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Jameson--<br><br>Yes, sorry to have again missed SODA in my list of FBC/AOC methods.<br><br>Methods involving delegation or proxy can do a good job of avoiding strategy problems. <br><br>I suggest that Proxy Direct Democracy, as I've described it during the last few months on EM, <br>is the obvious best form of government. (if count-validity can be assured) ...Let's let government catch up with technology.<br><br>Of course in Proxy DD, there'd still be single-winner choices among alternatives (but not candidates).<br>SODA, therefore, wouldn't be applicable in Proxy DD.<br><br>Under the present system of single-winner-elected representation, I include SODA among the good<br>FBC/ABE methods, even though I neglected to list it in my previous posting.<br><br>So I don't oppose or criticize SODA. I consider SODA less winnable than the simplest ballots-only FBC/ABE<br>methods. But that's just an individual subjective impression, not supported by polling. Well, yes I did<br>talk to a few people unfamiliar with voting systems, and they didn't like SODA because it was a bit<br>complicated, and because the weren't used to deciding elections by anyone other than the voters<br>themselves.<br><br>So I personally feel that SODA will be a harder sell. I've had a few conversations to back up that impression,<br>but I'm the first to admit that there has been no genuinely useful polling on the matter.<br><br>We should do polling about which FBC/ABE methods people will accept. Only then can reliable<br>statements be made on that matter, and regarding the matter of which proposal would be best.<br><br>But there's a much more important and immediate polling need:<br><br>We must poll people about which 2012 presidential candidates they like. Preferably rank-balloting,<br>with sincere ranking requested. Tell voters to rank sincerely, to find out which candidate is the<br>best one that they can get.<br><br>Count the ballots by Condorcet-Schwartz-Top.<br><br>The main purpose would be to find a voted CW. If there is, instead, a circular tie, then the Schwartz set is the<br>natural place to look for the best candidate that one can get. The most favorite candidate in that set<br>seems the best one to support with out Plurality votes.<br><br>But it could be said that Beatpath looks for the Schwartz-set member most qualified to be in the Schwartz-set,<br>and so maybe Beatpath (Or the equivalent Schwartz-Sequential-Dropping (SSD) ) would be a good count method for that practical poll.<br><br>But even a Plurality poll would be useful. Assuming a 1-dimensional political spectrum, we could find the median candidate, and<br>give our Plurality support to hir.<br><br>Since legitimate single-winner reform advocates don't have the kind of money that FairVote has, it could be a very, very<br>long time before we get a better single-winner method. And likely it would start out only in local elections. Then it would<br>take even longer for it to replace Plurality in state and federal elections.<br><br>In stark contrast, we could effectively have Condorcet _immediately_, for 2012, if we did Condorcet polling to determine<br>the best candidate to whom to give our Plurality votes. <br><br>Condorcet for 2012! Let's do polling to make the best use of the voting system that we already have, Plurality.<br><br>And let's do such polling before all elections for state and national office.<br><br>We could simultaneously work for the enactment of better single-winner methods too, of course. But right now, in a <br>presidential election year, surely public effort should be toward using Plurality to elect the CW.<br><br>And no, don't assume that the CW is a Democrat or a Republican.<br><br>Mike Ossipoff<br><br><br><br><br><br> </div></body>
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