[EM] Re: Strong FBC, strategy, thresholds

[Chris Benham]

Kevin,
Here is a maybe tolerable method:  
Have an approval cutoff  in the rankings. Default cutoff  is between 
first and second. Eliminate candidates who do not make a low  Approval 
threshold which is related to the number of candidates. Among remaining 
candidates: if no CW elect the most approved Smith set member.
This way a voter who wants to give first preference to  a sure loser 
 and  second prefernce to a maybe CW, can place approval cutoff between 
second and third and so help second preference  make the threshold.
Regarding Forest's  pairs approval method, I think that in practice it 
might be that not all of  the major parties will field  2 candidates and 
that if they do the voters might react against it  so that the most 
 approved pair  might often not be 2 candidates from the same party. But 
even so  giving voters a choice between candidates of the same party and 
getting all the sincere preferences (or even ratings) on the ballot (and 
presumably strictly complying with Majority Favourite) to me makes it 
better than plain Approval.

Chris