Also, let me take this moment to address yet another thing that I think is a problem with your voting system.
Let's say there are, I don't know, 16 candidates running for an office. I decide that I'm going to do the classic "child pushing every button in an elevator" play and fill in every single bubble, because weeeeeee! Bubbles! So I've cast a vote for all 16 candidates. So I've voted 16 times.
Let's say a second person, he's just doesn't give a crap about the election. This one seems ok. This one seems ok. This other person's alright. He just says screw it, can't be bothered, so he votes for all three. So he's voted 3 times.
Then the third person comes in, registered party member, very much ideologically in line with one of the parties, this candidate is perfect, exactly what he/she has been waiting to come along, and that person votes for that one candidate and no others. So he/she has voted once.
So, I get 16 votes for being an ********, someone gets three votes for being apathetic, and the third person who actually cares and exhibits a strong preference gets 1 vote.
If you have to rank them all, the candidates the voter doesn't care or know about will likely be ranked in whatever order they're listed on the ballot, and it's hardly fair for Senator Aardvark to get higher ranking in the polls than Representative Zyzzyx simply due to listing order.
Our ballots are randomised for exactly this reason. Is that not standard?
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Quote from MD »
I am willing to bet my collection that Frozen and Solid are not on the same card. For example, Frozen Tomb and Solid Wall.
If Frozen Solid is not reprinted, you are aware that I'm quoting you in my sig for eternity?
You're implying a false dichotomy. Just because voters can choose to vote however they wish, and the voting system does not explicitly disadvantage third parties does not mean it doesn't disadvantage third parties.
Yes, but the disadvantage you cite has thusfar been that the third parties don't get as much support from the populace.
And, while that is a disadvantage, it's a disadvantage on par with one football team having much less skilled players than another football team. Namely, it's not unfair for the team that's less skilled to lose to the more skilled team. That's the point of a contest of athleticism, the team that displayed greater athleticism should win.
Stop saying this, I've addressed it already. It's a misrepresentation of my argument and that should be clear from what I've said.
You yourself said this was a valid argument:
there's something inherent to the system that makes it unnecessarily restrictive
And I told you this is what I was arguing- that without preferential voting people are restricted in a way that generally disadvantages third parties.
I am. The fact that the elections are free is a glaring problem with your argument. You're claiming the system is unfair when it's working exactly how a vote should be working.
It's obvious that free elections are more fair than non free elections and that the US voting system is free. That's not under dispute. But it's simply false to say that just because elections are free the voting system is fair. You're not addressing why I am wrong in claims about why there is a certain unfairness to the system, you're just introducing concepts that distract from the point at hand. If talking about free elections was being use in an attempt to discredit my claims, actually directing toward my claims, that would be absolutely fine, but you arguing that- you're just saying it's free therefore it's fair.
It doesn't matter whether third parties would necessarily get more success
Seems to matter to you. You appear to be selling this voting system on the promise that third parties will get more votes. Seemed to me that was your intention.
Highroller, 'necessarily' is a fairly specific term. Generally or situationally getting something is quite fundamentally different to necessarily getting it. Benefit to third parties is not the complete picture of my argument, and I told you in this exact paragraph the detail of that.
My argument is by general principle, third parties rely more on getting initial support from people already invested in politics to build enough exposure and perception of relevance to get more dedicated support. It's incredibly hard to break the major parties in America for this reason. Preferential voting doesn't guarantee change, but it allows it to happen in cases where I think it should, and secondarily I think on balance it's more beneficial than not to third parties.
See? Right here. "Benefit third parties" seems to be the entire point behind this system you're proposing.
If you ignore all the ways in which it's not, then sure. You're absolutely right.
"allows (change) to happen in cases where I think it should" is not equivalent to "just benefit third parties". Neither is "on balance it's more beneficial than not".
I am talking about making things a little bit fairer overall for third parties, not just giving them benefits for the sake of it. That should be clear from what I just said here, because that is pretty much exactly what I just said here.
Now, crafting an entire system to the benefit of certain parties and the detriment of others
A strawman for the reasons above.
Note also that I am not crafting this system, this system is already in place in some form in a number of countries and is generally considered to be perfectly fair.
I am not just making up this idea to benefit third parties, and neither did the people who made voting systems incorporating this.
But even if we set that aside for now, let's look at the obvious flaw in what you're saying: the reason why third parties are not seen as relevant is because people choose voluntarily not to support them
You cannot use voter choice to defend your position. For the last time, hopefully, I am arguing that voter choices are restricted in a somewhat unfair manner by the US voting system, and that preferential voting provides a fairer system in this way. It's irrelevant what voters choose, this is about how the system affects that. You tell me third parties don't get votes, I'll tell you that's the whole point, that they should generally be getting more but the system restricts that. I don't want to have to repeat myself on this again.
No, I'm not. As I said, you only need to get the support to become a major party in the first place. After that, you have a privileged status of media and public attention.
You're right, the media and public do tend to focus on things that large numbers of people care about and don't tend to focus on things that only a very small percentage of people care about. Not sure why that's a problem.
Votes are far from an accurate measure of what people care about. For god's sake, like 40% of eligible voters in the US don't vote. That can't possibly be a reliable enough measure, even ignoring the whole point I'm making here about the influence of the voting system and the relationship to other societal factors on major parties vs third parties.
Yes, they need to receive a certain amount of support to continue to be a major party, but it's much less difficult to maintain the necessary support once you've gotten to be major party.
You're right, it is easier to be politically relevant when 50% of the country supports you than when less than 4% of the country supports you. Again, not sure why that's a problem.
To repeat, you can't use the result of the system in question to prove the system is fair. That would only work if we assume the results are fair, which would be begging the question, now wouldn't it?
People have and continue to vote for major parties because other parties aren't major enough to receive their attention, or because they aren't major enough to be seen as relevant.
Yes, and they want to vote the party that actually stands a chance of winning over the party that doesn't. Again, I'm not sure why that's a problem
Because then people's votes are based upon a kind of political strategy, instead of being an accurate representation of their beliefs and interests. Because then people's votes got to a party they actually don't support the most, and nothing from those people goes to the party they do, and the third party does actually get support from the voting system that reflects their support from the actual beliefs of the populace.
How about that?
and moreover, I'm not sure why you think that people will magically stop doing this exact thing when you give them more votes.
Because the whole premise of this situation is removed- people no longer have to either vote to support the third party they support the most among the parties or express a preference between the major parties- they can do both, and in the order they think the two are most important.
People can go into every single election knowing nothing except they support a major party and not have to worry, and they don't have to do as much research to get to that position. Hell, people are influenced by their peers- group think supports major parties too.
This does not change under your system.
The context of that comment was about ways in which major parties get systemic benefits from their status regardless of their support. With preferential voting, voting in the manner described here is not mutually exclusive with supporting third parties, people who do this aren't eliminated from supporting major parties because of their commitment to the major party. It now actually matter what they think of parties other than their own.
Moreover, it makes it even clearer that you're creating your system with the expressed intent of benefiting certain political groups over others. How can you then proceed to label this as fair knowing your biases?
Because I'm not doing that. I am not creating this system, it was not created for that reason, and I am not arguing it is good for that reason. It's silly for me to be here arguing the US system has a certain unfairness towards third parties, and for you to act like all I am saying is benefit third parties. I have clearly been talking about system disadvantage, voter's ability to express their actual support, and fairness. I have mentioned all of these notions.
Let's say there are, I don't know, 16 candidates running for an office. I decide that I'm going to do the classic "child pushing every button in an elevator" play and fill in every single bubble, because weeeeeee! Bubbles! So I've cast a vote for all 16 candidates. So I've voted 16 times.
Let's say a second person, he's just doesn't give a crap about the election. This one seems ok. This one seems ok. This other person's alright. He just says screw it, can't be bothered, so he votes for all three. So he's voted 3 times.
Then the third person comes in, registered party member, very much ideologically in line with one of the parties, this candidate is perfect, exactly what he/she has been waiting to come along, and that person votes for that one candidate and no others. So he/she has voted once.
So, I get 16 votes for being an ********, someone gets three votes for being apathetic, and the third person who actually cares and exhibits a strong preference gets 1 vote.
Highroller, do you know how preferential voting works? Because, it doesn't sound like you do. Preferential voting is about voting for candidates in an order of preference, hence the name. A very long and complex vote like you describe here ultimately reduces to a vote for a single candidate, the preference list just means they are multiple candidates it could end up going to based on how successful they are. A more complex vote is just a more complex vote, it doesn't count for more, it just provides a more detailed description of the voters preferences than a simple vote.
That's fair to you? That makes an abundance of sense? That the guy who doesn't care has more influence than the person who does have a strong preference over the final vote, but the complete jerkass has more influence over the final outcome than either of them? That's utopia to you?
Do your research before you say this again.
Also, what do you plan on doing about write-in candidates? You do know you can write in anyone, right? You want to give people an unlimited number of votes with the potential for write-in? Yeah, have fun with that.
Look up how the voting system in Australia works please, then you have a reasonable idea of what this all actually means because you really shouldn't be having this conservation without looking at an example, because I'm not going to explain how preferential voting systems can work.
So originally having no idea what Preferential Voting was or how it worked I looked up Australia and found something really weird with the argument here. DJK3654, you're saying this will support third/minor parties, except when looking up Preferential Voting one of the main problems it claims to have is "It promotes a two-party system to the detriment of minor parties and independents." From what I can tell(and this may be horribly wrong) you would effectively remove the concept of protest votes for third parties. Right now one of the main reasons to vote for a third party is because they take a stand on a specific(or multiple) issues that the major parties either shy away from or aren't to your liking. By voting for the third party you are telling the major parties that they need to look at this issue and make it important to them or they will continue to lose votes that 'should' have gone to them. The Preferential Voting systems gives them your vote anyways, assuming you ranked them higher than the group you actively oppose. It sounds like it would further insulate the major parties so that they never have to fear a smaller party stealing their votes causing a loss to the other party. If this is wrong could you explain how you believe this would help the smaller parties because the only information I could find seems to contradict this stance.
Looking at the voting math side of things as I was thinking about it earlier and about an idea of being able to place more than one vote ranked accordingly by whom would be first choice, and whom would be second (will limit this to 2 picks for simplicity). If the first choice (and I have zero idea how this actually works, so I'm just putting this out there to see if I am getting anywhere near close to what the OP was getting at) was worth say, 2 points, and the second choice was worth say 1 point, there certainly are scenarios where a bit of a crazy situation could happen with a third party candidate.
(This is all theoretical based upon the above so just keep that in mind, once again the OP can clarify if I am anywhere close at all).
So say you have an election, where the country is largely split as it has been evenly between the two major parties, under such situations both of the major parties would get very close to 50% each of the total votes cast for something like president, with a third party getting a few percent in there somewhere. Now lets say under the above mentioned situation you have two choices, the first ranked choice getting 2 points, and the second ranked choice getting 1 point. Now lets say that you have each person actually choosing a first and second ranked choice. If you figure that most will stick their primary first ranked vote with one of the two major parties, thus keeping it largely how it is now, the second ranked vote could have the potential to have significant impact if, say, you ended up with a scenario where a third party candidate was considered a reasonable second rank choice by nearly everyone.
In such an instance you have by the math a situation where you could have say, 47% major party 1 first ranked, 47% major party 2 first ranked, and 6% third party first ranked, but then you add the second ranked votes, where you have say, 3% major party 1 second ranked, 3% major party 2 second ranked, and potentially 94% third party second ranked. Going by the point system, you end up with the following:
Major Party 1: (47% first ranked x 2 points) + (3% second ranked x 1 point) = 97 points
Major Party 2: (47% first ranked x 2 points) + (3% second ranked x 1 point) = 97 points
Third Party: (6% first ranked x 2 points) + (94% second ranked x 1 point) = 106 points
Suddenly you have the potential for a third party candidate to be able to win if their message was balanced enough to get that much of the second ranked voting in the style as mentioned above (once again this is all theoretical, but just looking at numbers only).
Would anything like this ever happen under such a system... Who knows honestly, the more potential ranked votes you have and the more potential parties (if you go above 3 with any significant chance), the greater the likelihood it would seem that it would revert to the standard setup we already currently have.
Once again the OP can certainly respond as to whether I was even close at all, I just enjoy doing the math on such ideas, and figured I would post on what I was thinking about, and hey, If I'm way off on the overall, then that is 100% fine, I just wanted to throw the above out there in case it could add to the discussion at all.
That's not how existing Preferential Voting functions, if its how the OP envisioned it then it would be interesting to here their explanation on how it could work. In the current system you rank all nominees then if no one wins(50%+1 in rank 1) then the lowest scoring nominees' votes are given to their second choice, then if no one wins the new lowest is given to the next choice(skipping candidates that have already been considered non-valid), until a candidate has 50%+1. This system seems best for establishing 2 dominate parties but is fairly irrelevant when you already have 2 dominate parties. It makes sure that no lesser party wins just because they have a majority, something like 30% of the votes, but are disliked by 50% of the electorate.
Ok, do not complain about my misrepresenting your argument and then act like I'm supporting you. You're saying it's "unnecessarily restrictive" and wrong to give each person one vote. I'm saying this argument is asinine. Let's get it together here.
And I told you this is what I was arguing- that without preferential voting people are restricted in a way that generally disadvantages third parties.
If you're complaining about how this current voting system because it promotes a two-party system to the detriment of third parties and independents, well, it would seem you're going about this the wrong way.
Quote from Advantages of the Preferential System »
4. It promotes a strong two-party system, ensuring stability in the parliamentary process.
Quote from Disadvantages of the Preferential System »
3. It promotes a two-party system to the detriment of minor parties and independents.
OOOOPS!
You're saying that the problem is people end up voting for a candidate that doesn't necessarily reflect their values exactly due to that candidate having a greater chance of winning, and your response to this is to propose we shift to the Australian voting system... In which your vote ends up getting reallocated to one of the parties that actually has a chance of winning.
So instead of people reallocating their votes by choice, you want the government to reallocate their votes for them. That does not make any sense.
Because then people's votes are based upon a kind of political strategy, instead of being an accurate representation of their beliefs and interests. Because then people's votes got to a party they actually don't support the most, and nothing from those people goes to the party they do, and the third party does actually get support from the voting system that reflects their support from the actual beliefs of the populace.
How about that?
Are you seriously suggesting, sir, that people might actually alter their strategy based on how a political system works in order that they might increase their chances of getting what they want? SHOCKING!
For goodness sakes, man, why do you think parties exist in the first place? Do you think it's because they're Constitutionally mandated? Hint: they aren't. They exist because people recognize that in any representative government based on majority vote, you need a large group of people who are willing to work together to get anything done, because the system is designed so that things don't happen unless you have that. So unless you have that, nothing gets done. So people naturally must band together in order to to see certain things get accomplished. As such, it is necessary in America to group together under common ideologies, which is why parties form. Not everyone in a party agrees 100% with everything the party does or expresses ideologically, but they're willing to work together under a common banner to see their common interests get met. This is Politics 101.
Not to mention, if you're complaining about the fact that people end up voting for someone who doesn't necessarily match their ideological views because he has a greater chance of winning, that's exactly what the hell happens under the Australian voting system. That's fundamentally how it works. If you're complaining about how people vote Republican instead of Libertarian or Democrat instead of Green Party because that party at least has some chance of winning, THAT'S PRECISELY WHAT'S GOING TO HAPPEN UNDER THE AUSTRALIAN SYSTEM! All of their votes are going to eventually get reallocated to the Republican or Democratic party anyway.
The context of that comment was about ways in which major parties get systemic benefits from their status regardless of their support.
No, you are once again ignoring that their status IS BECAUSE of their support. There are places in which third parties at the local level are significant presences because they have a significant basis of support. They're not at the presidency because they never get anywhere close to that level of support.
And there's a reason for this. Most third parties that rise to prominence tend to run towards extreme positions, or focus around one specific position around an issue that the two major parties aren't addressing. The reason they don't get elected is because third parties tend to either alienate people based on their extreme positions in the former case, or in the latter case, that issue ends up being addressed and the third party ends up being absorbed into one of the two major ones.
And also, once again, the Australian system does not fix this. It just creates a system to reallocate the votes to the major parties.
I have clearly been talking about system disadvantage, voter's ability to express their actual support, and fairness. I have mentioned all of these notions.
Except this again this is silly, given that the voters end up having their votes reallocated anyway. If your problem is that people who want a third party to win often will vote for another party that actually stands a chance of winning to at least see the changes they want, then it really makes no sense for you to propose we shift to another system that is based entirely around that very concept. Now instead of a percentage of voters who support a third party choosing to vote for a party that has a greater chance of winning in order to maximize their likelihood of getting the things they want to happen to happen, ALL of them are going to end up voting for one of the two major parties anyway because the government shifted their votes.
And I'm also going to ask about protest votes: what if someone chooses to vote for a third party and expresses a preference for none of the others? What if I want my vote to count for this person, but I only want this person and none of the others? I presume this is still possible, but like, in the US, votes for a third party like the Libertarian or the Green Party remain votes for that party. They don't get shifted around. So if you want representation, it would seem that's an instance in which the US voting system more accurately reflects the way people have chosen to vote.
Ok, do not complain about my misrepresenting your argument and then act like I'm supporting you. You're saying it's "unnecessarily restrictive" and wrong to give each person one vote. I'm saying this argument is asinine. Let's get it together here.
You said "You can say that maybe there's something inherent to the system that makes it unnecessarily restrictive, and there would be a debate there, but right now, you're essentially saying that the unfair thing is that only the parties that get large amounts of votes win in a contest involving voting"
I am telling you my argument is the first one, but you seem to keep referencing my argument as if it's the second.
And I told you this is what I was arguing- that without preferential voting people are restricted in a way that generally disadvantages third parties.
If you're complaining about how this current voting system because it promotes a two-party system to the detriment of third parties and independents, well, it would seem you're going about this the wrong way.
That's not exactly what I am arguing, I told you it was about fairness and voter choice in relation to third parties. Benefit to third parties is merely a secondary consideration in my argument.
Quote from Advantages of the Preferential System »
4. It promotes a strong two-party system, ensuring stability in the parliamentary process.
Quote from Disadvantages of the Preferential System »
3. It promotes a two-party system to the detriment of minor parties and independents.
OOOOPS!
[/quote]
Directing your attention to the page you just linked, you may notice this interesting point:
It ensures that voters can support minor parties and independent candidates, knowing that their preferences may be used to decide the winner. Thus, votes for minor parties and independents are not wasted.
THAT is what I have just spent the last few posts telling you I am actually arguing whenever you say I am just trying to benefit third parties. I will admit I am also claiming benefit to third parties, and this page does seem to disagree on that point, but I suspect it means it terms of candidates getting elected. because of people's freedom to vote for third party as well as main party, I think it means third parties get much more influence on the main points, as well as general public recognition. I am not sure therefore, that it is more difficult for third parties to get elected overall because while the way votes get distributed may (I say may, I haven't looked very much into this) mean less chance of third party victory, I think the system promotes much more third party presence. I am pretty sure that overall it doesn't hurt third parties, even if it hurts their election chances, because of other benefits to third parties.
Also do note, that I am not talking about the Australian preferential voting system, but the idea of a preferential voting system in general. I am not arguing the US voting system should necessarily work exactly like the Australian system. If there is a problem with the Australian system compared to the US system and there is a way to maintain the US advantage while incorporating preferential voting, then I am all for changing both. Keep that in mind with all of these points.
You're saying that the problem is people end up voting for a candidate that doesn't necessarily reflect their values exactly due to that candidate having a greater chance of winning, and your response to this is to propose we shift to the Australian voting system... In which your vote ends up getting reallocated to one of the parties that actually has a chance of winning.
Yes, because they can also express a preference for the third party they support in doing so. You can express support for the third party AND actually substantially influence the election. And that matters, even if their votes for third parties just get redistributed, because that first choice is reported on and that shows other people the third party support.
So instead of people reallocating their votes by choice, you want the government to reallocate their votes for them. That does not make any sense.
No, the government does not relocate their votes if you use your preferences well, then you get to specify exactly the order for your vote to be relocated, and thereby show clearly what your support is for each of those parties.
Because then people's votes are based upon a kind of political strategy, instead of being an accurate representation of their beliefs and interests. Because then people's votes got to a party they actually don't support the most, and nothing from those people goes to the party they do, and the third party does actually get support from the voting system that reflects their support from the actual beliefs of the populace.
How about that?
Are you seriously suggesting, sir, that people might actually alter their strategy based on how a political system works in order that they might increase their chances of getting what they want? SHOCKING!
I'm not saying it's bad that people choose to do that, or that it happens, but the extent to which it takes away from the vote representing the interests of the people. The vote is supposed to keep the government supporting the interests of the people, not be a little political game for voters.
Not to mention, if you're complaining about the fact that people end up voting for someone who doesn't necessarily match their ideological views because he has a greater chance of winning, that's exactly what the hell happens under the Australian voting system. That's fundamentally how it works. If you're complaining about how people vote Republican instead of Libertarian or Democrat instead of Green Party because that party at least has some chance of winning, THAT'S PRECISELY WHAT'S GOING TO HAPPEN UNDER THE AUSTRALIAN SYSTEM! All of their votes are going to eventually get reallocated to the Republican or Democratic party anyway.
Much of the time, yes, but their preference is expressed. A statement is made that, for example, this many Labor voters support the Greens more so than Labor, therefore Labor should listen to what the Greens are saying. The third party does not need to be elected to have an influence, because their preference numbers present a real show of support, and one that can threaten the main parties if they do not pay attention to it.
The context of that comment was about ways in which major parties get systemic benefits from their status regardless of their support.
No, you are once again ignoring that their status IS BECAUSE of their support.
No, I am not. It results from support. Of course it does. But it is power that gives you MORE support based on how your existing support has larger effects.
And there's a reason for this. Most third parties that rise to prominence tend to run towards extreme positions, or focus around one specific position around an issue that the two major parties aren't addressing. The reason they don't get elected is because third parties tend to either alienate people based on their extreme positions in the former case, or in the latter case, that issue ends up being addressed and the third party ends up being absorbed into one of the two major ones.
And also, once again, the Australian system does not fix this. It just creates a system to reallocate the votes to the major parties.
I have neither said anything about getting elected. Benefit means more than getting elected. Namely, the idea of influence of the major parties and public recognition.
I have clearly been talking about system disadvantage, voter's ability to express their actual support, and fairness. I have mentioned all of these notions.
Except this again this is silly, given that the voters end up having their votes reallocated anyway. If your problem is that people who want a third party to win often will vote for another party that actually stands a chance of winning to at least see the changes they want, then it really makes no sense for you to propose we shift to another system that is based entirely around that very concept. Now instead of a percentage of voters who support a third party choosing to vote for a party that has a greater chance of winning in order to maximize their likelihood of getting the things they want to happen to happen, ALL of them are going to end up voting for one of the two major parties anyway because the government shifted their votes.
And all of them can do so while still showing support for the third party. You don't have to choose between making a statement and voting to make a difference. Your vote that makes your statement gets relocated to make a difference as well.
Let's just be clear about this, as my initial statement in the OP indicates, the affect on third parties overall, not just the benefit to them, is secondary. The most important point about preferential voting system is how it allows people to express their preferences in detail, the next point of order is how that relates to third party supporter's choices, and the next one after that is the idea that it will produce some overall benefit to third parties influence.
Okay, I think I get it now based upon that post. Your goal with the ranking system then would be to give people more freedom to be willing to vote for a third party candidate as their primary (first ranked) choice, knowing that worse comes to worst and the third party candidate they first-ranked voted for doesn't have enough support to win or be in the top two, their second ranked vote would then go towards one of the top two to be able to still influence and not be "wasted" as many view such votes for those outside of the top two parties, which could have the result of increasing the percentage of first ranked voting for the third parties and remove the influence of votes outside of the top two parties acting as potentially unintended spoilers when much of that vote may be drawn from one party or the other of the top two.
Its certainly interesting I'll give it that, I'm still not sure I personally see a problem with our existing system, but assuming I now correctly understand where you are coming from, that at least gives a greater basis to discuss that part of the topic further.
No, the government does not relocate their votes if you use your preferences well, then you get to specify exactly the order for your vote to be relocated, and thereby show clearly what your support is for each of those parties.
And then those in charge of tallying the votes reallocate them. This is what I mean by the government reallocating your votes.
So you're saying it's bad that people cast their vote for certain parties based on those parties actually being competitive for the vote... and then you talk about shifting to a system in which the government reallocates your votes to the actual competitive parties, which is not only what this system does, but the principle upon which it is built on.
That makes no sense whatsoever. I mean, I guess it's less effort on your part, "Why reallocate your vote when the government will do it for you?", but it's effectively the same damn thing.
Yes, because they can also express a preference for the third party they support in doing so.
Yes. Whoop-de-doo. Congratulations, you voted for a third party. Now we're going to switch your vote to one for one of the two dominant parties, so your vote counts for them instead of the third party you voted for.
Again, your problem is that people who vote for a third party are motivated to switch their votes to a party that is actually competitive, and so your solution to this is to change our voting system to a system where everyone who voted for a third party in a race in which the third parties aren't competitive will have their votes changed to a party that is actually competitive. That makes no sense. None. "This thing that people do is a problem. I will instate a system in which it happens 100% of the time." No sense whatsoever.
Also, not only is this not actually more representative in practice, it's debatable whether this is representative in theory. At least when you vote for someone in our elections, your vote continues to count for the same person by the end of it.
No, the government does not relocate their votes if you use your preferences well, then you get to specify exactly the order for your vote to be relocated, and thereby show clearly what your support is for each of those parties.
And then those in charge of tallying the votes reallocate them. This is what I mean by the government reallocating your votes.
But the only person with power over the reallocation of votes are the voters. And the tallying is done by an independent body from the rest of the government, so describing it as 'the government' is misleading.
So you're saying it's bad that people cast their vote for certain parties based on those parties actually being competitive for the vote
No, I have been saying it's bad you can't both make a competitive choice and a more ideological choice, that you have to pick between one or the other.
Yes, because they can also express a preference for the third party they support in doing so.
Yes. Whoop-de-doo. Congratulations, you voted for a third party. Now we're going to switch your vote to one for one of the two dominant parties, so your vote counts for them instead of the third party you voted for.
Your vote is only switched at the point where it can no longer matter except as a protest vote. Your vote will not be redistributed if the third party could win with it. So it amounts to the same thing a vote for third party in the US does- a expression of support for the third party, while also counting toward the contest between the major parties.
Also, not only is this not actually more representative in practice, it's debatable whether this is representative in theory. At least when you vote for someone in our elections, your vote continues to count for the same person by the end of it.
Your primary vote does not disappear from existence. It is still on record and reported on, and that matters. Which is as much as you can say for third party votes in the US as well. It doesn't matter if by the end of it it doesn't count towards the parties total if that makes no difference to anything, and it doesn't, because, if the third party was going win, if wouldn't get redistributed in the first place and the third party does win.
By the way, I don't know if you noticed this, but if you reread that thing again:
It ensures that voters can support minor parties and independent candidates, knowing that their preferences may be used to decide the winner. Thus, votes for minor parties and independents are not wasted.
Like, read it closely.
It's saying that a vote for a minor party or independent candidate would be wasted UNLESS it were switched to a major party candidate.
In other words, a vote for a third party candidate is useless either way. It's only if it's a vote for an actually viable candidate - whether it started out as such or was switched into being one - that the vote isn't wasted.
In other words, I don't think this system works the way you thought it did.
But the only person with power over the reallocation of votes are the voters. And the tallying is done by an independent body from the rest of the government, so describing it as 'the government' is misleading.
Ok, then the voting tally people are doing it. The point remains: whether the people who are voting decide to vote for the major parties, or their vote gets switched to the major parties, in the end, it's the exact same damn thing. It's just that one has a middle man and the other does not.
So if you're objecting to people voting for the major parties because those are the ones with an actual chance of winning, as opposed to third parties which have no chance of winning, then touting this system as a solution to that is weird, in an ass-backwards sort of way, because saying, "No! I don't want third party voters to switch their votes for the dominant two parties, I WANT SOMEONE ELSE TO DO IT FOR THEM!" doesn't seem to actually accomplish anything meaningful here.
No, I have been saying it's bad you can't both make a competitive choice and a more ideological choice, that you have to pick between one or the other.
But it doesn't actually matter either way. Your vote still doesn't actually end up counting for the party you want, it ends up ultimately counting for the party that was never your first choice.
In that sense, our system is more representative. The people who really wanted to vote for the third party have their votes actually count for the third party. It's not, "Oh ok, you 'voted for a third party,' but nah, just kidding, you're voting the dominant parties."
Your vote is only switched at the point where it can no longer matter except as a protest vote. Your vote will not be redistributed if the third party could win with it. So it amounts to the same thing a vote for third party in the US does- a expression of support for the third party, while also counting toward the contest between the major parties.
So in essence, "It's the exact same thing as the system I'm objecting to, unless the third party won't win, in which case the thing I'm objecting to will happen."
I'm not sure you've really thought this argument through.
You're saying that the problem is people end up voting for a candidate that doesn't necessarily reflect their values exactly due to that candidate having a greater chance of winning, and your response to this is to propose we shift to the Australian voting system... In which your vote ends up getting reallocated to one of the parties that actually has a chance of winning.
So instead of people reallocating their votes by choice, you want the government to reallocate their votes for them. That does not make any sense.
How much have you read about election law and election reform outside this thread?
I feel that at this point this needs to be asked if you are making a statement so staggeringly obtuse because that's not how any other voting system works that's either being discussed in this thread or in full effect in other parts of the world. Also, transferable votes is everything that the US third parties want because they would allow candidates to run in races that are three or higher without fear of being pinned a spoiler candidate, which could have far-reaching implications on US politics.
As for my personal opinion since to the OP is this is my first post in the thread, the American Voting System (aka First past the post) is something I think the United States should abolish, and honestly, I have no qualms with allowing people to vote for all candidates they want to rather than just one and resolve any ties with a runoff election, although ranked choice voting works as well.
I feel that at this point this needs to be asked if you are making a statement so staggeringly obtuse because that's not how any other voting system works that's either being discussed in this thread or in full effect in other parts of the world.
Or, alternatively, you could point out exactly how I'm being wrong instead of just saying, "no you're wrong," and then we might have a remote chance of a productive discussion.
By the way, I don't know if you noticed this, but if you reread that thing again:
It ensures that voters can support minor parties and independent candidates, knowing that their preferences may be used to decide the winner. Thus, votes for minor parties and independents are not wasted.
Like, read it closely.
It's saying that a vote for a minor party or independent candidate would be wasted UNLESS it were switched to a major party candidate.
In other words, a vote for a third party candidate is useless either way. It's only if it's a vote for an actually viable candidate - whether it started out as such or was switched into being one - that the vote isn't wasted.
In other words, I don't think this system works the way you thought it did.
No, that's exactly how I think it works.
Quote from me:
No, I have been saying it's bad you can't both make a competitive choice and a more ideological choice, that you have to pick between one or the other.
I have never claimed third party votes will not often end up changing nothing. Third parties don't usually win, that's why they are third parties. What I am claiming is it gives you more say by allowing you to express the equivalent of multiple ways one could vote to express their position in the US system.
Quote from DJK3654 »
But the only person with power over the reallocation of votes are the voters. And the tallying is done by an independent body from the rest of the government, so describing it as 'the government' is misleading.
Ok, then the voting tally people are doing it. The point remains: whether the people who are voting decide to vote for the major parties, or their vote gets switched to the major parties, in the end, it's the exact same damn thing. It's just that one has a middle man and the other does not.
No, it's not because:
Your primary vote does not disappear from existence. It is still on record and reported on, and that matters. Which is as much as you can say for third party votes in the US as well. It doesn't matter if by the end of it it doesn't count towards the parties total if that makes no difference to anything, and it doesn't, because, if the third party was going win, if wouldn't get redistributed in the first place and the third party does win.
Don't ignore my argument.
So if you're objecting to people voting for the major parties because those are the ones with an actual chance of winning, as opposed to third parties which have no chance of winning, then touting this system as a solution to that is weird, in an ass-backwards sort of way, because saying, "No! I don't want third party voters to switch their votes for the dominant two parties, I WANT SOMEONE ELSE TO DO IT FOR THEM!" doesn't seem to actually accomplish anything meaningful here.
So you are telling me the system works exactly how I have been saying it does and how I want it to, and then you say that fact is a counter to my objections with the US system?
Interesting approach.
Let me reiterate, because you have yet to respond accurately around this point:
it's bad you can't both make a competitive choice and a more ideological choice, that you have to pick between one or the other
That does not say 'it's bad that people make a competitive choice', that says I actively want people to be able to do it. You quoted this in your response, immediately after the section I am responding to here, but yet you think I am "objecting to people voting for the major parties because those are the ones with an actual chance of winning"?
No, I have been saying it's bad you can't both make a competitive choice and a more ideological choice, that you have to pick between one or the other.
But it doesn't actually matter either way. Your vote still doesn't actually end up counting for the party you want, it ends up ultimately counting for the party that was never your first choice.
I have responded to this already, don't ignore my argument.
Your vote is only switched at the point where it can no longer matter except as a protest vote. Your vote will not be redistributed if the third party could win with it. So it amounts to the same thing a vote for third party in the US does- a expression of support for the third party, while also counting toward the contest between the major parties.
So in essence, "It's the exact same thing as the system I'm objecting to, unless the third party won't win, in which case the thing I'm objecting to will happen."
I'm not sure you've really thought this argument through.
No, in essence, you can do the equivalent of a third party vote in the US (that doesn't change the result, but makes a statement) and make a vote to express an impactful preference between the major parties. This quote you are responding to explicitly details why I think a third party vote on a preference list does matter as well as the deferral to a major party, but you've just ignored that argument.
It seems that everything you are pushing for is summed up here
THAT is what I have just spent the last few posts telling you I am actually arguing whenever you say I am just trying to benefit third parties. I will admit I am also claiming benefit to third parties, and this page does seem to disagree on that point, but I suspect it means it terms of candidates getting elected. because of people's freedom to vote for third party as well as main party, I think it means third parties get much more influence on the main points, as well as general public recognition. I am not sure therefore, that it is more difficult for third parties to get elected overall because while the way votes get distributed may (I say may, I haven't looked very much into this) mean less chance of third party victory, I think the system promotes much more third party presence. I am pretty sure that overall it doesn't hurt third parties, even if it hurts their election chances, because of other benefits to third parties.
Also do note, that I am not talking about the Australian preferential voting system, but the idea of a preferential voting system in general. I am not arguing the US voting system should necessarily work exactly like the Australian system. If there is a problem with the Australian system compared to the US system and there is a way to maintain the US advantage while incorporating preferential voting, then I am all for changing both. Keep that in mind with all of these points.
Basically you want preferential voting so that third parties can get their 'actual' support even if it is less than necessary to be elected because then everyone can actually see how much support they have rather than the current system where they only get as much support as people who are willing to throw away their vote in protest. The point of this would be that major parties would then see this support and 'maybe' change their position on some policies. While currently this will happen if enough people protest vote to cost the 'similar' major party to lose to the other major party, they are then forced to change to get back the protest votes. However the preferential voting system doesn't actually encourage major parties to change at all, it actually encourages them to stay the same "the opposite of the other major party" because then you are guaranteed to get all the votes that are 'against' the other major party I don't know enough about current systems that use this to know how they actually function rather than theoretically function, but logically the preferential system discourages change while the current system only encourages change when a 'significant'(enough to cause you to lose) minority pushes for it or when the majority has actually shifted.
It can be summed up as preferential=everyone knows your preferences but it doesn't really matter at all, while FPTP=only certain people make their preference known and it rarely matters. Neither seem preferable but I would go with the one where your preferences can matter.
It seems that everything you are pushing for is summed up here
THAT is what I have just spent the last few posts telling you I am actually arguing whenever you say I am just trying to benefit third parties. I will admit I am also claiming benefit to third parties, and this page does seem to disagree on that point, but I suspect it means it terms of candidates getting elected. because of people's freedom to vote for third party as well as main party, I think it means third parties get much more influence on the main points, as well as general public recognition. I am not sure therefore, that it is more difficult for third parties to get elected overall because while the way votes get distributed may (I say may, I haven't looked very much into this) mean less chance of third party victory, I think the system promotes much more third party presence. I am pretty sure that overall it doesn't hurt third parties, even if it hurts their election chances, because of other benefits to third parties.
Also do note, that I am not talking about the Australian preferential voting system, but the idea of a preferential voting system in general. I am not arguing the US voting system should necessarily work exactly like the Australian system. If there is a problem with the Australian system compared to the US system and there is a way to maintain the US advantage while incorporating preferential voting, then I am all for changing both. Keep that in mind with all of these points.
Basically you want preferential voting so that third parties can get their 'actual' support even if it is less than necessary to be elected because then everyone can actually see how much support they have rather than the current system where they only get as much support as people who are willing to throw away their vote in protest. The point of this would be that major parties would then see this support and 'maybe' change their position on some policies. While currently this will happen if enough people protest vote to cost the 'similar' major party to lose to the other major party, they are then forced to change to get back the protest votes.
The protest votes rarely have sufficient volume to concern much concern in the US as far as I am aware.
However the preferential voting system doesn't actually encourage major parties to change at all, it actually encourages them to stay the same "the opposite of the other major party" because then you are guaranteed to get all the votes that are 'against' the other major party
Except the third party voters usually want change and change in specific areas. People are fine with the status quote are generally going to want to vote for a major party.
Example here, going off somewhat the example I used earlier and because it's one of the strongest ones, the Greens party support Labor over the Liberals, but a major part of the Greens platform is environmental issues, which means change. The Greens vote going to Labor is significantly based around Labor's history of more active climate change action. If that stops, Greens voters may vote liberal higher based on a number of other issues, such as for example right now the leader of the Liberal party and Prime Minister, Malcolm Turnbull, is somewhat popular among Greens and Labor voters, while Bill Shorten the Labor leader is often seen as uninspiring.
Take into account also the important element than a significant percentage of the vote is cases where the voters defer their reallocation preferences to the parties preferences, which means a third party can itself directly put pressure on a major party to maintain policies or support around issues.
the current system only encourages change when a 'significant'(enough to cause you to lose) minority pushes for it or when the majority has actually shifted.
But then it only encourages any change from those third parties that actually pose a threat and only when they do. Preferential voting means every party and there voter base's preferences matter effectively constantly. And overall I think that generates more exposure that drives more people to consider the third party and therefore put pressure on the major parties.
I think the culture of the preferential voting system at least can be more supportive of third parties.
It can be summed up as preferential=everyone knows your preferences but it doesn't really matter at all, while FPTP=only certain people make their preference known and it rarely matters. Neither seem preferable but I would go with the one where your preferences can matter.
Again, I don't think primary votes ever don't matter. They are a very tangible show of support. It makes harder for major parties to ignore third party's existence except when they think they are at threat.
No, I have been saying it's bad you can't both make a competitive choice and a more ideological choice, that you have to pick between one or the other.
But you end up picking between one or the other anyway.
Your vote does not count for both. You don't get two votes. You are forced to vote for one of the actually competitive parties after the choice you really want gets eliminated. You are forced to compromise.
And that's really it. You're complaining because people are forced to compromise, saying this is a horrible thing our system does. But it's not particular to our system, it's particular to all representative governments. The fact that we have parties at all is a result of the necessity to compromise that comes from any system in which majority vote is a determining factor of what gets done.
And the fact remains, if that's such a problem for you, this system does not solve it. It makes zero sense for you to complain about having to choose between the group that ideologically fits you and the group that actually has a chance of winning and then advocate a system that is entirely built around just that. It makes zero sense to complain about how people find themselves choosing to switch their votes from someone that ideologically fits them and the candidate that has a chance of winning and then advocate a system that is entirely built around that.
This system is doing exactly what it is you're complaining about. It's formulated to make people do the exact same things you don't want them to do. Ultimately they're the exact same thing in terms of result. All you've done is just add steps in between. The difference is nominal at best, and effectively nonexistent.
Moreover, user_938036 makes a very good point, if anything, this makes the system worse for third parties. In our system, a vote for a third party cannot count for either of the two major parties, and that constitutes a serious issue for the major parties if a race is close between the two major parties and one party finds themselves losing a lot of votes to a third party. At least in our system, the major party must make concessions to the third party voters in order to get them back on their side. In preferential voting, there's no such necessity for concession. There's no necessity for a party to adjust their strategy if they were to know that a person has to end up voting one of two parties and that person would definitely not vote the other one. That's effectively what this ends up being.
So in essence, you're crafting a system that benefits parties as opposed to voters. In our system, protest votes actually carry weight. They're not just nominal, they carry value. In our system, if someone doesn't vote for you, you don't get a chance to reclaim that vote, it's lost to you, so there's a lot of incentive upon you to give the person enough to get them to go along with you. And I would imagine that benefits the voter more. People side with certain parties because those parties have at least promised to enact changes that these voters want. In our system, there's a greater incentive for other parties to create concessions to try to bring voters over. But if the Republicans and the Democrats knew that all the protest votes for third parties were just going end up coming back to them anyway, why change? What, are all the Green Party people going to vote Republican? No, of course not. Are Libertarians going to support Democrats? No, of course not. So why change? If anything, this frees up the major parties to court those voters less, not more.
No, I have been saying it's bad you can't both make a competitive choice and a more ideological choice, that you have to pick between one or the other.
But you end up picking between one or the other anyway.
Your vote does not count for both. You don't get two votes. You are forced to vote for one of the actually competitive parties after the choice you really want gets eliminated. You are forced to compromise.
Highroller, you can't ignore the primary vote. I am repeatedly hammering you about the idea that the primary vote is important, and you just ignore it and act like it doesn't exist or doesn't matter. I'm not going to continue if you can't follow. I'm only going to repeat myself so many times.
For the last time, the primary vote of a preferential voting system matters because
1. It actually can determine elections, third parties do actually win.
2. It makes a statement
3. It gets publicity for the third party
And those three points are all you can really say of third party votes in the US, the only 'disadvantage' is the votes get transferred when they wouldn't matter anyway, making this 'drawback' moot.
And that's really it. You're complaining because people are forced to compromise, saying this is a horrible thing our system does. But it's not particular to our system, it's particular to all representative governments. The fact that we have parties at all is a result of the necessity to compromise that comes from any system in which majority vote is a determining factor of what gets done.
Don't give me a speech about the virtue of compromise, that's just red herring territory. Stay on point.
And the fact remains, if that's such a problem for you, this system does not solve it. It makes zero sense for you to complain about having to choose between the group that ideologically fits you and the group that actually has a chance of winning and then advocate a system that is entirely built around just that.
A system that's entirely built around combining the two.
So in essence, you're crafting a system that benefits parties as opposed to voters. In our system, protest votes actually carry weight. They're not just nominal, they carry value. In our system, if someone doesn't vote for you, you don't get a chance to reclaim that vote, it's lost to you, so there's a lot of incentive upon you to give the person enough to get them to go along with you. And I would imagine that benefits the voter more. People side with certain parties because those parties have at least promised to enact changes that these voters want. In our system, there's a greater incentive for other parties to create concessions to try to bring voters over. But if the Republicans and the Democrats knew that all the protest votes for third parties were just going end up coming back to them anyway, why change? What, are all the Green Party people going to vote Republican? No, of course not. Are Libertarians going to support Democrats? No, of course not. So why change? If anything, this frees up the major parties to court those voters less, not more.
Because, as I have already argued and you just ignored to reiterate what others have already said, there are other factors in play.
For those arguing that putting a preference for a third party doesn't matter because it'll be redistributed in a preferential voting system I'll present the case of a couple of federal parliament seats in Victoria.
For those unaware of Australian politics, main parties are Liberals (right-wing), Labor (left-wing) and the Greens (further left-wing, third party). So most seats would be Liberals vs Labor with Greens votes shifting to Labor.
For those seats (this has slowly built up over a few elections) the Greens primary vote has grown enough that the seats have turned into Labor vs Greens, with Liberal preferences deciding it.
The point being that being able to present a preference lets support for third parties to build up (without being a giant spoiler), and potentially flip around what the strongest two parties are in an area.
Highroller, you can't ignore the primary vote. I am repeatedly hammering you about the idea that the primary vote is important, and you just ignore it and act like it doesn't exist or doesn't matter.
Because it ultimately doesn't matter.
You trumpet this system as a great alternative to the current system because, in the instances in which the third party is not competitive, their votes get shifted over to one of the main parties, and what a wonderful thing this is, so much better than the US, in which... people shift their votes over to one of the main parties. Your position is: "I disagree with people shifting their votes, so I'm going to solve this problem... By having other people shift their votes for them."
And that's just being asinine.
But yes, your actual preference gets noted down. Which makes ultimately makes no difference whatsoever. I guess that does something for you, but what, exactly, is the profound difference in the end result? Answer: there isn't one!
It's like when a company puts your call on hold for half an hour, but there's a voice every so often that says, "Your call is important to us." You're arguing for how amazing this message is, so much better than if they just played hold music without that message, because this way, it demonstrates to people that their calls are important. But it doesn't! The difference is purely nominal. The same ******* thing whether it's there or not there! Ultimately, the person's call still gets ignored. The same result happens.
The point being that being able to present a preference lets support for third parties to build up (without being a giant spoiler), and potentially flip around what the strongest two parties are in an area.
Except there are areas in which the race is going to be between a Republican/Democrat and an Independent, with the Democrat/Republican candidate being a cypher. That happens at the local level, and at the Senate/House level.
The point I'm trying to make is there's no real effective difference here between the preferential voting and the US voting, and that DJK is complaining about certain realities about voting in the US that don't end up really changing under preferential voting.
Specifically, DJK is complaining about how people who are voting for a third party candidate in a situation in which the two major parties end up being overwhelmingly dominant must either vote for the third party and get blown out, or vote for one of the two major parties because those two are actually popular, and in so doing not vote for the party that's actually idealistically closer to them.
The problem with this is this situation is not at all solved by preferential voting, because the same damn thing happens. The only difference is both scenarios happen at the same time, so you still end up ultimately voting for the person whom you weren't really a match for idealistically. And he's trumpeting this like it's some great triumph. Yes, congratulations, instead of switching your vote to Joe Candidate as opposed to Third Party Option, someone else switched it for you. Boy, you sure beat the system there.
It's a completely baffling mindset to me, because he's expressing that it's a problem that people end up voting the candidate they don't really want, but his proposed solution is to make them have to do it anyway. It's like when someone tells a character in a sitcom to do something, and then the character does it, but retorts, "Alright, I'm doing it, BUT NOT BECAUSE YOU WANT ME TO!" And that's funny, but it's funny specifically because he's treating it like a victory when it isn't. He's still done the thing that the person asked him to do. The same result ended up happening. Yes, he expressed his grievance, but no one gives a damn. That's why it's comedy. Yet DJK doesn't get the joke.
Highroller, you can't ignore the primary vote. I am repeatedly hammering you about the idea that the primary vote is important, and you just ignore it and act like it doesn't exist or doesn't matter.
Because it ultimately doesn't matter.
You trumpet this system as a great alternative to the current system because, in the instances in which the third party is not competitive, their votes get shifted over to one of the main parties, and what a wonderful thing this is, so much better than the US, in which... people shift their votes over to one of the main parties. Your position is: "I disagree with people shifting their votes, so I'm going to solve this problem... By having other people shift their votes for them."
So, it's not important you could put a vote that could give a third party a win, and put a vote that favours a major party at the same time? And it's also not important to put a vote for a third party to make a statement and try to pressure the major parties, even if it doesn't affect the election. So, third party votes in general are not important? Because those are the only things a third party vote does in the US. Should we just get rid of third parties, while we are it?
So, it's not important you could put a vote that could give a third party a win, and put a vote that favours a major party at the same time?
It's not at the same time. For it to be the same time, you would need to give someone more than one vote. Your vote only ever counts for one party at a time, ultimately switching to a later party. The only effective difference between voting for a third party and then having it switch to a main party, or just voting for the main party because the main party is actually competitive is that there are more steps involved. You've taken up more time. That's it.
And it's also not important to put a vote for a third party to make a statement and try to pressure the major parties, even if it doesn't affect the election.
They do that here as well. Again, no effective difference. No difference in the ultimate outcome.
So, third party votes in general are not important? Because those are the only things a third party vote does in the US. Should we just get rid of third parties, while we are it?
I'm not saying we should. I'm saying there's absolutely no ultimate difference between what you're proposing and the things you're objecting to.
You're talking about how you don't like that people have to choose between supporting a third party or voting for an actual viable party in a race in which a third party isn't competitive, because then it's a choice between voting for the party or having to compromise and vote for a candidate who might not fit your ideals as closely as the first candidate. Except your proposed solution doesn't really solve that problem. You've just made the people who voted for their party ALSO people who compromise on their vote to support the viable candidate. You've neither increased the size of the first group nor decreased the size of the second group. You've instead made them all the second group.
It's like saying, "I hate the fact that people have to either choose to order a blue shoe in this store and then be told they don't have any, or order a green or red shoe because that's what they actually have, even though it's not the color they wanted. To remedy this, I will have a system in which people will order a blue shoe, and then be told that they don't have any, but then be asked what their second preference is, green or red, and then they will end up being sold the green or the red shoe. THIS IS SO MUCH BETTER!" It's not any better, it's ultimately the same damn thing. (If anything, it's probably worse at communicating the need for a blue shoe, because at least in the original situation, those would be lost sales.)
But maybe that's what you consider a win. In which case, sure, whatever, I guess you feel better somehow, good for you. Again, maybe some people are made to feel better when they're told their call is important as they're on hold for thirty minutes. But for me, I don't see any difference when my call is on hold for thirty minutes between someone telling me my call is important or not important during that time. Either way I'm still being ignored.
Highroller, you can't ignore the primary vote. I am repeatedly hammering you about the idea that the primary vote is important, and you just ignore it and act like it doesn't exist or doesn't matter.
Because it ultimately doesn't matter.
You trumpet this system as a great alternative to the current system because, in the instances in which the third party is not competitive, their votes get shifted over to one of the main parties, and what a wonderful thing this is, so much better than the US, in which... people shift their votes over to one of the main parties. Your position is: "I disagree with people shifting their votes, so I'm going to solve this problem... By having other people shift their votes for them."
So, it's not important you could put a vote that could give a third party a win, and put a vote that favours a major party at the same time? And it's also not important to put a vote for a third party to make a statement and try to pressure the major parties, even if it doesn't affect the election. So, third party votes in general are not important? Because those are the only things a third party vote does in the US. Should we just get rid of third parties, while we are it?
I think part of the argument being made, is that while the third party candidates will very rarely win (local/state level from time to time I imagine though), The role they play in the current system, as it exists within the US voting system, is that of forcing the major parties to pay attention, especially in instances where there is such an even split between the two major parties that ultimately a third party can draw from one of the two main parties to cause the opposition party to come out on top in the end. The existing system may not lead to the third party candidates winning much, but what the third party represents certainly gets a lot more attention simply because of that "spoiler effect" that can be caused by people intentionally voting for the third party on ideological grounds to make the point that they need to pay attention to what that third party stands for and make sure that if they want to win in tightly contested races they had better address the concerns of those third party voters. This can have the effect of causing a shift to the left or right respectively to be able to draw those voters back to the main parties, or in the case of a solid middle of the road independent, cause a shift towards the middle. It is an interesting dynamic when you think about it. In many ways, as a result, the current US system gives those 3rd parties potentially more power than they would otherwise simply by being there and getting their message out and drawing in enough ideological voters and votes their way to potentially cause a swing to an otherwise fairly balanced election between the two major party choices. This other system the OP is presenting could actually, in fact, decrease the potential impact of those parties simply for the sake of a greater number of initially counted votes for them, only to see those votes whisked back to the main parties anyway, in the end, giving less of a reason for the main parties to have to pay attention to and take action towards the concerns of the third party candidates and what they stand for knowing that in the end, most if not all of those votes will come back to them anyway, negating the potential spoiler power that may exist for them now. That is my thought and view on it anyway, inevitably it is a very complicated process all the way around, and each system in the world likely works best for each country that employs it within the context of their country's political process.
EDIT: I'm not sure what is up with the quoting of the post I am responding to, but the only portion of this post that is actually from me is the block of text at the bottom, the rest is from the quoting of others discussing the topics from the previous post that I was quoting from.
candidus inperti; si nil, his utere mecum.
Stop saying this, I've addressed it already. It's a misrepresentation of my argument and that should be clear from what I've said.
You yourself said this was a valid argument:
And I told you this is what I was arguing- that without preferential voting people are restricted in a way that generally disadvantages third parties.
It's obvious that free elections are more fair than non free elections and that the US voting system is free. That's not under dispute. But it's simply false to say that just because elections are free the voting system is fair. You're not addressing why I am wrong in claims about why there is a certain unfairness to the system, you're just introducing concepts that distract from the point at hand. If talking about free elections was being use in an attempt to discredit my claims, actually directing toward my claims, that would be absolutely fine, but you arguing that- you're just saying it's free therefore it's fair.
Highroller, 'necessarily' is a fairly specific term. Generally or situationally getting something is quite fundamentally different to necessarily getting it. Benefit to third parties is not the complete picture of my argument, and I told you in this exact paragraph the detail of that.
If you ignore all the ways in which it's not, then sure. You're absolutely right.
"allows (change) to happen in cases where I think it should" is not equivalent to "just benefit third parties". Neither is "on balance it's more beneficial than not".
I am talking about making things a little bit fairer overall for third parties, not just giving them benefits for the sake of it. That should be clear from what I just said here, because that is pretty much exactly what I just said here.
A strawman for the reasons above.
Note also that I am not crafting this system, this system is already in place in some form in a number of countries and is generally considered to be perfectly fair.
I am not just making up this idea to benefit third parties, and neither did the people who made voting systems incorporating this.
You cannot use voter choice to defend your position. For the last time, hopefully, I am arguing that voter choices are restricted in a somewhat unfair manner by the US voting system, and that preferential voting provides a fairer system in this way. It's irrelevant what voters choose, this is about how the system affects that. You tell me third parties don't get votes, I'll tell you that's the whole point, that they should generally be getting more but the system restricts that. I don't want to have to repeat myself on this again.
Votes are far from an accurate measure of what people care about. For god's sake, like 40% of eligible voters in the US don't vote. That can't possibly be a reliable enough measure, even ignoring the whole point I'm making here about the influence of the voting system and the relationship to other societal factors on major parties vs third parties.
To repeat, you can't use the result of the system in question to prove the system is fair. That would only work if we assume the results are fair, which would be begging the question, now wouldn't it?
Because then people's votes are based upon a kind of political strategy, instead of being an accurate representation of their beliefs and interests. Because then people's votes got to a party they actually don't support the most, and nothing from those people goes to the party they do, and the third party does actually get support from the voting system that reflects their support from the actual beliefs of the populace.
How about that?
Because the whole premise of this situation is removed- people no longer have to either vote to support the third party they support the most among the parties or express a preference between the major parties- they can do both, and in the order they think the two are most important.
The context of that comment was about ways in which major parties get systemic benefits from their status regardless of their support. With preferential voting, voting in the manner described here is not mutually exclusive with supporting third parties, people who do this aren't eliminated from supporting major parties because of their commitment to the major party. It now actually matter what they think of parties other than their own.
Because I'm not doing that. I am not creating this system, it was not created for that reason, and I am not arguing it is good for that reason. It's silly for me to be here arguing the US system has a certain unfairness towards third parties, and for you to act like all I am saying is benefit third parties. I have clearly been talking about system disadvantage, voter's ability to express their actual support, and fairness. I have mentioned all of these notions.
Highroller, do you know how preferential voting works? Because, it doesn't sound like you do. Preferential voting is about voting for candidates in an order of preference, hence the name. A very long and complex vote like you describe here ultimately reduces to a vote for a single candidate, the preference list just means they are multiple candidates it could end up going to based on how successful they are. A more complex vote is just a more complex vote, it doesn't count for more, it just provides a more detailed description of the voters preferences than a simple vote.
Do your research before you say this again.
Look up how the voting system in Australia works please, then you have a reasonable idea of what this all actually means because you really shouldn't be having this conservation without looking at an example, because I'm not going to explain how preferential voting systems can work.
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(This is all theoretical based upon the above so just keep that in mind, once again the OP can clarify if I am anywhere close at all).
So say you have an election, where the country is largely split as it has been evenly between the two major parties, under such situations both of the major parties would get very close to 50% each of the total votes cast for something like president, with a third party getting a few percent in there somewhere. Now lets say under the above mentioned situation you have two choices, the first ranked choice getting 2 points, and the second ranked choice getting 1 point. Now lets say that you have each person actually choosing a first and second ranked choice. If you figure that most will stick their primary first ranked vote with one of the two major parties, thus keeping it largely how it is now, the second ranked vote could have the potential to have significant impact if, say, you ended up with a scenario where a third party candidate was considered a reasonable second rank choice by nearly everyone.
In such an instance you have by the math a situation where you could have say, 47% major party 1 first ranked, 47% major party 2 first ranked, and 6% third party first ranked, but then you add the second ranked votes, where you have say, 3% major party 1 second ranked, 3% major party 2 second ranked, and potentially 94% third party second ranked. Going by the point system, you end up with the following:
Major Party 1: (47% first ranked x 2 points) + (3% second ranked x 1 point) = 97 points
Major Party 2: (47% first ranked x 2 points) + (3% second ranked x 1 point) = 97 points
Third Party: (6% first ranked x 2 points) + (94% second ranked x 1 point) = 106 points
Suddenly you have the potential for a third party candidate to be able to win if their message was balanced enough to get that much of the second ranked voting in the style as mentioned above (once again this is all theoretical, but just looking at numbers only).
Would anything like this ever happen under such a system... Who knows honestly, the more potential ranked votes you have and the more potential parties (if you go above 3 with any significant chance), the greater the likelihood it would seem that it would revert to the standard setup we already currently have.
Once again the OP can certainly respond as to whether I was even close at all, I just enjoy doing the math on such ideas, and figured I would post on what I was thinking about, and hey, If I'm way off on the overall, then that is 100% fine, I just wanted to throw the above out there in case it could add to the discussion at all.
If you're complaining about how this current voting system because it promotes a two-party system to the detriment of third parties and independents, well, it would seem you're going about this the wrong way.
You're saying that the problem is people end up voting for a candidate that doesn't necessarily reflect their values exactly due to that candidate having a greater chance of winning, and your response to this is to propose we shift to the Australian voting system... In which your vote ends up getting reallocated to one of the parties that actually has a chance of winning.
So instead of people reallocating their votes by choice, you want the government to reallocate their votes for them. That does not make any sense.
Are you seriously suggesting, sir, that people might actually alter their strategy based on how a political system works in order that they might increase their chances of getting what they want? SHOCKING!
For goodness sakes, man, why do you think parties exist in the first place? Do you think it's because they're Constitutionally mandated? Hint: they aren't. They exist because people recognize that in any representative government based on majority vote, you need a large group of people who are willing to work together to get anything done, because the system is designed so that things don't happen unless you have that. So unless you have that, nothing gets done. So people naturally must band together in order to to see certain things get accomplished. As such, it is necessary in America to group together under common ideologies, which is why parties form. Not everyone in a party agrees 100% with everything the party does or expresses ideologically, but they're willing to work together under a common banner to see their common interests get met. This is Politics 101.
Not to mention, if you're complaining about the fact that people end up voting for someone who doesn't necessarily match their ideological views because he has a greater chance of winning, that's exactly what the hell happens under the Australian voting system. That's fundamentally how it works. If you're complaining about how people vote Republican instead of Libertarian or Democrat instead of Green Party because that party at least has some chance of winning, THAT'S PRECISELY WHAT'S GOING TO HAPPEN UNDER THE AUSTRALIAN SYSTEM! All of their votes are going to eventually get reallocated to the Republican or Democratic party anyway.
No, you are once again ignoring that their status IS BECAUSE of their support. There are places in which third parties at the local level are significant presences because they have a significant basis of support. They're not at the presidency because they never get anywhere close to that level of support.
And there's a reason for this. Most third parties that rise to prominence tend to run towards extreme positions, or focus around one specific position around an issue that the two major parties aren't addressing. The reason they don't get elected is because third parties tend to either alienate people based on their extreme positions in the former case, or in the latter case, that issue ends up being addressed and the third party ends up being absorbed into one of the two major ones.
And also, once again, the Australian system does not fix this. It just creates a system to reallocate the votes to the major parties.
Except this again this is silly, given that the voters end up having their votes reallocated anyway. If your problem is that people who want a third party to win often will vote for another party that actually stands a chance of winning to at least see the changes they want, then it really makes no sense for you to propose we shift to another system that is based entirely around that very concept. Now instead of a percentage of voters who support a third party choosing to vote for a party that has a greater chance of winning in order to maximize their likelihood of getting the things they want to happen to happen, ALL of them are going to end up voting for one of the two major parties anyway because the government shifted their votes.
And I'm also going to ask about protest votes: what if someone chooses to vote for a third party and expresses a preference for none of the others? What if I want my vote to count for this person, but I only want this person and none of the others? I presume this is still possible, but like, in the US, votes for a third party like the Libertarian or the Green Party remain votes for that party. They don't get shifted around. So if you want representation, it would seem that's an instance in which the US voting system more accurately reflects the way people have chosen to vote.
You said "You can say that maybe there's something inherent to the system that makes it unnecessarily restrictive, and there would be a debate there, but right now, you're essentially saying that the unfair thing is that only the parties that get large amounts of votes win in a contest involving voting"
I am telling you my argument is the first one, but you seem to keep referencing my argument as if it's the second.
That's not exactly what I am arguing, I told you it was about fairness and voter choice in relation to third parties. Benefit to third parties is merely a secondary consideration in my argument.
[/quote]
Directing your attention to the page you just linked, you may notice this interesting point:
THAT is what I have just spent the last few posts telling you I am actually arguing whenever you say I am just trying to benefit third parties. I will admit I am also claiming benefit to third parties, and this page does seem to disagree on that point, but I suspect it means it terms of candidates getting elected. because of people's freedom to vote for third party as well as main party, I think it means third parties get much more influence on the main points, as well as general public recognition. I am not sure therefore, that it is more difficult for third parties to get elected overall because while the way votes get distributed may (I say may, I haven't looked very much into this) mean less chance of third party victory, I think the system promotes much more third party presence. I am pretty sure that overall it doesn't hurt third parties, even if it hurts their election chances, because of other benefits to third parties.
Also do note, that I am not talking about the Australian preferential voting system, but the idea of a preferential voting system in general. I am not arguing the US voting system should necessarily work exactly like the Australian system. If there is a problem with the Australian system compared to the US system and there is a way to maintain the US advantage while incorporating preferential voting, then I am all for changing both. Keep that in mind with all of these points.
Yes, because they can also express a preference for the third party they support in doing so. You can express support for the third party AND actually substantially influence the election. And that matters, even if their votes for third parties just get redistributed, because that first choice is reported on and that shows other people the third party support.
No, the government does not relocate their votes if you use your preferences well, then you get to specify exactly the order for your vote to be relocated, and thereby show clearly what your support is for each of those parties.
I'm not saying it's bad that people choose to do that, or that it happens, but the extent to which it takes away from the vote representing the interests of the people. The vote is supposed to keep the government supporting the interests of the people, not be a little political game for voters.
Much of the time, yes, but their preference is expressed. A statement is made that, for example, this many Labor voters support the Greens more so than Labor, therefore Labor should listen to what the Greens are saying. The third party does not need to be elected to have an influence, because their preference numbers present a real show of support, and one that can threaten the main parties if they do not pay attention to it.
No, I am not. It results from support. Of course it does. But it is power that gives you MORE support based on how your existing support has larger effects.
I have neither said anything about getting elected. Benefit means more than getting elected. Namely, the idea of influence of the major parties and public recognition.
And all of them can do so while still showing support for the third party. You don't have to choose between making a statement and voting to make a difference. Your vote that makes your statement gets relocated to make a difference as well.
Let's just be clear about this, as my initial statement in the OP indicates, the affect on third parties overall, not just the benefit to them, is secondary. The most important point about preferential voting system is how it allows people to express their preferences in detail, the next point of order is how that relates to third party supporter's choices, and the next one after that is the idea that it will produce some overall benefit to third parties influence.
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Its certainly interesting I'll give it that, I'm still not sure I personally see a problem with our existing system, but assuming I now correctly understand where you are coming from, that at least gives a greater basis to discuss that part of the topic further.
So you're saying it's bad that people cast their vote for certain parties based on those parties actually being competitive for the vote... and then you talk about shifting to a system in which the government reallocates your votes to the actual competitive parties, which is not only what this system does, but the principle upon which it is built on.
That makes no sense whatsoever. I mean, I guess it's less effort on your part, "Why reallocate your vote when the government will do it for you?", but it's effectively the same damn thing.
Yes. Whoop-de-doo. Congratulations, you voted for a third party. Now we're going to switch your vote to one for one of the two dominant parties, so your vote counts for them instead of the third party you voted for.
Again, your problem is that people who vote for a third party are motivated to switch their votes to a party that is actually competitive, and so your solution to this is to change our voting system to a system where everyone who voted for a third party in a race in which the third parties aren't competitive will have their votes changed to a party that is actually competitive. That makes no sense. None. "This thing that people do is a problem. I will instate a system in which it happens 100% of the time." No sense whatsoever.
Also, not only is this not actually more representative in practice, it's debatable whether this is representative in theory. At least when you vote for someone in our elections, your vote continues to count for the same person by the end of it.
But the only person with power over the reallocation of votes are the voters. And the tallying is done by an independent body from the rest of the government, so describing it as 'the government' is misleading.
No, I have been saying it's bad you can't both make a competitive choice and a more ideological choice, that you have to pick between one or the other.
Your vote is only switched at the point where it can no longer matter except as a protest vote. Your vote will not be redistributed if the third party could win with it. So it amounts to the same thing a vote for third party in the US does- a expression of support for the third party, while also counting toward the contest between the major parties.
Your primary vote does not disappear from existence. It is still on record and reported on, and that matters. Which is as much as you can say for third party votes in the US as well. It doesn't matter if by the end of it it doesn't count towards the parties total if that makes no difference to anything, and it doesn't, because, if the third party was going win, if wouldn't get redistributed in the first place and the third party does win.
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Like, read it closely.
It's saying that a vote for a minor party or independent candidate would be wasted UNLESS it were switched to a major party candidate.
In other words, a vote for a third party candidate is useless either way. It's only if it's a vote for an actually viable candidate - whether it started out as such or was switched into being one - that the vote isn't wasted.
In other words, I don't think this system works the way you thought it did.
Ok, then the voting tally people are doing it. The point remains: whether the people who are voting decide to vote for the major parties, or their vote gets switched to the major parties, in the end, it's the exact same damn thing. It's just that one has a middle man and the other does not.
So if you're objecting to people voting for the major parties because those are the ones with an actual chance of winning, as opposed to third parties which have no chance of winning, then touting this system as a solution to that is weird, in an ass-backwards sort of way, because saying, "No! I don't want third party voters to switch their votes for the dominant two parties, I WANT SOMEONE ELSE TO DO IT FOR THEM!" doesn't seem to actually accomplish anything meaningful here.
But it doesn't actually matter either way. Your vote still doesn't actually end up counting for the party you want, it ends up ultimately counting for the party that was never your first choice.
In that sense, our system is more representative. The people who really wanted to vote for the third party have their votes actually count for the third party. It's not, "Oh ok, you 'voted for a third party,' but nah, just kidding, you're voting the dominant parties."
So in essence, "It's the exact same thing as the system I'm objecting to, unless the third party won't win, in which case the thing I'm objecting to will happen."
I'm not sure you've really thought this argument through.
How much have you read about election law and election reform outside this thread?
I feel that at this point this needs to be asked if you are making a statement so staggeringly obtuse because that's not how any other voting system works that's either being discussed in this thread or in full effect in other parts of the world. Also, transferable votes is everything that the US third parties want because they would allow candidates to run in races that are three or higher without fear of being pinned a spoiler candidate, which could have far-reaching implications on US politics.
As for my personal opinion since to the OP is this is my first post in the thread, the American Voting System (aka First past the post) is something I think the United States should abolish, and honestly, I have no qualms with allowing people to vote for all candidates they want to rather than just one and resolve any ties with a runoff election, although ranked choice voting works as well.
candidus inperti; si nil, his utere mecum.
~~~~~
No, that's exactly how I think it works.
Quote from me:
I have never claimed third party votes will not often end up changing nothing. Third parties don't usually win, that's why they are third parties. What I am claiming is it gives you more say by allowing you to express the equivalent of multiple ways one could vote to express their position in the US system.
No, it's not because:
Don't ignore my argument.
So you are telling me the system works exactly how I have been saying it does and how I want it to, and then you say that fact is a counter to my objections with the US system?
Interesting approach.
Let me reiterate, because you have yet to respond accurately around this point:
That does not say 'it's bad that people make a competitive choice', that says I actively want people to be able to do it. You quoted this in your response, immediately after the section I am responding to here, but yet you think I am "objecting to people voting for the major parties because those are the ones with an actual chance of winning"?
I have responded to this already, don't ignore my argument.
No, in essence, you can do the equivalent of a third party vote in the US (that doesn't change the result, but makes a statement) and make a vote to express an impactful preference between the major parties. This quote you are responding to explicitly details why I think a third party vote on a preference list does matter as well as the deferral to a major party, but you've just ignored that argument.
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Basically you want preferential voting so that third parties can get their 'actual' support even if it is less than necessary to be elected because then everyone can actually see how much support they have rather than the current system where they only get as much support as people who are willing to throw away their vote in protest. The point of this would be that major parties would then see this support and 'maybe' change their position on some policies. While currently this will happen if enough people protest vote to cost the 'similar' major party to lose to the other major party, they are then forced to change to get back the protest votes. However the preferential voting system doesn't actually encourage major parties to change at all, it actually encourages them to stay the same "the opposite of the other major party" because then you are guaranteed to get all the votes that are 'against' the other major party I don't know enough about current systems that use this to know how they actually function rather than theoretically function, but logically the preferential system discourages change while the current system only encourages change when a 'significant'(enough to cause you to lose) minority pushes for it or when the majority has actually shifted.
It can be summed up as preferential=everyone knows your preferences but it doesn't really matter at all, while FPTP=only certain people make their preference known and it rarely matters. Neither seem preferable but I would go with the one where your preferences can matter.
The protest votes rarely have sufficient volume to concern much concern in the US as far as I am aware.
Except the third party voters usually want change and change in specific areas. People are fine with the status quote are generally going to want to vote for a major party.
Example here, going off somewhat the example I used earlier and because it's one of the strongest ones, the Greens party support Labor over the Liberals, but a major part of the Greens platform is environmental issues, which means change. The Greens vote going to Labor is significantly based around Labor's history of more active climate change action. If that stops, Greens voters may vote liberal higher based on a number of other issues, such as for example right now the leader of the Liberal party and Prime Minister, Malcolm Turnbull, is somewhat popular among Greens and Labor voters, while Bill Shorten the Labor leader is often seen as uninspiring.
Take into account also the important element than a significant percentage of the vote is cases where the voters defer their reallocation preferences to the parties preferences, which means a third party can itself directly put pressure on a major party to maintain policies or support around issues.
But then it only encourages any change from those third parties that actually pose a threat and only when they do. Preferential voting means every party and there voter base's preferences matter effectively constantly. And overall I think that generates more exposure that drives more people to consider the third party and therefore put pressure on the major parties.
I think the culture of the preferential voting system at least can be more supportive of third parties.
Again, I don't think primary votes ever don't matter. They are a very tangible show of support. It makes harder for major parties to ignore third party's existence except when they think they are at threat.
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Your vote does not count for both. You don't get two votes. You are forced to vote for one of the actually competitive parties after the choice you really want gets eliminated. You are forced to compromise.
And that's really it. You're complaining because people are forced to compromise, saying this is a horrible thing our system does. But it's not particular to our system, it's particular to all representative governments. The fact that we have parties at all is a result of the necessity to compromise that comes from any system in which majority vote is a determining factor of what gets done.
And the fact remains, if that's such a problem for you, this system does not solve it. It makes zero sense for you to complain about having to choose between the group that ideologically fits you and the group that actually has a chance of winning and then advocate a system that is entirely built around just that. It makes zero sense to complain about how people find themselves choosing to switch their votes from someone that ideologically fits them and the candidate that has a chance of winning and then advocate a system that is entirely built around that.
This system is doing exactly what it is you're complaining about. It's formulated to make people do the exact same things you don't want them to do. Ultimately they're the exact same thing in terms of result. All you've done is just add steps in between. The difference is nominal at best, and effectively nonexistent.
Moreover, user_938036 makes a very good point, if anything, this makes the system worse for third parties. In our system, a vote for a third party cannot count for either of the two major parties, and that constitutes a serious issue for the major parties if a race is close between the two major parties and one party finds themselves losing a lot of votes to a third party. At least in our system, the major party must make concessions to the third party voters in order to get them back on their side. In preferential voting, there's no such necessity for concession. There's no necessity for a party to adjust their strategy if they were to know that a person has to end up voting one of two parties and that person would definitely not vote the other one. That's effectively what this ends up being.
So in essence, you're crafting a system that benefits parties as opposed to voters. In our system, protest votes actually carry weight. They're not just nominal, they carry value. In our system, if someone doesn't vote for you, you don't get a chance to reclaim that vote, it's lost to you, so there's a lot of incentive upon you to give the person enough to get them to go along with you. And I would imagine that benefits the voter more. People side with certain parties because those parties have at least promised to enact changes that these voters want. In our system, there's a greater incentive for other parties to create concessions to try to bring voters over. But if the Republicans and the Democrats knew that all the protest votes for third parties were just going end up coming back to them anyway, why change? What, are all the Green Party people going to vote Republican? No, of course not. Are Libertarians going to support Democrats? No, of course not. So why change? If anything, this frees up the major parties to court those voters less, not more.
Highroller, you can't ignore the primary vote. I am repeatedly hammering you about the idea that the primary vote is important, and you just ignore it and act like it doesn't exist or doesn't matter. I'm not going to continue if you can't follow. I'm only going to repeat myself so many times.
For the last time, the primary vote of a preferential voting system matters because
1. It actually can determine elections, third parties do actually win.
2. It makes a statement
3. It gets publicity for the third party
And those three points are all you can really say of third party votes in the US, the only 'disadvantage' is the votes get transferred when they wouldn't matter anyway, making this 'drawback' moot.
Don't give me a speech about the virtue of compromise, that's just red herring territory. Stay on point.
A system that's entirely built around combining the two.
Because, as I have already argued and you just ignored to reiterate what others have already said, there are other factors in play.
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For those unaware of Australian politics, main parties are Liberals (right-wing), Labor (left-wing) and the Greens (further left-wing, third party). So most seats would be Liberals vs Labor with Greens votes shifting to Labor.
For those seats (this has slowly built up over a few elections) the Greens primary vote has grown enough that the seats have turned into Labor vs Greens, with Liberal preferences deciding it.
The point being that being able to present a preference lets support for third parties to build up (without being a giant spoiler), and potentially flip around what the strongest two parties are in an area.
You trumpet this system as a great alternative to the current system because, in the instances in which the third party is not competitive, their votes get shifted over to one of the main parties, and what a wonderful thing this is, so much better than the US, in which... people shift their votes over to one of the main parties. Your position is: "I disagree with people shifting their votes, so I'm going to solve this problem... By having other people shift their votes for them."
And that's just being asinine.
But yes, your actual preference gets noted down. Which makes ultimately makes no difference whatsoever. I guess that does something for you, but what, exactly, is the profound difference in the end result? Answer: there isn't one!
It's like when a company puts your call on hold for half an hour, but there's a voice every so often that says, "Your call is important to us." You're arguing for how amazing this message is, so much better than if they just played hold music without that message, because this way, it demonstrates to people that their calls are important. But it doesn't! The difference is purely nominal. The same ******* thing whether it's there or not there! Ultimately, the person's call still gets ignored. The same result happens.
Except there are areas in which the race is going to be between a Republican/Democrat and an Independent, with the Democrat/Republican candidate being a cypher. That happens at the local level, and at the Senate/House level.
The point I'm trying to make is there's no real effective difference here between the preferential voting and the US voting, and that DJK is complaining about certain realities about voting in the US that don't end up really changing under preferential voting.
Specifically, DJK is complaining about how people who are voting for a third party candidate in a situation in which the two major parties end up being overwhelmingly dominant must either vote for the third party and get blown out, or vote for one of the two major parties because those two are actually popular, and in so doing not vote for the party that's actually idealistically closer to them.
The problem with this is this situation is not at all solved by preferential voting, because the same damn thing happens. The only difference is both scenarios happen at the same time, so you still end up ultimately voting for the person whom you weren't really a match for idealistically. And he's trumpeting this like it's some great triumph. Yes, congratulations, instead of switching your vote to Joe Candidate as opposed to Third Party Option, someone else switched it for you. Boy, you sure beat the system there.
It's a completely baffling mindset to me, because he's expressing that it's a problem that people end up voting the candidate they don't really want, but his proposed solution is to make them have to do it anyway. It's like when someone tells a character in a sitcom to do something, and then the character does it, but retorts, "Alright, I'm doing it, BUT NOT BECAUSE YOU WANT ME TO!" And that's funny, but it's funny specifically because he's treating it like a victory when it isn't. He's still done the thing that the person asked him to do. The same result ended up happening. Yes, he expressed his grievance, but no one gives a damn. That's why it's comedy. Yet DJK doesn't get the joke.
So, it's not important you could put a vote that could give a third party a win, and put a vote that favours a major party at the same time? And it's also not important to put a vote for a third party to make a statement and try to pressure the major parties, even if it doesn't affect the election. So, third party votes in general are not important? Because those are the only things a third party vote does in the US. Should we just get rid of third parties, while we are it?
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It's not at the same time. For it to be the same time, you would need to give someone more than one vote. Your vote only ever counts for one party at a time, ultimately switching to a later party. The only effective difference between voting for a third party and then having it switch to a main party, or just voting for the main party because the main party is actually competitive is that there are more steps involved. You've taken up more time. That's it.
They do that here as well. Again, no effective difference. No difference in the ultimate outcome.
I'm not saying we should. I'm saying there's absolutely no ultimate difference between what you're proposing and the things you're objecting to.
You're talking about how you don't like that people have to choose between supporting a third party or voting for an actual viable party in a race in which a third party isn't competitive, because then it's a choice between voting for the party or having to compromise and vote for a candidate who might not fit your ideals as closely as the first candidate. Except your proposed solution doesn't really solve that problem. You've just made the people who voted for their party ALSO people who compromise on their vote to support the viable candidate. You've neither increased the size of the first group nor decreased the size of the second group. You've instead made them all the second group.
It's like saying, "I hate the fact that people have to either choose to order a blue shoe in this store and then be told they don't have any, or order a green or red shoe because that's what they actually have, even though it's not the color they wanted. To remedy this, I will have a system in which people will order a blue shoe, and then be told that they don't have any, but then be asked what their second preference is, green or red, and then they will end up being sold the green or the red shoe. THIS IS SO MUCH BETTER!" It's not any better, it's ultimately the same damn thing. (If anything, it's probably worse at communicating the need for a blue shoe, because at least in the original situation, those would be lost sales.)
But maybe that's what you consider a win. In which case, sure, whatever, I guess you feel better somehow, good for you. Again, maybe some people are made to feel better when they're told their call is important as they're on hold for thirty minutes. But for me, I don't see any difference when my call is on hold for thirty minutes between someone telling me my call is important or not important during that time. Either way I'm still being ignored.
I think part of the argument being made, is that while the third party candidates will very rarely win (local/state level from time to time I imagine though), The role they play in the current system, as it exists within the US voting system, is that of forcing the major parties to pay attention, especially in instances where there is such an even split between the two major parties that ultimately a third party can draw from one of the two main parties to cause the opposition party to come out on top in the end. The existing system may not lead to the third party candidates winning much, but what the third party represents certainly gets a lot more attention simply because of that "spoiler effect" that can be caused by people intentionally voting for the third party on ideological grounds to make the point that they need to pay attention to what that third party stands for and make sure that if they want to win in tightly contested races they had better address the concerns of those third party voters. This can have the effect of causing a shift to the left or right respectively to be able to draw those voters back to the main parties, or in the case of a solid middle of the road independent, cause a shift towards the middle. It is an interesting dynamic when you think about it. In many ways, as a result, the current US system gives those 3rd parties potentially more power than they would otherwise simply by being there and getting their message out and drawing in enough ideological voters and votes their way to potentially cause a swing to an otherwise fairly balanced election between the two major party choices. This other system the OP is presenting could actually, in fact, decrease the potential impact of those parties simply for the sake of a greater number of initially counted votes for them, only to see those votes whisked back to the main parties anyway, in the end, giving less of a reason for the main parties to have to pay attention to and take action towards the concerns of the third party candidates and what they stand for knowing that in the end, most if not all of those votes will come back to them anyway, negating the potential spoiler power that may exist for them now. That is my thought and view on it anyway, inevitably it is a very complicated process all the way around, and each system in the world likely works best for each country that employs it within the context of their country's political process.
EDIT: I'm not sure what is up with the quoting of the post I am responding to, but the only portion of this post that is actually from me is the block of text at the bottom, the rest is from the quoting of others discussing the topics from the previous post that I was quoting from.
candidus inperti; si nil, his utere mecum.