[EM] Best winner

[Michael Ossipoff]

>
>>
>>
> I'd said:

>
>>
> The voters are certain that the winner will be either the Republican or
> the Democrat, and so they (nearly) all vote for the Republican or the
> Democrat. And so guess what?...The winner is therefore predictably always
> the Republican or the Democrat.
>
> Dave replies:
> Assuming X is reported as likely to win, these voters would help this
> along by also voting for X
>

[endquote]

Sure, if X is the one that they like. But if you want to look at it
strategically, they should approve the candidates who are _better_ than
what they expect. Maybe also the one who is exactly as good as they expect,
if they like hir.


> , rather than voting for X or Y according to which they would prefer to
> have win.
>
> Agreed that if X and Y are Rep and Dem, considering only among them as
> major candidates makes sense
>

[endquote]

I disagree. The media tell us that the Dem & Repub are the only candidates
who can win. Why? Because they're the candidates promoted by media, and
because voters believe the media.

Do you know anyone who actually thinks that the Dem's policy proposals are
the best that could be? Anyone who really agrees with and likes the Dem and
hir policies? Consistently, surveys and polls have found that the public
are, as a whole, considerably more progressives than the Dems.

As I've said here before, the public feeling is that "the politicians"
(meaning Repubs & Dems) are corrupt sleazes. And as I've also said, only a
schoolyard drug-dealer is regarded with as much contempt and disgust as the
politicians who are running our country--the Dem & Repub politicians.

And yet people seem to believe that only Dem & Repub can win. With
Approval, you'll find that that isn't so.Polls and surveys indicate that
the voter median is more in the spectrum-region of the Greens. For example,
when I last checked last night, two Greens were leading, in the Democracy
Chronicles Approval presidential poll.




> Dave continues:
>>
>
>
> If all you know is that you see X and Y as each deserving, you properly
> vote for both.
>
> However, changing that to preferring X, and X and Y each being possible
> deserving winners, you need to consider:
>      If your vote will likely not affect which one wins, vote for both.
>      If voting for Y could cause Y to win over X, you think on this as
> part of deciding whether to also vote for Y.
>
>
[endquote]

Condorcetists worry about that too much. If you really like both, then is
it really important which one wins? That's why I suggest that you approve
all the candidates whom you like and trust.

Suppose that you (unlike me) consider the Dems as acceptable, and that
(unlike most people), you don't consider them corrupt sleazes::

When the first Approval election shows that candidates you like better than
the Dems can outpoll the Repubs, then you'll know that you have
no strategic reason to approve a Dem.

And then, when after another election, it's obvious that several candidates
whom you prefer to the Dem can all outpoll the Dem, you'll know that you
needn't approve everyone who is better than the Dem. You have no strategic
reason to not choose among those candidates who are better than the Dem,
 because the candidates in that set I referred to can all beat the Dem.

So, we get rid of one (or several) perceived needed compromise with each
Approval election result.

In short, as I've previously demonstrated here, Approval will quickly home
in on the voter-median, and then stay there.

Dave said:

>
>
> It gets sticky.  If considering only Y, then whether Y may be deserving is
> all you need as to voting.  Add to this X being deserving, and you need to
> consider possibility of voting for both causing X to lose.
>

[endquote]

But, as I said above, if you like then both, then don't worry about which
one wins. Approve them both, because they're both good, because you like
the both. After all, there are candidates whom you _dislike_, aren't
there?  You could do a lot worse than to elect one of those whom you like.
So approve them.

Mike Ossipoff
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