Vote for Change - V for Change

unimportant · Joined: 14 Apr 2008 Posts: 566 Location: Right behind you.

XD our system is so complex, most people choose to ignore the eccentricities and pretend its simple.

I was wondering, does anyone have an opinion on what I believe is called "watershed voting"? It's the format where you place the candidates in a certain order, your top choice being number one, your second choice number two, etc. And then, if your top choice doesn't get picked, that candidate is removed from the running and your vote is counted towards your next highest pick that's still in the running, and so on until a winner is chosen.

It seems somewhat complicated to me, but I do like the theory of it. Any thoughts?
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theBSDude · Posted: Thu Oct 09, 2008 5:12 pm Post subject:

I think that's the basic principle behind primaries.
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devilman2045 · Guest

theBSDude · Posted: Thu Oct 09, 2008 5:22 pm Post subject:

*smirk*

I was one.
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TheBSDude, dubbed 'BS' by Asa and nicknamed 'Thebes.'
Keeper of the Tristam, The Amazing Non-Emo Vampire!(tm) and a Massive List of Webcomics.

"I'm like a ninja with no hopes or dreams." --Wally of Dilbert

devilman2045 · Guest

theBSDude · Posted: Thu Oct 09, 2008 5:36 pm Post subject:

Really not a lot to do with my support for McCain; more about the video itself. I do support McCain, though, due to a number of factors, including family loyalty to nuclear energy. Manhataan Project, ftw!
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...In accordance with the prophesy.

TheBSDude, dubbed 'BS' by Asa and nicknamed 'Thebes.'
Keeper of the Tristam, The Amazing Non-Emo Vampire!(tm) and a Massive List of Webcomics.

"I'm like a ninja with no hopes or dreams." --Wally of Dilbert

devilman2045 · Guest

theBSDude · Posted: Thu Oct 09, 2008 8:00 pm Post subject:

I had to ask too... it's 'For the Win.'
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...In accordance with the prophesy.

TheBSDude, dubbed 'BS' by Asa and nicknamed 'Thebes.'
Keeper of the Tristam, The Amazing Non-Emo Vampire!(tm) and a Massive List of Webcomics.

"I'm like a ninja with no hopes or dreams." --Wally of Dilbert

Nem · Joined: 14 Apr 2008 Posts: 2112 Location: England

As I understand it current forms of nuclear energy have about twenty to thirty years worth of fuel left on most production curves, at current use rates.
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Tenshi · Joined: 18 Apr 2008 Posts: 2594 Location: Star Stuff

Ironically, that coincides with the figures I last heard for fossil fuel consumption...
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electricpanda · Joined: 03 Sep 2008 Posts: 608 Location: Smelbourne

Tamir · Joined: 22 Mar 2008 Posts: 1628 Location: Israel

We've got a multiparty system, where again, the Knesset is split accordingly by which parties got more votes. There are 120 seats total in the Knesset, and if a party didn't get enough votes for 2 seats, they're not represented. So we have many parties which never seem to get represented, and around 10-15 which do get represented. This ensures that people can vote for what they really want, however we pay for it by a lack of stability in the government. In order to pass laws, different parties have to form coalitions, and often it's hard to get things done.

I kinda like it, though.

devilman2045 · Guest

Tinalles · Posted: Fri Oct 10, 2008 8:10 pm Post subject:

The primary election system doesn't really resemble the system that Fable was asking about. There are several rank-your-choices type systems. The most common is is the Condorcet Method.

It works like this:

1) Potential candidates for a position sign up.

2) Campaign.

3) Voters cast ballots. On the ballots, they vote for EVERY CANDIDATE, by indicating their order of preference. (Top choice, second choice, third choice, etc.)

4) In order to win, you have to have a clear majority of votes -- that is, you MUST have 50% or more of the vote. The vote counters go through and tally up the FIRST CHOICE votes only. Suppose you have a three person race, with candidates Alice, Bob, and Charlene, and the FIRST CHOICE breaks down like this:

Alice: 40%
Bob: 40%
Charlene: 20%

No candidate has a total of 50% or more. But Charlene has the least number of votes. Therefore Charlene is eliminated from the running, and they count the ballots again. This time, on any ballot that indicated Charlene as their FIRST choice, they count the SECOND CHOICE vote instead. The new totals break down like this:

Alice: 60%
Bob: 40%;

Alice is now the winner. She is the candidate who is MOST acceptable to the largest number of people. You repeat that process (throwing out the least popular candidate) until somebody has a majority.

There are variations, of course, and provisions for tie breakers (if you got a case where it's 50/50 dead split).

The basic idea is to make it possible for people to vote for third party candidates without wasting their vote. Under our current system, a vote for a third party candidate is frequently beneficial to the voter's political opponents. Scenario: suppose I'm a conservative libertarian type, and that I like Ron Paul, am so-so on John McCain, and hate Obama's guts. Ron Paul doesn't really stand a chance. If I vote for Ron Paul, that's a vote that John McCain isn't getting, and so it winds up benefiting Obama, the candidate I like least. And exactly the same thing happens on the other end of the spectrum, where I can't vote for Cynthia McKinney (the Green Party candidate) without taking a vote away from Obama, in favor of McCain.

Ranking your candidates makes it a lot easier for people to support third-party candidates, because there's no fear that you'll accidentally throw the race to your least favored candidate. Al Gore lost Florida by a few hundred votes. If he'd had thousands upon thousands upon thousands of Nader's votes added to his, he would had been President. And I bet a lot of those Green Party voters from 2000 where really, really sorry they went with the third party candidate once GW Bush won.
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