There are n! possible results of ranking n candidates. On YOUR ballot, when you make your first selection out of 15 candidates, your second selection out of 14, etc, you are making 15 choices when ranking 15 candidates. Actually you are making 14 choices, unless you include the choice to include the last option at all. You cant make a 16th choice, because there are no options left to choose.
If you only rank 3 of the 15 candidates, there are still thousands of possible results. But you are only making 4 choices - the 3 names you list, and the choice to not rank a 4th.
onenote defines a “choice” as a choice between each pair of cadidates that must be repeated for each possible pair. You are defining a “choice” as a choice between each set of candidates that must be repeated for each remaining set. The best sorting algorithm is actually O(n*log(n)), which is less than n for n < 10, and always less than n!. The human brain is not a binary computer, but it too can sort a list much more efficiently than n!.
So Trump is forcing in a yes man who will run the Fed however Trump wants. Queue the outrage. Except, this quote is answering a question about him moving jobs from the Treasury to the Federal Reserve.
JPMorgan Chase & Co. Chief Executive Officer Jamie Dimon said the Democratic Party went too far in its focus on diversity, equity and inclusion, prioritizing ideology over practical solutions.
“I have a lot of friends who are Democrats, and they’re idiots,” Dimon said Thursday at a foreign-ministry event in Dublin. “I always say they have big hearts and little brains. They do not understand how the real world works. Almost every single policy rolled out failed.”
Gerrymandering in vogue, especially dramaful in TX where the Democrats again fled the state to avoid a quorum for a vote they would otherwise lose. The irony of holing up in democratic stronghold IL and holding press conferences against gerrymandering was not lost on many observers.
The move to flee the state is part of a tactic to block a vote in the Texas House on redistricting. The proposal by Republicans would create five more Republican-leaning seats in the US House of Representatives, where the party holds a slim majority.
At least two-thirds of the 150-member state legislative body in Texas must be present to proceed with the vote. The quorum is unreachable while they are out of the state.
Meaning what, exactly? I don’t think you can draw any conclusions from these images. For the left image county results don’t matter, because counties have different population numbers. Election districts are supposed to be more representative, i.e. they have approximately the same number of people. Also just because it looks funny doesn’t mean it’s not fair.
There are other numbers on that wikipedia article that might imply Democratic gerrymandering, such as popular vote vs house seats. But even those numbers aren’t that meaningful. I.e., if you have a 51% majority in every single district, then popular vote would be 51/49, but one party would get 100% of the representatives.
The actual reason, assuming it is true, is described here:
Substitute the “Democrats” with “Republicans,” and the Illinois with Texas and you get the same result. That’s where the hypocrisy (and in my case sadness) originates. I’m an independent so I see these legalized abuses with concern, having witnessed legalized abuse/corruption when I was growing up in the old country.
Right. I was just trying to point out that the graphic you posted is not useful .
There’s a way to fix it (proportional representation), but this type of corruption is so ingrained here that it would probably take a revolution to fix. Or a wider adoption of RCV to break the duopoly and allow other parties to take control and fix it.
But you can’t have good things, because this same corruption makes lemmings believe that RCV is bad.
Alaska Democrats are plotting to use their RCV system to elect their candidate for governor with a minority vote.
It’s something of an understatement to note that ranked-choice voting (RCV) has been a bad idea for Alaska. A repeal of that harebrained voting scheme narrowly failed in Alaska’s 2024 election, by fewer than 500 votes, after being outspent ten-to-one by money mostly from Outside. We’re trying again in 2026, and here’s hoping Alaska’s voters have a sudden rush of brains to the head and deep-six this bad idea.
But if Alaska Democrats get behind a Peltola candidacy, it could place her as the only Democrat on the final ranked-choice ballet. That’s what happened to our Congressional election in 2022, when Mrs. Peltola pulled out a win against her two Republican opponents, Nick Begich III (who went on to defeat Mrs. Peltola in 2024) and former Governor Sarah Palin. We may well see a repeat of that fiasco, as there are already several Alaska Republicans lined up to take a shot.
That is simply nonsense and only demonstrates no understanding of RCV. It’s been explained here over and over, I’m not going to rehash it yet again.
From the linked article:
One well-funded candidate, with their party and its fundraising apparatus behind them, could win an election with considerably less than majority support,
No, that is how traditional elections work. In RCV, a candidate must get the support of a majority of voters.
NYT and at least some of the democrats are really losing it. If they can’t win, they want a coup, or at least overthrow democracy so they can be in charge. Links to their articles below.
More buyer’s remorse from Alaska. This from the governor.
In recent years, we’ve seen several changes to our state’s election system, including the adoption of ranked-choice voting (RCV) following the passage of Ballot Measure 2 in 2020. I want to speak plainly with you today about where I stand on this issue and why I believe Alaska should return to the traditional method of voting that served our state well for decades.
Let me start by acknowledging a simple fact: I have been elected governor under both systems. I won under the traditional voting method in 2018 and again under ranked-choice voting in 2022. So, my position on this issue is not about political gain or loss. It is about trust, clarity, and confidence in our electoral process.
Ranked-choice voting was pitched as a reform to solve a problem that, frankly, didn’t exist in Alaska. We were told it would reduce partisanship, promote consensus candidates, and make elections more fair. In reality, what we got was a system that confused voters, made outcomes less transparent, and created deep concerns about how votes are tabulated and who ultimately decides an election.
The article author writes:
I’ve seen this confusion for myself. In 2022, when the RCV system was in place, in our local polling place, I witnessed several people, most but not all older folks, claiming “I’m not ranking anything, I’m just voting once for (candidate) and that’s it.” It was sad and disillusioning, but it’s a fact. Also in 2022, because of this ill-advised system, it was weeks before we knew the outcome of the election. Alaska, in 2022, mind, had a little over 267,000 voters casting ballots. By way of contrast, Florida, with over eight million voters, knew its results much more quickly,
It’s easy to simply declare this to be a problem, but how about someone try explaining why it is a problem? A traditional system forces this to happen, so how does a traditional system solve this problem? In RCV if a voter doesnt want to have a second choice, that is their prerogative. You chose to support the candidates you want to support.
And the timeframe to get results? That isnt a function of RCV, that’s a function in someone making it way more difficult than it needs to be. And probably a bit because election officials are often patronage positions where competency isnt the primary qualification. Especially with computerized voting, RCV results should be available that night soon after polls close. And lest we forget Florida’s delayed Presidential election results a couple decades ago, that nearly delayed the inauguration? Delayed results can happen with any system.
It gets tiresome to see these claims that RCV is bad simply because it is bad. No one can actually explain why it’s bad, besides the fact they dont like it.
You completely ignore the cogent and intelligent arguments presented in the article.
Ranked-choice voting was pitched as a reform to solve a problem that, frankly, didn’t exist in Alaska. We were told it would reduce partisanship, promote consensus candidates, and make elections more fair. In reality, what we got was a system that confused voters, made outcomes less transparent, and created deep concerns about how votes are tabulated and who ultimately decides an election.
The problems with the remaining RCV systems in leftist areas are leading to their repeal.
That isnt cogent or intelligent, none of that is even tangible.
How does it confuse voters? Put your first choice first. Put your second choice second. There is nothing confusing about it, except the claims it is confusing in an attempt to justify not liking it.
There’s zero effect on transparancy.
The only concerns about how votes are tabulated are manufactured by people who dont like it and haven’t bothered to understand the very straightforward process.
The voters decide the election, like any other election.
The only problems with RCV are being created by opponents to intentionally sabatoge it.
On Democrat polling woes. It’s their policies and the far left nut jobs branding the whole party with their unpopular policies.
This is the fundamental problem for Democrats, not GOP gerrymandering. Because structural trends, including but not limited to ongoing redistricting, have made Democratic politicians ever more insulated from the median voter, the more radical forces in the party now hold the whip hand. They are determined to prevent the Democrats from pursuing an effective reform course that could make the party dominant once again. And, by and large, they are succeeding.
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