[EM] Why I think IRV isn't a serious alternative

[Markus Schulze]

Dear Greg,

you wrote (25 Nov 2008):

> While complete ballot data is ideal, I think a convincing
> case as to how a voting method might perform in a particular
> election can sometimes be made from polling data. For example,
> there's good exit polling data for the Senate race in Minnesota
> that's being recounted, showing that supporters of the
> Independence party candidate would have preferred Al Franken
> over Norm Coleman by a 5% margin. That would have given Franken
> at least another 20,000 votes, way more than the 215 votes he
> trailed by pre-recount. I think that's a pretty good case that
> IRV would have selected Franken, regardless of the results of
> the plurality recount.

Then what do you say about the opinion polls that said that
Bayrou was a clear Condorcet winner in the 2007 French
presidential elections (although IRV would have chosen
Sarkozy)?:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_presidential_election,_2007#Before_first_round_of_vote

Markus Schulze