[EM] Robert Bristow Johnson wrt Burlington et al.

[David L Wetzell]

meh,
I don't want to take bet number 1.  This list-serve is skewed towards smart
and politically-interested folks, who equally importantly tend to be
arm-chair/list-serve/blog activists.  Methinks, we tend to project our
attributes too much onto the general voting population as a matter of
wishful thinking and a relative lack of experience.  We also tend to think
of the possibilities a lot more and can get attached to our pet rules.

It's relatively easy for a smart person like you to come up with a SODA
election rule than it is to rally and lead an organization into promoting
it successfully for there are different skills involved. We got the former
quite a bit and the latter not so much.  This leads to conflict because
those who think they ought to be calling the shots about the direction of
electoral reform are not making the key decisions.  And we value different
stuff, which tends to lead to further estrangements.  My view of myself is
that I'm trying to bridge the two somewhat, by being careful about not
idealizing voters.  And, I'm playing the conservative, a selective defender
of the working orthodoxy of electoral activists.  I'm defending their
marketing pitch and their  right to decide what's important and what's
not-so-important.  What's telling and what's not-so-telling, like the
Burlington VT setback for IRV.

So I'll take bet number 2, but not number 1.  I think we're too estranged
from the realities of electoral activism on this list-serve and have other
factors that hinder us from coming to a good working consensus and/or
properly appreciating the X*P of IRV.

dlw

On Sun, Nov 27, 2011 at 6:10 PM, Jameson Quinn <jameson.quinn at gmail.com>wrote:

>
>> dlw: I believe you're serious.   Like I said, I'm not that motivated by
>> money....(especially for a guy with a PhD in Econ.)  It's a byproduct of me
>> being an aspie.  So I'd feel bad about taking you up on the 2nd one and the
>> first bet is inadequately framed in my view....
>>
>>
> C'mon. Neither of them is worth more than about $60 in net present value.
> I can afford that plus the risk.
>
> I realize that bet 1 is underspecified, but I don't think your direction
> for specifying it is good because it relies on a lot of work that would be
> better spent just promoting reform. I think we could develop an objective
> metric of "support" which didn't require so much intervention.
>
> Jameson
>
>
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