[EM] Long Term CR strategy

[Alex Small]

It is often asserted that Cardinal Ratings is strategically equivalent to
Approval Voting.  In the context of a single election I completely agree. 
You're either going to do everything you can to help a candidate win, or
else you won't.  However, I have argued in the past that when one takes a
longer-term view of matters, and considers relationships with candidates
and parties, giving intermediate ratings (e.g. 0 on a scale of -1 to 1, or
2 on a scale of 0 to 5, or whatever) might make sense.

This has been disputed, so let me refine my argument:

First, let me observe that single-election strategy need not be the same
as multi-election strategy.  For instance, consider elections with
plurality voting.  If your only concern is getting the best feasible
outcome from the present election, then you should always vote for one of
the top 2 front-runners.  In the US, 99.99% of the time that means voting
for either a Republican or a Democrat.  There's no point, in the context
of a single election, in voting for a Green or Libertarian or genuine
independent or whatever.  However small the difference between the
Democrat and Republican might be, if your only concern is the result of
this election (rather than, say, sending a message to your lesser evil)
then you should vote for your lesser evil.

However, every year a few percent of the people vote third party based on
other concerns.  Some place a premium on conscience (e.g. Forest has
argued that there are negative spiritual ramifications to voting against
your conscience).  Others believe that voting for a third party will do
good in the long term.  Your "lesser evil" might lose today, but in the
future he might respect you more and take better, more principled
positions if he sees that doing so is the only way to win your vote, and
if he sees that your vote is necessary.  Of course, that's not always
going to happen, but that's the hope.  I certainly vote third party most
of the time.


OK, now that we've established that single-election strategy is not always
the same as long-term strategy, let's examine CR strategy.  It's already
accepted by most people here that CR is equivalent to Approval Voting if
all you care about is the immediate election.  But what about sending
signals to a party over the long term?  Say that the Democrats are your
lesser evil, and that the Greens are your true preference among the
various third parties.  (A similar analysis could hold for Republicans and
Libertarians, or even Democrats and Libertarians if you have odd-ball
beliefs as I do.)  Your long-term goal is to nudge the Democrats into
adopting more Green-like stances, by sending them signals in the voting
booth.

If over several election cycles you and like-minded voters consistently
give the Democrat zero points (or a negative number in some CR
implementations) and give the Green maximum points, you risk the Democrats
concluding that you are simply unreachable.  Just as most Democrats (Joe
Lieberman excepted...) don't bother to reach out to the far-right, they
won't bother reaching out to you if they conclude that your demands are
too stringent.

So, you have to decide what your demands will be.  You are negotiating
with them in an environment where other blocs of voters are also
negotiating with them.  As long as you stick to giving either zero points
or full points you face a dilemma:

1)  If you set too low a threshold for giving them full points then you
relinquish any further power over them.  Once they've crossed that low
threshold they will go no further for you.

2)  If you set too high a threshold for giving full points you risk being
ignored.  Just as no Democrat (other than Joe Lieberman...) will reach out
to the far right, no Democrat, no Democrat will reach out to voters whose
demands are perceived (however wrongly so) as being too far to the left.


The solution is to split the difference and set a threshold for partial
points, as well as another threshold for full points.  You give them
something to work for, and once they get there you give them yet another
goal to work for.

Besides, people who vote third party are already doing something
strategically similar to giving intermediate CR scores.

The left and right bases of the Democrats and Republicans have found that
staying home or voting third party is a useful strategy to keep a lever of
control over candidates.  Thus Bush makes an effort to keep his base happy
on at least some issues.  What's interesting is that voting third party or
staying home are NOT the biggest sticks that you can wield against a
Democrat or Republican.  If you REALLY want to make the Democrat suffer,
you could always vote Republican.  Not only would you take one vote out of
his column, you'd actually add a vote to his strongest opponent's column.

However, most people on the left don't go as far as voting Republican. 
Part of it is obviously that a vote for the Green will send a message,
while a vote for the Republican, even if it is meant to "punish" the
Democrat, will be misinterpreted.  However, part of it is also
psychological:  Most liberals just can't bring themselves to vote for
Republicans (and who can blame them?  I can't bring myself to vote for
_either_ side).



Now, maybe you disagree with my assessment of the Democrats, believing
that they are incorrigible.  Fine.  I'm just using the Democrats as an
example for a more general point, namely that in negotiating with
candidates and parties it may be worthwhile to give partial points in CR
elections.  If you don't like this example, in place of the word
"Democrat" substitute "a leftish candidate who is honest but not as good
as the Greens" and my analysis may be more appealing.  I'd rather stick to
the general questions of strategy for now, and leave for another forum the
political questions.  One could conclude that the Republicrats are
incorrigible thieves, whores, and liars, but still believe that in some
cases (e.g. in dealing with parties that are more honest but still flawed)
it makes sense to give intermediate scores in CR elections.



Alex