[EM] The Coming California Single Seat Election

[Adam Tarr]

>On economics, I prefer A>B>C (techie>moderate>farm subsidy).  On social
>and civil liberties I prefer B>C>A (ACLU>moderate>Patriot Act).  On
>foreign policy I prefer C>A>B (non-intervention>moderation>hawk).  You can
>agree or disagree with my stances, but it's rational for me to order the
>candidates in cyclic order on those 3 issues.

OK, I stand corrected, in the sense that Forest's scenario makes sense 
without forcing anyone to have cyclic preferences on any specific 
stance.  That said:

>Now, in the end I'll probably make some trade-offs (e.g. there is no free
>market for people imprisoned as "enemy combatants", so Patriot Act fan A
>is out) and come up with a transitive order.

Precisely.  A cyclic tie, while it may be present in a certain way, just 
doesn't make sense in the aggregate.  If you're throwing A out, it means 
that you considered A inferior to B despite the 2-1 issue margin.  Once you 
make a decision that you weight one issue above another, you resolve the 
cyclic tie into a transitive order.  If you give every issue equal weight, 
then you end up with a sincere tie, which is a resolution of sorts as well.

-Adam