[Election-Methods] would range/approval have changed 2000?

[CLAY SHENTRUP]

rob brown believes rv/av would have made no difference in 2000:
>  Nader would have thrown things to Bush in 2000 with Range just as he did
> under plurality.  Or with Approval, for that matter, because inevitably a lot
> of people who would have given Gore a Yes would give him a No if Nader
> was running (so they could express that they like Nader better than Gore).
> Only in your bizarro contrived-world would that not have happened. Think
> about that one.  Seriously, give it some thought.  Resist your urge to
> contrive a case where everyone bizarrely votes in unison, but think real
> world.  Would Nader's running have given Bush a strong advantage under
> Range and Approval?  My position is that anyone who says "no" is downright insane.

I respond:
What do you mean _if_ Nader was running?  Nader did run, garnering
97,488 votes.  With Range/Approval, those voters' best strategy would
have been to additionally vote for their favorite of the
"front-runners", meaning Gore would have won with Range or Approval,
so long as a mere *one half of one percent* of Nader voters had also
voted for him (plus enough to counter any who would have voted for
Bush).  So what you call "bizarro contrived", I call downright
obvious.

Of course, if we want to get really technical, we could suppose that
more candidates would have run under RV, meaning possibly someone like
John McCain could have won, as an independent for instance.  I'm
obviously limiting this discussion to the candidates who actually ran
in the general.

I appreciate everyone else's comments on this, to assure me that I'm
not "downright insane".



-- 
If you think there would be a whole world of difference between what
Hillary Clinton
would accomplish in the Rome-of-the-Borgias down there on the Potomac,
by comparison
with what Rudy, or Fred, or Mitt would accomplish, you won't be supporting Paul.

If, however, you think that much of the underbrush that has grown up
around our national
institutions this past 40 years needs to by pulled up by the roots and
burned, before it
chokes the life out of our Republic, then Paul's your man.

- John Derbyshire