[EM] STAR Zero Cost Upgrades

[Forest Simmons]

If you can get STAR adopted, you have set the stage for more than you can
imagine at zero extra cost.

It's like getting a quantum computer to use as a typewriter. How did you do
it? And are you truly content just using it to make an occasional entry in
your journal?  ... happy it has a printer attached ... so much more legible
than your handwriting.

 Or like getting a precision 100 inch parabolic telescope mirror .. to cook
hot dogs in back yard picnics.

Or like getting a brand new Cadillac .... just to play the car radio.

If you had the candidate scores and all of the pairwise info needed for an
instant top two runoff, would you be content with an instant runoff between
the top two score candidates?

It's OK as far as it goes ... but the wasted opportunity is agonizing to
contemplate.

You set up the volley ball perfectly for your guy next to the net, but he
decides to float it over easy to the tall guy on the other side ... how
does that make you feel?

Since you have all of the instant runoff information at your fingertips,
now is your opportunity to make sure that every non-winning candidate is
eliminated democratically, which means only by majority decision.

Let's assume you have the instant runoff information in the form of a table
with two parallel columns ... both of them identical lists of the candidate
names in alphabetical order ... with arrows connecting candidate names in
the left column to those in the right column that they would defeat in an
instant runoff. [It only takes an instant to follow an arrow with your eye
from the left to the right column.]

Then after all of the scores have been counted, an efficient, orderly
ceremony for insuring our democratic dictum starts by lining up all of the
candidates in score order.

Label the candidate at the front of the line "front" by giving her a piece
of cardboard "front" on the front and velcro on the back. Consult your
instant runoff table to see which candidates (if any) are defeated by
"front" pairwise, i.e. in an instant runoff. Move these candidates (if
there are any) to the front of the line immediately behind "front" while
maintaining their relative order among themselves.

Now start a new line called "chain" by moving "front" to the nearby square
labeled "chain" on the floor. Transfer the "front" label to the candidate
at the front of what remains of the original line, and give a new label
"head" to the erstwhile "front".

Next, move the candidates (if any) defeated by the new "front" into
position immediately behind this new "front". Then move this new "front" to
the head or the tail of "chain" depending on whether or not it defeats
"head." Adjust labels by sending the "front"label back to the candidate at
the front of the first line, and making sure the "head" label is held by
the candidate at the head of the second line (the "chain").

>From here on, now that we have more than one candidate in the chain ...

First check to see if "front" from the shrinking line can be accommodated
into the growing chain in such a way that it is defeated by every candidate
ahead of it, while defeating every candidate behind it. If not, it is
thanked for its service and dismissed. Note that this dismissal is by
democratic instant runoff defeat l: if it were not pairwise defeated by
some other candidate, it would have been accommodated as "head" of "chain"
instead of being thanked and dismissed.

If "front" can be accommodated into "chain" it first moves its defeated
candidates (if any) into position immediately behind it, before bidding
them adieu and moving into its rightful place in "chain."

Each such stage shrinks the original line by one candidate (namely,
"front") ... fitting it into "chain" when possible, or thanking and
dismissing it, otherwise.

When the candidate line is totally depleted, "chain" is complete, and
"head" defeats each of the other "chain" members.

In sum, the dismissed candidates have all been democratically defeated, and
so have all of the chain members except for "head", which leaves only
"head" itself to be elected.

This little drama takes only a few minutes to rôle play once the pairwise
table and the candidate scores have been tallied ... the exact same
information needed for the STAR runoff ... no extra cost for an edifying
drama that elects the "true majority winner" when there is one, and the
next best thing, otherwise.

-Forest
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