[EM] RE: [Condorcet] A "Condorcet" by any other name stillsmells as sweet?

[Paul Kislanko]

All of this notwithstanding, no one has ever explained to me how including
an extraneous "+" is different from

my_preferred>all_others_could_live_with>>those I think would save me some
problems by having a heart attack.

I repeat, if I can say A+=B> then you shold be able to infer that from that
me saying A>B>>(all others). 

The "plus" added to a ranked ballot is unnecessary, but it could turn an
approval ballot into a semi-ranked ballot. If that is desirable, just use a
ranked ballot to begin with. 

> -----Original Message-----
> From: election-methods-electorama.com-bounces at electorama.com 
> [mailto:election-methods-electorama.com-bounces at electorama.com
> ] On Behalf Of Abd ulRahman Lomax
> Sent: Friday, September 30, 2005 9:40 PM
> To: Condorcet at yahoogroups.com
> Cc: election-methods-electorama.com at electorama.com
> Subject: Re: [EM] RE: [Condorcet] A "Condorcet" by any other 
> name stillsmells as sweet?
> 
> At 06:46 PM 9/30/2005, Simmons, Forest wrote:
> 
> >Approval is unacceptable to voter psychology because once you 
> >approve Compromise, you erase the ballot distinction between 
> >Favorite and Compromise.  That's why ordinary Approval is not a 
> >viable ballot proposal.
> 
> This is the main objection I have seen to Approval, other than the 
> phoney one that Approval allegedly gives one voter more than one vote.
> 
> >What does that leave?
> >
> >1. Creative use of simple ballots to get voter rankings, as (for 
> >example) in Jobst's DFC proposal.
> >
> >2.  Ranked or not, ballots have to allow distinction of Favorite 
> >without strong incentive to rate or rank Compromise with the 
> >distinctive mark along with (or in place of) Favorite.  This means 
> >that the distinctive mark has to be mostly expressive or symbolic, 
> >with very weak instrumentality, such as having a role in 
> breaking ties.
> >
> >After Asset Voting, Approval Plus (A+) is the simplest such 
> a proposal.
> 
> Depending on how it is implemented, A+ is actually a Condorcet 
> method.... But Forest does not go there with it. The Condorcet 
> variation I've called A+PW, PW standing for pairwise.
> 
> >Approval Plus  is Approval with the ability to distinguish one 
> >candidate with a plus.
> 
> It is Approval "plus" specification of a Favorite. The word 
> "Approval" does cause some problems. Some people think that it is 
> insincere to "Approve" a candidate who you can barely stand, merely 
> because he or she is a frontrunner and is not as bad as the other. So 
> I've switched the names to
> 
> Favorite, Preferred, [blank = Not Preferred]
> 
> There is no reason to prohibit the designation of more than one as 
> Favorite, but most voters won't do it. The reason *not* to prohibit 
> it is simply that it does no harm.
> 
> >Along with the approval tally, there is a tally of each 
> candidate's plusses.
> >
> >When the max approval candidate is unique, that candidate is elected.
> 
> The max approval candidate will so rarely not be unique that we could 
> practically neglect the possibility and leave the resolution to 
> existing law, which might be a coin toss. However, one could use the 
> Favorite information to resolve a tie, and I see no reason to 
> resort to:
> 
> >When two or more candidates are tied for max approval, then the plus 
> >tally for each candidate is used to determine how many marbles will 
> >correspond to that candidate in an urn full of different colored 
> >marbles (one color for each candidate).
> >
> >A marble is drawn.  The candidate owning the drawn marble picks the 
> >winner from among the tied candidates.
> 
> However, the Favorite (Plus) information could be actually used, in 
> more ways than one. First of all, I've never seen Approval advocates 
> (other than myself) mention it, but Approval has a problem when mated 
> with public campaign finance laws. What happens when you approve two 
> candidates? If you are a Nader voter, is the public funding resulting 
> from your Green vote split with the Democrats?
> 
> However, Plus solves this problem. Campaign financing would be 
> determined by the Plus votes. Plus also solves the psychological 
> problem of being unable to specify a favorite.
> 
> However, in basic A+, one problem remains. When there is a two-party 
> system and the chances of a third party winning are vanishingly 
> small, basic Approval solves the spoiler problem (as does any 
> Condorcet method). However, as a third party approaches parity, the 
> spoiler problem will loom again. If there are three parties, about 
> equal in voting strength as seen in polls going into the election, a 
> voter who has a strong preference will have a difficult choice: vote 
> for only the Favorite and thus abstain from the pairwise election 
> between the two other candidates, or vote for the Favorite and a 
> Preferred, and abstain from *that* pairwise election.
> 
> Plus suggests a possible path: Use the Favorite information in the 
> pairwise contest between any Favorite and Preferred candidate. This 
> must be done ballot-wise, it can't just be totals, I think. 
> Essentially, this is Condorcet, with only three ranks allowed.
> 
> Because it is a Condorcet method, it should be vulnerable to cycles. 
> But, by its nature, it has clear Approval information, which can be 
> used to resolve cycles. I think that the DMC method could be used, 
> but I prefer simply awarding the election to the Approval winner 
> among the members of a cycle.
> 
> I have *not* examined all the implications of this proposal. There 
> have been other attempts to suggest methods using a similar ballot, 
> but I have not yet found an existing proposal that analyzes the 
> ballots in the same way. It seems simple to me, and obvious, but I 
> didn't think of it until a few days ago, and it *may* be that somehow 
> this procedure was overlooked.
> 
> It is an Approval method. And it is a Condorcet method, but with 
> limited ranking.
> 
> I think it is worthy of examination, and this is happening to some 
> degree on the EM list. As I have written many times, I don't consider 
> myself an expert.....
> 
> I have come to realize this, though: much of the concern over 
> strategic voting may be misplaced. Strategic voting, by definition, 
> risks a failure to elect a preferred candidate just as much as it may 
> result in a supposedly better outcome. Strategic voting can be 
> employed by more than one group. I think that it would actually be 
> rare that an attempt would even be made. So simply noting that a 
> method is vulnerable to some strategy may not be fatal to the method. 
> I'm much more concerned about the possibility that, with sincere 
> voting, Condorcet failure may occur *without* the compensating fact 
> that the Approval winner was elected.
> 
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