CVD wants Alt.V to be fairer but it isn't: misleading website

[Craig Carey]

Mike stated some theory of expediency: dumb[?] people need very
simple methods, so Mike says. This sounds like the beliefs that
publicity relations people have to be practised in. Variable
openness. Why doesn't Mike drop the plan to hide his purposes from
the list for as many years as would be the case and post in the
equations representing his modelling of what is desirable?.

Mike states below that a method should be simple and that he
recommends Condorcet.
So no winners at all is 'fine' -- that simplest method returns no
winners. So Mike has some opposing balancing idea that lead him to
prefer the Approval Vote over the little used method which is the
method that does not find any winner.

It could be an aim for success. But maybe success for Mike is a loss
for the council and another electoral reformer. They can get taken
down without knowing why.


 >As I said, there are places and situations where I'd start out with
 >Approval as the proposal, and there are other places & situations
...

I'd say the list should readjust the 'Defcon' status because there
could be a philosophy that I get to see in public relations officers;
i.e. an assessment of who is asking the questions and a variable
disclosure. The dim lamp and the lesser mushrooms that are subscribed.
They will see more later: it may take many years.

What about a questionaire for all subscribers to see if they like
the principles of a reformed monotonic STV?.



At 00:55 04.10.00 +0000 Wednesday, MIKE OSSIPOFF wrote:



>I'd said:
>
>Using Condorcet doesn't require any math. Anyone can rank their choices.
>
>Demorep wrote:
>
>---
>D- We have gone over this before many times.  Some of the public, media and
>politicians with some brains will want to know exactly what is done with the
>ranked votes (thus producing some instant math confusion).
>
>I reply:
>
>
>And you think that Tideman(m), SSD, and PC are all too complicated?
>We'll never know till we offer them. We could give up in advance,
>and not propose Condorcet anywhere. That's called
>"pre-emptive surrender". The problem isn't that Condorcet is too
>complicated. The problem is that it's one of innumerable ways of
>counting ranked ballots. If we've got the busy little IRVies on the
>job, then we have to convince people why one way of counting
>ranked ballots is better than another. That could be a job, especially
>when we consider IRV's money, big membership, and promotional
>zealotry. Should we, then, give up? Let's find out what happens, first.
>
>As I said, there are places and situations where I'd start out with
>Approval as the proposal, and there are other places & situations where
>I'd offer Condorcet. I do agree, however, that, with the IRVies on
>the job, the best chance of getting a good method adopted is to
>point to the tremendous simplicity advantages of Approval. The fact
>that Approval is nothing other than Plurality done right, while IRV
>is a whole new method. The fact that Approval is instantly implemetable
>at no cost. The fact that it takes one short sentence, a few seconds,
>to describe & propose Approval. And, aside from all that, of course,
>the fact that Approval is incomparably better than IRV in terms of
>criteria, and apparently also in terms of worst-case SU ratio for
>0-info elections.


"I'd start out with Approval ... [it's] instantly implementable ..."
"tremendous simplicity [in some] situations [but not others...]".


Expediency in pursuit of success?. That could lead Mike to ignore about
all that has been written here. What Mike does in private might not be
something that should concern us. However I'll assume the contrary for
this message.

Anybody else want to state that they want to give advice with a motive
of expedient success, i.e. with an aim for success?.



>Demorep continues:
>
>The more ABC, etc,  XYZ criteria that are thrown out as being absolutely
>critical for an election method, the more the public will get confused and
>keep same old rotten plurality.
>
>I reply:
>
>I disagree. Some criteria can't be ignored. True, many don't like
>criteria, but those same people care very much about the LO2E problem,
>and will listen when told that the criteria measure for the LO2E
>standard, and for the majority rule standard.
>
>Demorep continues:
>
>     Many folks are not quite so strategy/
>conspiratorial minded as some folks on this list (especially regarding added
>or removed votes from the ballot boxes).
>
>I reply:
>
>You're very mistaken there. Most folks are not only strategy-conscious,
>but are thoroughly & pitifully cowed & dominated by their perceived
>need to strategize. Most reform folks are very concerned about the

...

>I reply;
>
>KISSies want to give up before we even find out what people will
>accept. That's what I referred to above as "pre-emptive surrender".
>
>It's for simplicity that, when I propose Condorcet, I propose it
>without any of the enhancements that would further improve it. I
>propose it in its simple unenhanced form, to keep the proposal simple.

Really?.

A poll in a prison ward could lead to a finding that it is not good
enough to have a single election that fails to find a winner.

How do they reply to you once you say that Mike?. Please regard this
question the one I am most interested in, of all in this message.


>Anyway, you want to complicate rank-balloting methods by adding
>Y/N to the ballot. That doesn't just complicate the proposal and the
>ballot. It tremendously complicates the voting strategy too.

...
...

I reply:

>Maybe CVD would do fine with Stalin or Hitler, because CVD is as
>antidemocratic in its internal governance as it is in its

So what if they are anti-democratic?. They promote a single method,
rather than represent a diverse community. It might be a problem for
people inside but there is no sympathy for those few.


>sleazy tactics in LWV. The Center for Voting & Democracy couldn't

You mean expedient?, or money seeking?.

>be any more antidemocratic than it is. I hope you'll help publicize

You could try to say that they do not collect data or do not consider
it very reasonably, or whatever.


>that, along with IRV's failures, to the people to whom CVD is
>promoting its nonreform.
>
>Demorep continues:
>
>That is, CVD should only be pushing p.r. at the moment.
>
>I reply:
>
>That's for sure. I wish you could convice them to get out of the
>way, and stay out of single-winner reform, instead of aggressively
>promoting something that no one but them likes.
>
>Mike Ossipoff

If there is enough electoral data and a suitable computer program then
they can be attacked over non-monotonicity failures. Candidates that
lost might welcome software that could tell them that they should have
won. There may not be an interest in that. The data might be hard to
get.


I object: suppose a union of TV wrestlers and fridge removal experts
were lectured at by you on why dumb methods are best.



(1)

 >the best chance of getting a good method adopted is to point to the
 >tremendous simplicity advantages of Approval.

I don't believe you have any idea of the chance of getting a method
through. The lists has seem claims to know about probabilities before.
This is a bit different.



(2)

 >It's for simplicity that, when I propose Condorcet, I propose it
 >without any of the enhancements that would further improve it. I
 >propose it in its simple unenhanced form, to keep the proposal simple.

This implies you have not had any success anywhere, or perhaps you mean
that the recipients of the idea loves to receive you undefined ideas
and then correct the definitions. So everybody you contact has that
everpresent capacity for having inflicted onto them, incomplete
definitions. We know something the councillors may not: to send to
you arguments like a convoy of tree carrying trucks won't lead to any
sensitive admission that an incomplete definition from you is
actually repairable since incomplete. I personally suspect that the
fact that we and the councillors may be offended in the same way,
implies that whatever the purpose for this is, is has nothing to do
with opposing IRV-ies or effecting external reform in public organs.
I really don't want to inquire into that, and it may be the same with
the list. The page of definitions still has instantly detectable
blunders on it, but bits got deleted.


(3)

 >As I said, there are places and situations where I'd start out with
 >Approval as the proposal,

Using what data Mike?.


(4)

 >That could be a job, especially when we consider IRV's money, big
 >membership, and promotional zealotry. Should we, then, give up?

If we have fair city officials subscribed, perhaps they could tell
us what is wrong with the Approval Vote?. Is it true that its main
selling advantage is that it can be comprehended easily?. Any maths?.

Discussion of the Approval Vote, and all advocacy of it, is outside
of the topic of preferential voting, since (to the extent that) the
Approval Vote hasn't got numbers indicating preferences on the
papers.

I request that discussion of the Approval Vote be strictly banned
on the grounds that its advocacy is like smoking cigarettes.

Standards could be higher if subscribers imagined that they were
trying to remove STV rather than trying to replace FPTP.

If the Approval Vote is to replace STV, it seems to have transfer
values that are much larger than 1. We can calculate these imagined
transfer values. Once the council uses STV, proven it is not too
complex, it looks like Mike can't get it removed by a method of
recommending the Approval Vote. People that know STV do not like
transfer values greater than 1. It is more obvious how unlikable
the Approval Vote is when the election is a 1 winner election
(or the number of votes can exceed the number of seats). I don't
recall Mike Ossipoff ever  commenting about the topic of the last
clause. It has to do with limiting power held by the voters. (The
theorists maybe will not get power themselves unless they respect
that idea. STV advocates can let the wind blow their hair back as
they criss-cross the open highways. But little of that is detected
here.)



Is there any experts on simple ideas that can act as reviewers on
this minor little dispute?.