[EM] whipping-boy Borda

[Alex Small]

James Green-Armytage said:
> 	So I am inviting you all to send me some of the most convincing and
> pithy
> arguments against the Borda count. Obviously it is a clunky system that
> is not as elegant as STV or Condorcet, but what are it's overall worst
> effects?

Well, we could certainly take out all of our favorite technical arguments
against Borda and for our favorites.  But those arguments might be too
boring.

Probably the best arguments would involve examples from actual elections. 
You can take all of our favorite technical arguments stated in technical
jargon (e.g. Borda violates Clone Independence) and translate them into
examples.  Is there a case when a group ran clones to manipulate Borda?

I think that actual examples will be best.  Some criticisms of IRV (e.g.
nonmonotonicity) are often shrugged off with the statement "Well, such
things are rare."  We can huff, and puff, but we won't blow their house
down unless we have actual examples.  The best theoretical argument in the
world fails without data.  So go through elections where a lot of people
were unhappy with the outcome and say "Borda gave us such-and-such bad
outcome, <insert other method here> would have given us <insert outcome
here>."

Out of curiousity, how long has your school used Borda?  Do you know how
the case was made?



Alex