Brief Unauthorized Vote Announcement

[Mike Ossipoff]

The posting to ER of the results of our recommendation vote is
taking more months than I'd expected. The Presidential election
campaign is well into its last month. I'm going to post a briedf,
individual, unauthorized announcement of the result, 48 hours from
now, so that electoral reformers will have some time to talk to
people about it, if they want to, during the Presidential campaign,
and the period of heightened interest that goes with that campaign.

Another condsideration that has led me to do that: It's getting more
difficult to keep our result a secret now that methods are being
discussed on ER, and ER has been told that we've done a vote and
will soon be posting our result. ER knows of the vote. Some people
are wondering whats the result was. How long should it remain secret?

Don said, on ER, that our report was lost somewhere. Wouldn't we
all like the recommendation to be available to ER members?

Steve's report is better than my announcement. Steve's report is
much more complete, detailed, informative. It will probably eventually
be posted, I hope. Maybe before the Presidential election, maybe not.
What's the advantage of my announcement then? I can't post Steve's
report to ER without permission, but I can post my own announcement.

My announcement will make clear that it isn't authorized by ER.

Here's how it will go:

This announcement was written & posted by me, Mike Ossipoff. It
was not written or posted by EM, and its writing or posting was
not discussed in EM, except that I stated, 48 hours in advance, that
I would post it to ER. So this announcement is by & from me, not by
or from EM. Still, the facts in it are accurate.

After much discussion & debate, over a long period, EM voted on what
single-winner method to recommend to ER members, as a good method to
propose to the public, for use in public political single-winner
elections.

The winner was a method known as Smith-Condorcet (it will be defined
later in this brief message). 

But if Smith-Condorcet were removed from the rankings, the winner would
be Condorcet's method, also referred to as plain Condorcet. 
(It will likewise be defined in this message)

The election wasn't close. Smith-Condorcet won very decisively,
and Condorcet's method's 2nd place status was decisive.

A muh more complete & thorough report of the vote result will
soon be posted to ER. After that, a message from EM will soon be
posted here that contains individuals' comments & conclusions about
the methods. This is probably more acceptable to ER members than
a debate on ER about the methods' relative merits.

[Definitions of these 2 methods would be next in my announcement to
ER]

48 hours after the time stated in the "Date:" line of this 
message, I'll post that announcement on ER.


Mike





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