[EM] piling on against IRV (was ... Czech Green party - Council elections)

[Jameson Quinn]

1. Don't denigrate other solutions to problems you acknowledge. In fact, I
think you should support them. That means that whenever comparing IRV to
another reform proposal, make it clear from the outset that the other
proposal is superior to plurality (except in the very rare cases where it
isn't).


i [R B-J] think they mostly claim that any other method has no track record
in governmental elections and have an ice cube's chance in hell of being
adopted.  i continue to ask "what if it was Condorcet that was promoted
instead of IRV from the very beginning?"  in order to accomplish something,
you have to begin.

That may be be their main argument, when they don't ignore other methods
altogether. However, I have clearly seen cases where they've made arguments
which would be read by an average person as saying that Condorcet is worse
than Plurality. They should stop.

> 2. Don't lie about the benefits of IRV. For instance, unless full ranking
> is mandatory, IRV does not guarantee a majority. You could say instead that
> it "does a better job of getting a majority" than plurality, or whatever.
>
>
> Here I [DK] choke.  A candidate ranked only because of some demand such as
> full ranking is not truly a vote by the voter, and should not be counted as
> if it was.  Think of a voter "approving" all candidates in Approval - that
> voter has done nothing to favor any one of the candidates.
>

That is a matter of interpretation - an interpretation I share. But I'm not
asking FairVote to share my interpretations. I'm asking them not to lie.
They consistently make statements which are flat-out lies. I ask them to
stop. If they simply made statements I disagree with - such as that
Australia's system guarantees a true majority - I would simply disagree, and
ask them to debate.

it doesn't even do that with full ranking.  we [R B-J] had full ranking (5
candidates and 5 levels of ranking) in Burlington yet a candidate was
elected with IRV when there was a clear majority of voters that had marked
their ballots that another specific candidate was preferred.  that limited
ranking (i hear in SF you had dozens of candidates and 3 levels of ranking)
is a problem, but not the sole cause of the thwarted majority pathology.


same response. I believe that a non-condorcet candidate should not be called
a majority candidate. But if they do have an absolute majority of all votes
in the last IRV round, calling them that is just dodgy, not a flat-out lie.

JQ
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