[EM] What happens when Approval doesn't let you vote Favorite>Dem>Repub?

[Michael Ossipoff]

> On 27.5.2012, at 22.37, Michael Ossipoff wrote:
> 
> > You know, that's the Condorcetists' and IRVists' objection to Approval.
> 
> The question is what happens when Approval doesn't let you vote A>B>C. The
> difference is that there is no division to minor and major candidates. The
worst
> Approval problems appear when there are three or more potential winners.

The differences between the methods appear when there are more than 2 viable
candidates. It's for that situation that we want a better voting system. The
assumption in all of this discussion is that there are more than 2 potential
winners.

What you call "Approval's problems" are only a nuisance. Sometimes not even
that. That nuisance needs to be kept in perspective, in comparison to
Plurality's problems.

And Approval doesn't share Condorcet's favorite-burial incentive problem.
And Condorcet shares Approval's C/D problem.

> > after the 1st Approval election, in which the non-Republocrat parties
> > and candidates have somehow managed to make at least some people aware
> > of their different platforms, policies and proposals, the count
> > results are going to show many more votes for non-Republocrats, now
> > that everyone, for the first time, has the freedom to rate anyone as
> > they themselves choose to, and no longer constrained by the
> > lesser-of-2-evils problem.
> 
> The first Approval elections in a former two-party system could go really
well if
> we assume that the third parties won't be potential winners yet.

In the first Approval election, that may very well be assumed by the
lesser-evil Democrat voter. So s/he'll approve the Democrat. But s/he'll
additionally approve everyone whom s/he likes more. The resulting count
result will therefore more accurately show who is liked and what is wanted.

Therefore your assumption that the Republocrats are all that's viable won't
hold up long in Approval. That mis-assumption can only be preserved by means
of Plurality voting.

People want something better. Believing that only the Republocrats are
viable, people convince themselves that somehow the Republocrats will be
what the voter wants them to be--because it's believed that they're the only
game in town. The need to believe is amazingly strong. The suckers will keep
coming back for more, when their Democrat tells them that he's in favor of
"change", and that's he's dedicated to helping them. The suckers need to
believe. 

With Approval, it will immediately be apparent that people want more than
what the Republocrats have proven to be. The "problem" that you speak of, in
which people have the preferences Green>Democrat>Republican will vanish when
it becomes obvious that he Republocrats aren't as popular as the media have
been claiming. The Republican threat will no longer be taken seriously, and
the idea of a need to support  the nearly-identical Democrat, to protect
from the Republican, will be seen as hilarious.

> > Don't Democrat and Republican candidates continually offer "change"?
> > :-) They promise those things because they know that the public want
> > those things.  But the public will now notice that they don't offer
> > squat, in regards to those things.
> 
> This is a problem of all political systems, also when there are multiple
parties.
> The problem may be one step worse in a two-party system where these two
> parties are almost guaranteed to return back to power soon, whatever they
do.

You catch on fast. The problem is that, since people believe that only Dem
can beat Repub, they're going to vote for the Dem no matter what, and the
Dems know that, and so they know that they don't have to be less corrupt
than the Repubs. They don't even have to keep their own promises. You should
have seen and heard Bill Clinton trying to keep from laughing, when he told
us that he realized that he wouldn't be able to keep his middle-class
tax-break campaign promise.

We had a congressional candidate who emotionally spoke against NAFTA, and
campaigned in an anti-NAFTA T-shirt. But when he won and got to Washington,
he immediately became pro-NAFTA.

And no, that isn't a problem of all political systems. It's a problem where
people believe that there is no alternative to "the two choices".

Mike Ossipoff