You keep asking about how anyone could be against it! So I’m trying to explain.
Can you just accept that there are valid criticisms of the ranked choice system, even if you really dont understand what those criticisms are?
Central / liberal criticism of Biden
This is how you re-elect Trump: keep pandering to the far left, suck up to wealthy college grads [student debt giveaways], allow millions of fraudulent “asylum-seekers” to enter the country, insist that men are women, discriminate against whites and Asians and men, while constantly appearing as merely reacting to events rather than creating new political realities. Biden is losing this election, deservedly. And if he cannot pull off an almighty pivot — and I suspect at this point, he really can’t — this election really is Trump’s to lose.
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If you insist that your examples are factually valid, then I accept that I don’t understand how they’re valid. I just wanted to know what they are.
Andrew Sullivan considers himself a conservative. I’d say he’s a moderate conservative, not a liberal. And he has been promoting these viewpoints for quite some time. I tend to agree with these points.
Thanks for the clarification. I guess I missed where he talked about how he thought about himself politically. I’ve read his commentary for a while, it seems like he is both against Trump, and in favor of more traditionally liberal ideas (such as free-speech and so forth, things at odds with the current progressive wing of the Democratic Party), which is why I though of him that way.
If the Voter does not make a choice then he risks not having a say who wins the final result. I think this leads to different voting patterns than in a normal election where you get one choice. So he is forced to make the rank choices. Maybe Boudin would have won in the first round, but we will never know since, in my opinion, the voter’s thought process is distorted by the complexity of the rank choice system
They did have a say – their vote went to a candidate who lost.
The complexity of the rank choice system is identical to the complexity of deciding whether to vote for a sure loser in a three-way race or select the lesser of the two evils amongst the two candidates that actually have a chance of winning. In the upcoming election, for example, those who really want to support RFK have to decide whether it is worth throwing away their vote on someone who definitely will not win, or compromise and pick between Biden and Trump instead. In the current system RFK has zero chance, but in RCV/IRV he actually does, and IMO that is a more fair way to decide elections.
I do not think it is fair to have a voting system that is so complex that it gives unintended results. The two party system has served us well.
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This may explain RFK’s odd behavior
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It’s no more complex than ordering at a fast food restaurant – you look at the menu and decide what you want and in what order. Also it does not give unintended results. Do you understand how it works? I provided an example earlier – please follow it and show me what in it is unintended.
Maybe up until about 20 years ago. Now it’s a shit show.
I’ve never been to any restaurant where I had to plan out my order like “I want a burger, unless you’re out then I’ll have the chicken, unless that’s also gone then I’ll try the pizza, but if you dont have that either I’ll try the fish.” I pick what I want, and if they dont have it they tell me before I think about it any further.
The unintended results - which I agree isnt really unintended, it’s the purpose of using this system - is that the person receiving the most votes may not win. It’s giving voters multiple votes for the purpose of preventing certain candidates from winning. Or at minimum giving voters the equivalent of letting them change their mind but only after seeing who won in the initial results. “Oh no, I voted for Biden and you voted for RFKJ so Trump won, we need to go back and change our votes so they’re for the same person so that person can beat Trump instead.” That’s essentially what happens in a ranked choice election, without making the voters actually have that conversation.
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This is because our elections require a majority win, not a plurality. If only a plurality was required to win, then you’d be correct.
Since a majority is required, then this system is not the equivalent of letting voters change their mind after seeing who won, it’s more like letting them change their mind after seeing who lost. Except it’s neither letting them change their mind, nor doing so after the votes are counted – it’s letting them make up their mind before the votes are counted. And only if they want to.
Never? Are you being entirely honest? I admit it’s not a regular experience, but I have been to plenty of restaurants that run out of some popular dishes early. Sometimes the menu doesn’t fully describe the dish and I have questions about it, and I’ll decide whether I want it or not based on the answers. So I usually come up with a backup so I don’t have to send the server away to come back after I re-examine the whole menu.
I know the electoral college skews this since technically those are the votes that count, but when is the last time a Presidential election had a majority winner? Only certain states require a majority to win, in most it’s whoever gets the most votes.
Regardless, in such elections when a majority is not received, there is a new runoff election that starts with a clean slate. Not a recount that allows only certain voters to change their votes.
I’m not trying to argue with you. I’m giving you the alternate perspective. You can disagree with it all you want, it doesnt change the fact that it is the alternate perspective. What you say to justify dismissing it is no different than what they say to justify dismissing your perspective.
But no one is casting a vote pending a candidate answering some questions. They’re casting it after the questions have been asked/answered.
“I want this guy. Wait, the vote totals say the evil bad guy might win? Then I want to change my vote to this other guy so he can have more votes instead.” That’s ranked choice voting in a nutshell.
The point was about how complex or simple it is, not about questions or answers.
That’s just not true, glitch. It is more like “I want this guy. Wait, this guy might not win? If he doesn’t win, then I want this other guy to win”. It’s not the same as what you wrote. You don’t know the totals and you don’t know who is going to win or lose in advance.
What you are describing is our current system – the people who would have otherwise liked to vote for RFK are making a very logical choice to vote for the major parties’ leading candidates in the first (and only) round, because they know that RFK can’t possibly win. With RCV, nobody could be certain about RFK’s chances. Whoever wants RFK to win would vote for him as their first choice, but if he loses, they still have a chance to select the winner in their second choice. I bet he’d get a ton of votes, because even though he’s a bit of a nut, he’s more alive than the other two and I think more moderate, which at this point is a good compromise.
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Other than allowing ALL voters to needlessly change their votes, it is exactly the same but less efficient. I say needlessly because the result of the first round should make no difference on the opinion of the voter for the second round. If you voted for someone who didn’t win the majority but also did not come in the last place, it makes no sense for you to change your vote in the second round. If you were certain and correct about who would lose, you would not vote for them in the first place. But you can never know, so the most logical strategy is to rank your candidates in your preferred order.
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I’m not trying to argue either. I’m also not disagreeing with that alternate perspective, I’m showing why it’s wrong. That alternate perspective is opinion that isn’t grounded in fact.
And those with that opinion would disagree with you, that you are only showing why you think it is wrong. There is no right or wrong, it’s all subjective and I can see both sides. Apparently you cannot. It is what it is.