of HER votes would be added to Hillary. Trump and Hillary would still be contenders.

The next to fall would be Gary Johnson, and his votes would be split between Hillary (RINO's and left-Libertarians who don't want Trump) and Right-Libertarians who don't want Hillary.

With Hillary's 2 million popular vote lead from those two power-Blue States of New York and California, guess who would win?

Sorry, I'm not going to play any game that could allow such a thing to happen. :no:

The system we have is perfectly fine. :coffeepap:
 
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Captain Adverse said:
Fantasy, at least in our current political clime.

The two major parties will always get more votes than any third party candidate. It will be one after another of the third party candidates who will be eliminated, and their second or third votes will eventually go towards either the Republican or Democratic candidate.

Take this current election. (Ignoring the tiny fraction that voted for small third-party candidates as they would be eliminated quickly and their votes passed up among the top four) Jill Stein got the least votes of any of the top four contenders. It is more likely than not anyone who voted Green would pick the Democratic candidate over the Republican in this race. Thus most of HER votes would be added to Hillary. Trump and Hillary would still be contenders.

The next to fall would be Gary Johnson, and his votes would be split between Hillary (RINO's and left-Libertarians who don't want Trump) and Right-Libertarians who don't want Hillary.

With Hillary's 2 million popular vote lead from those two power-Blue States of New York and California, guess who would win?

Sorry, I'm not going to play any game that could allow such a thing to happen. :no:

The system we have is perfectly fine. :coffeepap:
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Honestly I don't think it would swing this election. I'd have to think most of Johnson's votes that get distributed would go to Trump, not a huge majority, but most of them. Meanwhile most of Stein's supporters seemed to be in the NeverHillary camp anyway. The type who wouldn't vote for her, even as a second choice. She got a lower percentage than her national vote in Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and Michigan which are the states that Hillary would need to flip anyway. I doubt the result changes.

I think that's beside the point anyway. I don't think she would have but if Hillary would have won a two way race with Trump, Johnson, and Stein then she deserves to be President. Our system occasionally lets candidates win who would have almost definitely lost in a two way race to every other candidate. (LePage and McCaullife offhand that I can think of, and even more in primaries.) A system that allows that is broken.
 
Captain Adverse said:
Fantasy, at least in our current political clime.

As it stands now the two major parties will always get more votes than any third party candidate in a Presidential election. It will be one after another of the third party candidates who will be eliminated, and their second or third votes will eventually go towards either the Republican or Democratic candidate.

Take this current election. (Ignoring the tiny fraction that voted for small third-party candidates as they would be eliminated quickly and their votes passed up among the top four) Jill Stein got the least votes of any of the top four contenders. It is more likely than not anyone who voted Green would pick the Democratic candidate over the Republican in this race. Thus most of HER votes would be added to Hillary. Trump and Hillary would still be contenders.

The next to fall would be Gary Johnson, and his votes would be split between Hillary (RINO's and left-Libertarians who don't want Trump) and Right-Libertarians who don't want Hillary.

With Hillary's 2 million popular vote lead from those two power-Blue States of New York and California, guess who would win?

Sorry, I'm not going to play any game that could allow such a thing to happen. :no:

The system we have is perfectly fine. :coffeepap:
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Another fantasy might be if a third party candidate polls at 10% or higher then whichever candidate gets the most electoral votes over 190 wins the election.
 
Crovax said:
Stronger in numbers but have no voice in policy whatsoever, doesn't seem like a very good trade off for those who would be into those parties
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You're forgetting that the same system would be in place for congressional elections. You would see quite a few seats going to third, fourth, and fifth parties.
 
Masterhawk said:
Ranked choice voting is when a voter ranks each candidate from favorite to least favorite. Our current first past the post system is such more simple, only being one check. FPTP simply gives the person with the most votes victory. The main problem is when people are forced to chose between the "lesser of two evils" and don't vote for their favorite candidate because they want to keep their least favorite candidate out of office. A single transferable vote (alternative voting) first removes the candidate with the least first votes then redistributes those votes based on their choices. This process continues until someone comes out with a majority. In cases where more than one person fills in the spot, candidates which went over an amount of votes have them redistributed based on their choices.

This video explains it better:

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I think each person should get a one vote for every acre owned. People that own half an acre gets half of a vote. That makes as much sense as this method of voting. The average citizen already has problems voting. This would make it much harder for the idiots that can't even find the DMV to get an ID.
 
NonoBadDog said:
I think each person should get a one vote for every acre owned. People that own half an acre gets half of a vote. That makes as much sense as this method of voting. The average citizen already has problems voting. This would make it much harder for the idiots that can't even find the DMV to get an ID.
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Australia can manage it. It stands to reason that the US can.
 
DifferentDrummr said:
You're forgetting that the same system would be in place for congressional elections. You would see quite a few seats going to third, fourth, and fifth parties.
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I don't think you would see any. You might see some 3rd parties finish in 2nd place but none would win. If they had the support to win they could already win now.
 
Captain Adverse said:
Fantasy, at least in our current political clime.

As it stands now the two major parties will always get more votes than any third party candidate in a Presidential election. It will be one after another of the third party candidates who will be eliminated, and their second or third votes will eventually go towards either the Republican or Democratic candidate.

Take this current election. (Ignoring the tiny fraction that voted for small third-party candidates as they would be eliminated quickly and their votes passed up among the top four) Jill Stein got the least votes of any of the top four contenders. It is more likely than not anyone who voted Green would pick the Democratic candidate over the Republican in this race. Thus most of HER votes would be added to Hillary. Trump and Hillary would still be contenders.

The next to fall would be Gary Johnson, and his votes would be split between Hillary (RINO's and left-Libertarians who don't want Trump) and Right-Libertarians who don't want Hillary.

With Hillary's 2 million popular vote lead from those two power-Blue States of New York and California, guess who would win?

Sorry, I'm not going to play any game that could allow such a thing to happen. :no:

The system we have is perfectly fine. :coffeepap:
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I simply listed a possibility. Probably a more likely one is that the republican and libertarian together get more votes than the democrat but the democrat gets the most first votes. The libertarian is eliminated and the republican wins.
 
Crovax said:
I don't think you would see any. You might see some 3rd parties finish in 2nd place but none would win. If they had the support to win they could already win now.
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You're forgetting that the system itself will convince many voters that third parties now have a decent shot. And then there's the additional donations those parties would get.
 
DifferentDrummr said:
You're forgetting that the system itself will convince many voters that third parties now have a decent shot. And then there's the additional donations those parties would get.
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Considering that it doesn't change thier chances at all, it would only convince morons that they have a "decent" shot
 
DifferentDrummr said:
Plenty of morons think that Trump will bring back manufacturing jobs, too.
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True, but I would think its easier to convince people of something that they want to believe than something they dont or have no interest in
 
Crovax said:
True, but I would think its easier to convince people of something that they want to believe than something they dont or have no interest in
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You didn't hear? People are constantly whining about how sick they are of the two major parties. Why wouldn't they be interested in backing someone else?
 
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