[EM] Winning-votes intuitive?

[Blake Cretney]

Adam Tarr wrote:

> This is a totally reasonable strategic truncation on the part of the 
> Bush camp.  They have nothing to lose, since Nader is a sure loser 
> anyway, and the election to gain.  If these people vote Gore second 
> (which is their obvious second choice) then all they do is make Gore 
> the Condorcet winner and hand him the election.  Why would they do 
> this?  Moreover, it is not a tough sell to make Bush voters leave off 
> a second preference; most of them probably don't like the idea of 
> voting for Gore anyway.
>
So, is the point of your example that the Bush voter's are dishonest 
then?  Because if you just judge by the votes you give, without any 
preconceptions about what Bush voters would really prefer, I think it is 
obvious that Bush really does deserve to win in your example.

But as for the strategy argument, my response is as follows.  Let's 
imagine that some voters aren't aware that they are allowed to vote a 
partial ranking.  Then, they will have to randomly rank candidates 
instead of placing them as equal.  On average, these random votes will 
tend to cancel each other out, with an effect as if they had voted in 
margins.  So in margins, knowing that they are allowed to vote partial 
rankings doesn't give a new opportunity for strategy that did not exist 
before.

However, if you count ballots in a way that tends to penalize those who 
vote partial rankings, which SSD does, the voters would actually be 
better off believing that they aren't allowed to vote partial rankings, 
since this will cause them to randomly rank, and thereby avoid the 
penalty.  In fact, an argument can be made that this is true even 
counting with margins, but the effect is minimized.

So, if people are better off believing that ranked ballots are not 
allowed, why not just ban partial rankings?  I mean, rather than allow 
partial rankings, but covertly penalize them, why not just be up front 
about it and say they aren't allowed? Is it because you're hoping to 
fool people who are trying to use strategy themselves?

BTW, I expect that Mike will have something to say about this issue, as 
is his right.  I've argued this point with Mike before, however, so I 
don't intend to reply to him unless someone else indicates that they 
would like to see a rebuttal for a particular argument.

---
Blake Cretney