[EM] How Progressives Might Optimally Vote in the 2012 Presidential Election, In Various Methods

Wed Nov 7 17:04:43 PST 2012

It's of interest how one would have voted in the recent 2012
 presidential election, using the voting systems that are being
 proposed.

I'll suggest how a progressive might vote optimally in that election,
 using the various proposed methods.

I'll name a candidate-set, consisting of the most well-known
 candidates, the ones who were in debates (televised and on the
 Internet). This candidate set includes the candidates of four
 media-banned parties. (All parties are media-banned, other than the
 officially recognized, promoted and endorsed one, the Republocrat
 party).

Candidate set:

Barak Obama
 Mitt Romney
 Jill Stein
 Gary Johnson
 Virgil Goode
 Rocky Anderson

Voting systems used:

Plurality
 Approval
 Score
 Instant Runoff
 Beatpath (a traditional unimproved Condorcet method)
 ICT
 Symmetrical ICT
 Majority-Judgment

As I've said, I claim that all of our official public elections are
 u/a. That greatly simplifies voting strategy.

As I mentioned in a previous post, it appears to me that Rocky
 Anderson and the Justice party are a strategic clone of Jill Stein and
 the Green Party US (GPUS), with the purpose of splitting the Green
 vote.

Anyone who has heard the debates among the four candidates of
 media-banned parties, or read platform policies &/or candidate
 statements on the Internet, will undestand why I don't include Obama,
 Romney, Goode or Johnson among the acceptable candidates.

If a progressive agrees with  me on that, then Anderson is an
 unacceptable. Even with methods that don't have a clone problem, a
 progressive would be unlikely to regard the Justice party as
 acceptable, because, once its intentions are in question, there's no
 reason to trust it or its candidates to really implement the good
 policies that they copy in their talk.

Based on the above two paragraphs, then, the only candidate, among the
 above-listed 6-candidate candidate-set, who is acceptable is Jill
 Stein.

So, here is how I suggest that a progressive voter would vote
 optimally in the 2012 Presidential election, using the above-listed 8
 voting systems:

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Plurality:

Jill Stein

That's because Plurality's u/a strategy is to combine votes on the
 most winnable acceptable candidate.

I've discussed the possibility of pre-election informational polling
 by ICT and Symmmetrical ICT. But large-scale polling is probably
 expensive, difficult, and hard to find people to do it, and hard to
 get participation from the public.

But the Green Party US (GPUS) party nomination serves the purpose
 well. I suggest that, for American progressives, the GPUS nominee is
 always the candidate whom we should regard as the most winnable
 acceptable candidate.

Hence my suggestion that a progressive would vote optimally in
 Plurality by voting for Jill Stein.

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Approval:

Jill Stein

That's because Approval's u/a strategy is to approve all of the
 acceptable candidates, and none of the unacceptable candidates.

As described above, I suggest that, among the above-listed
 candidate-set, Jill Stein is the only acceptable candidiate.

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0-10 Score:

Jill Stein 10
 Barak Obama 0
 Mitt Romney 0
 Gary Johnson 0
 Virgil Goode 0
 Rocky Anderson 0

That's because Score's u/a strategy is to top-rate all of the
 acceptable candidates, and bottom-rate all of the unacceptable
 candidates.

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Instant Runoff:

1. Jill Stein
 2. Rocky Anderson
 3. Virgil Goode
 4. Gary Anderson
 5. Barak Obama
 6. Mitt Romney

That's because IRV's u/a strategy is to rank the acceptables in order
 of winnability, and then rank the unacceptables in order of merit.

Sure, it isin't easy to say what the order of merit is among the 5
 unacceptables.

 But I suggest Anderson as the most meritorious unacceptable, because
 at least he re-states Stein's policy proposals, Even if we can't trust
 his sincerity, at least he doesn't espouse or advocate bad policy
 proposals.

Johnson would immediately get us out of Afghanistan, but Goode
 wouldn't allow non-congress-declared wars, and so presumably he'd do
 the same. None of those 6 candidates, other than Johnson, proposed the
 extreme Libertarian policies proposed by Johnson.

But, comparing Johnson to the Republocrats, Johnson's opposition to
 unnecessary wars, and his completely non-authoritarian positions make
 him better than the Republocrats. As for Johnson's extsreme
 LIbertarian policies, (elimination of occupational health and safety
 laws, consumer protection laws, product safety and food safety laws,
 etc.) if we had the desperate and undesirable choice between Johnson
 and the Republocrats, maybe it would be best to assume that, while the
 public would accept Johnson's better policies, they'd almost
 unanimously reject his worse policies, and they'd therefore never be
 implemented. That's why I rank Johnson over the Republocrats in IRV.

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Beatpath:

1. Jill Stein
 2. Rocky Anderson
 3. Virgil Goode
 4. Gary Johnson
 5. Mitt Romney
 6. Barak Obama

TUC's (and therefore Beatpath's) problem, even in a u/a election,
 regarding which acceptables to top-rank, doesn't occur with this
 candidate-set, because there's only one acceptable.

TUC's u/a strategy (when there's only one acceptable) is to top-rank
 the acceptable, and then rank the unacceptables in reverse order of
 winnability.

In the IRV poll, after the first FreeAndEqual debate, Johnson, in
 comparison to Stein, got a lot more transfers from Goode and Anderson.
 That strongly suggests that there are a lot more Goode-preferrers than
 Anderson-preferrers. Hence my 2nd-ranking of Anderson.

Of course the fact that Goode was eliminated before Johnson suggests
 less winnabilit for Goode, which is why I ranked Goode over Johnson.

Less demonstrated winnability likewise is the reason why I ranked
 Johnson over the Republocrats.

Everything that we were hearing suggested that Romney was less
 winnable than Obama, especially since Romney's 47% remark.

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ICT:

ICT's bottom-end strategy is the same as that of TUC (including Beatpath)

The top-end difference is avoided when there's only one acceptable.

Hence, with this candidate-set, my ICT ranking would be the same as my
 TUC ranking.

1. Jill Stein
 2. Rocky Anderson
 3. Virgil Goode
 4. Gary Johnson
 5. Mitt Romney
 6. Barak Obama

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Symmetrical ICT:

With Symmetrical ICT, there's no reason for random-fill in 0-info
 elections. And, even when there's some winnability information,
 there's less need to use that information or guesses.

Maybe, if the above-described winnability information is reliable, it
 could actually be best to rank as in ICT:

1. Jill Stein
 2. Rocky Anderson
 3. Virgil Goode
 4. Gary Johnson
 5. Mitt Romney
 6. Barak Obama

...but, because the method is Symmetrical ICT, there'd be much reason
 to do so, and it would be more strategically acceptable to just not
 rank any unacceptables:

1. Jill Stein

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A-F Majority-Judgment:

(Majority-Judgment advocates want to use emotionally-expressive,
 evaluative rating labels, such as the U.S school grading system: A, B,
 C, D, F)

Use it like Approval:

Jill Stein A
 Barak Obama F
 Mitt Romney F
 Gary Johnson F
 Virgil Goode F
 Rocky Anderson F

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Mike Ossipoff