[EM] Replying to Richard Moore:

[Former IRV Supporter]

Richard Moore wrote:
> 
> I Like IRVing wrote:
> >
> >      Now, for your letter.  My meaning is quite clear, but I will expand.
> >      I mean, under Approval, Bucklin, and Condorcet, if a voter of one of
> > the two largest factions wishes to preserve his right to vote for his most
> > preferred candidate as his top choice, then the voter should only make one
> > choice.  Voters of the lowest factions should consider making more than one
> > choice.  Is that clearer?
> 
> The meaning is clear but not the logic. Suppose we have five
> candidates, and my ratings for those candidates are
> 10, 9, 8, 0, and 0. Let's say the first and last candidates
> are the front runners. I adjust for this fact and find that
> the strategic values for the candidates are 10, 5, 4, -9,
> and -10. So you are saying because I support one of
> the front runners, I should vote only for that candidate in
> Approval. But why should I do this if I can nearly double
> the value of my vote by voting for my three favorites?


This would be a situation where the front-runner status of the first and
last choices is less than clear, and choices #2 and #3 have a fair
chance of tying or winning the election.  In fact the relative odds of a
tie for these four candidates must be somewhere around 35% / 18% / 17% /
30% (as a rough guesstimate).

I suppose #1 and #5 are still technically frontrunners, but not what I
had pictured in my previous message -- probably because my first
reaction is still to think in terms of our current two-party system.