[EM] Conceiving a Democratic Electoral Process

[Don Hoffard]

Good afternoon Fred:

You are championing a very important subject and I certainly enjoy your
posts.

 

Gohlke: Your post does not seem to address the issue of non-partisans, yet
they

       are, by far, the majority of the electorate (whether or not they

       actually vote).

 

I think you missed the point of the post.  If you note that the M (the
non-partisans candidate) wins in every one of my examples (with a different
voting method). If you change the voting method parties will be weaker and
non-partisan candidates will be stronger.

I don't believe that non-partisans are a majority of the register votes, and
even a smaller percent of the voters. A Gallup poll in 2010 said that 38% of
Americans identified themselves as independents. There is a big difference
between an independent and a non-partisan.  A large number of those saying
they are independent are registered in one of the major parties. If you have
a Republican dominated state and you are not a registered Republican you
can't vote in the primary and you have no influence on the election, which I
think is one of your (and my) major gripes.  If you are Democrat in a
Republican state you also have no influence on the election. 

 

Hoffard: "If you assume there are no Parties and we have the same

                 people running for office you get the same results."

 

Gohlke: I don't understand why, if there are no parties, it is proper to
assume

                  'we have the same people running for office'.  

 

I said "Assume we have the same people running" and we change the voting
method we get a different result, the M (non-partisan) wins the election.
Of course if we do not have any parties we may get different candidates.
But the point is by changing the voting method and ever with a Liberal (L)
and a Conservative (C) candidate running we could still have a moderate (M)
candidate winning.  Also ever without parties under a first-past-the-pole
system (with an L, M, and a C) the L or the C would win the election. 

 

Don Hoffard

 

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