No. Each voter has just as much say in the election as any other. (Approval: everyone gets N up-or-down choices. Condorcet: everyone expresses N-1 preferences between the N candidates.) It's not like you are dropping multiple ballots in the box. You are simply able to give a more complete expression of your choice.
IRV is deficient because part of that expression is thrown away on each round - that's a violation of "one person, one vote" if there ever was one. Sure you can still influence the choice between A and B even after C is eliminated, but your vote for C over both of them should not be completely ignored just because not many agreed with you.
That's the nice thing about Condorcet. It's just as easy to cast your vote as with IRV, but when it comes time to count them, all your preferences are tallied simultaneously not sequentially.
Yes. It would be "winner take all" by district. Candidates would have to campaign in every district where it was close, not run up the votes in one district of a "swing state" in order to win the whole state. This would be a great thing! This was one of the design considerations of the EC - that candidates couldn't just run up the tally in a small group of core supporters. The president needs a broad base of support.
I agree that you'd probably have to mandate it, for exactly the reason you say. It should be done, but it can hurt those that go first. So far only two small states (that wouldn't have gotten much attention anyway) have done it. However, I would only mandate that the entire state cannot go to the overall winner - let the individual states have a say in how to go about it (by district, proportionally, or some other scheme).
The only problem with eliminating official electors is when the pres-elect and VP-elect die between Election Day and Inauguration. You can always convene the EC and have them make their decision. Though the EC members are usually the party faithful that would support the party's designated replacements, simply having the parties nominate replacements that get the job automatically might not be the best solution. (Actually I don't think that replacements after the election would even be legal!) Human judgment should be a factor.
I suppose we could also just change the date of Election or Inauguration, though I haven't considered the possible ramifications of that. Did you know that Election Day is a Tuesday so that people (possibly going long distances by horse or foot) wouldn't have to travel on Sunday?
I feel much the same, but my solution would be different. Let 436 EC votes be decided by the people, by district, just like the House is. Let the other 102 be decided by "the States" just like the Senate is supposed to be. How exactly to go about this is still a good question, though. Electors were to be chosen at that time for the express purpose of electing the president - I don't think letting the sitting State legislatures appoint them fulfills that goal.
Therefore I would use those extra two votes to adjust the State's total toward the proportional result for that State. In NE, for example, all three districts may be won by Republicans by 60%, leaving about 40% for Democrats. Obviously they get the other two votes. In MN, the eight districts will be won by various parties, and the Green party may make a strong (10%) showing statewide without carrying any district, so they get one of those two votes.
Pure proportional allocation is not the federal design, IMO. This idea is a compromise between regional interests and more abstract philosophies. It's a little more complex, yes, but if you are a supporter of Condorcet you understand that accurately and fairly reflecting the wishes of the electorate is not always simple. Selecting the president is an important decision, and the process should be thoughtfully and soberly considered.
I agree. I think it's terrible that governors go crawling to Washington to get federal funds. If it weren't for the 17th Amendment, they could tell DC to kiss off and then raise the money within their own states! We need to repeal the 17th.
Agreed, social programs should be at the state level. The Constitution provides no authority for them.
I'd go even farther, and eliminate income tax competely. As long as there is even a hint of "justification" for it, it's a hand in your pocket grabbing an arbitrary amount of your money. This is wrong in principle. Allowing it "just a little bit" will always cause problems. Tariffs/duties and apportioned taxes can pay for all the Constitutional functions of the federal gov't.
Because approval voting is not strategy-free? You might approve of Nader and Gore, but approval doesn't express any kind of preference between the two. Others who agree with you but have a preference might select only one or the other in order to tip the results to that candidate. You are rewarded for voting dishonestly.
I consider Power/i to be the two tiers. The eMac can almost be neglected altogether - is one product enough to be called a tier? It's for a very small market niche.
I believe both vMac and Basilisk II will run System 6. Both have OS X versions.
If they just carbonized System 7.1 so it could run on a G5, that would be sweet. In many ways 7.1 was the "sweet spot" of the MacOS prior to X. Decent features, pretty stable, little bloat. It would run most any Mac app written up to that point, and with just a few extra extensions it could run many apps written in the OS 8 and 9 days too.
If I can get my hands on a Color Classic, this is what I'd do with it. (More fun if I could do the Mystic mod, too!) My SE/30 (80 MB, 9 GB, ethernet) is running NetBSD as my web/file/ntp server.
I can't get there right now. (Dang corporate web filter.) I remember reading about Aleph One quite some time ago, when I was looking for new Marathon scenarios. What is it? If it lets me run Marathon in OS X I'll be thrilled - Classic doesn't like 1 or Infinity, and 2 is the weakest of the three. If it does that and still networks to players with the original Marathons I'll be truly ecstatic.
Theoretically yes, but the difference was more marketing than anything else. My C650 was faster than my friend's Q700. Of course, shortly after I bought it they rolled out a new Quadra that was faster, but still.
The "Centris" name was canned in less than a year. (Three tiers was too many product lines.) The 610 and 650 got a speed bump to 33 MHz and were relabeled as Quadras.
Using iceWM on my SE/30 (NetBSD) is tolerable for light work. Mostly I just have a couple xterms open (they nearly overlap on the tiny screen) so I generally use screen/dt instead and skip X. Blackbox might have shown a bit of an improvement but I couldn't get the latest version to compile.
I feel compelled to stop the backhoe, too. And Michael Peroutka would stop it, wouldn't he? It is unfortunate, but understandable, that you are letting fear override conscience as decision maker.
The PBA ban does nothing to stop abortion. Those wanting them will still get them. The doctors will just advise getting them earlier to avoid prosecution. It's like saying it's not OK to steal my car between 12 and 4 AM, but it's fair game the rest of the day.
Bush campaigned for the pro-abortion Arlen Specter over the more pro-life Pat Toomey during the primaries. Specter will preside over the Judiciary Committee if he wins reelection. Do you really think pro-life judges will make it through this committee?
Slowing down the decay does not reverse the decay. Voting for Republicans still achieves the overall goals of the Left. They just throw you a bone in hopes of distracting you from the fact that everything else is getting much worse.
What's wrong with Marathon and Spectre? That's why I'm keeping around a couple of my beige Macs - a Q840AV and G3/300 to be exact. There a dozens of fan-made Marathon scenarios I have yet to play. In terms of storyline and gameplay I still think the Marathon series was the best FPS I've ever seen.
I don't like the idea of "none of the above" actually being able to win. Many small parties don't have that many qualified people to run, and couldn't field a candidate for a 2nd round. The uninformed and uneducated that vote NOTA as a protest out of dissatisfaction with the Dem/Rep hegemony would boot these candidates off the ballot without even knowing what they stood for. It's highly possible that they actually could agree with one of the 4 alternate candidates (looking at the presidential race as an example). You'd end up with even less-qualified Dems and Reps in office rather than giving everyone a fair chance, which is exactly what Condorcet is trying to do.
Practically, it's a huge waste and expense for all your fellow citizen-taxpayers to bear, as well. Thanks a bunch, man.
Mathematically, you can't rank NOTA (which is a multiple selection) in a slate against individual candidates. What sense does it make to say A, B, NOTA, C. You're trying to simultaneously say you prefer A and B over C, but you also don't prefer A or B over C.
We do need Condorcet voting, we do need less restrictive ballot access laws, we do need less restrictive campaign finance laws, we do need lower barriers to participate in debates, we do need to give the media a swift kick in the pants to give 3rd parties some reasonable coverage. Those would all help elections in general. Also we do need States to allocate EC votes by district, and we do need to repeal the 17th Amendment. Those would help the Senate and Presidential races.
It's a slightly expanded Approval voting. The addition of a -1 option doesn't change the concept much. Instead of results ranging from 0 - $POPULATION, the results can range from -$POPULATION - $POPULATION.
How about not letting people in the employ of government vote at all? This would send a clear message that bloated government is a drain on society.
Besides, if you're employed by government, there's going to be a natural tendency to vote for more/bigger government. It probably means a bigger paycheck for you. Congress does it directly, other gov't employees have to do it a little more indirectly, but it's the same.
If it's basically a volunteer job, having 400 people makes sense. Maybe a bunch of people are actually busy making a living at a real job back home. The small geography makes that possible.
In NE, it's only $12k a year - below the poverty line for a family of 4. Here, too, we have the retired and the independently wealthy running. (The candidates in my district, where the incumbent is not running again, are a retired guy and a young-ish lawyer.) You can't live on that, and you can't do it part-time because of the geography. It discourages a lot of qualified/interested people. Heck I'd like to give it a shot - but I couldn't even support myself on that, much less my family.
I've come to the conclusion that it's nearly impossible to be a citizen-legislator like I used to hear about - when the legislature had to wrap up in time for the farmers to get back to plant their fields. If gov't were small and the duties only required about 3 months, then maybe I could get by being a computer consultant for the rest of the year. That can't happen when you're in session for 6 months and frequently have special sessions at any time.
The Dems and Reps will always be whipping the electorate into a frenzy, saying this is the most important election ever, etc. I'm sick of it. The two candidates are so similar on so many views that it's disgusting. Neither respects the Constitution. I voted for Phillips, and will vote for Peroutka. If I don't stand by my principles, then they don't count for much. Bush will not restore the republic, he'll just chip at its foundation with a pick rather than a backhoe like Kerry.
A tiny state like NH has 400 people in the legislature (or is that just one house)? We only have 49 in NE (unicameral, so that's total) and we're bigger in area and population.
So how's the campaign going? Heck I think \. should interview you. A slashdotter running for office - that's got to be interesting.
(Technically I guess I'm up for election. I'm a presidential elector. By voting for my candidate you're actually voting for me to go vote for him.)
Also in this election has been billed as of the highest importance.
This happens every time. Each election becomes "the most important/critical of our lifetime!" This way the parties whip us into an incoherent frenzy, creating a bitter partisan rivalry (between two sides that are really not all that much different) so that they can entrench their power that much more. Drive home that identity, so that it becomes more important than actually thinking about issues. "Damn the issues, my team must win no matter what it takes!"
Meanwhile, third parties like Libertarians, Greens, and Constitutionalists peacefully and thoughtfully debate real issues with very little rancor between them. Where else do you see a candidate defer to another who is probably the most ideologically removed from him to explain a point?
Independently thinking Americans are anathema to the Duopoly - a threat to their power. Why do you think they try to marginalize third parties through ballot access restrictions, debate exclusions, not addressing the voting system shortcomings? The Duopoly likes voters who blindly believe whatever they're told. Do yourself, and America, a favor on Nov 2 - vote third party.
True, that, about Fort Sumter. But with Lincoln sending reinforcements and supplies to it, what were they to do? But you're right, in the court of public opinion and the annals of history they would have looked better.
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No. Each voter has just as much say in the election as any other. (Approval: everyone gets N up-or-down choices. Condorcet: everyone expresses N-1 preferences between the N candidates.) It's not like you are dropping multiple ballots in the box. You are simply able to give a more complete expression of your choice.
IRV is deficient because part of that expression is thrown away on each round - that's a violation of "one person, one vote" if there ever was one. Sure you can still influence the choice between A and B even after C is eliminated, but your vote for C over both of them should not be completely ignored just because not many agreed with you.
That's the nice thing about Condorcet. It's just as easy to cast your vote as with IRV, but when it comes time to count them, all your preferences are tallied simultaneously not sequentially.
Yes. It would be "winner take all" by district. Candidates would have to campaign in every district where it was close, not run up the votes in one district of a "swing state" in order to win the whole state. This would be a great thing! This was one of the design considerations of the EC - that candidates couldn't just run up the tally in a small group of core supporters. The president needs a broad base of support.
I agree that you'd probably have to mandate it, for exactly the reason you say. It should be done, but it can hurt those that go first. So far only two small states (that wouldn't have gotten much attention anyway) have done it. However, I would only mandate that the entire state cannot go to the overall winner - let the individual states have a say in how to go about it (by district, proportionally, or some other scheme).
The only problem with eliminating official electors is when the pres-elect and VP-elect die between Election Day and Inauguration. You can always convene the EC and have them make their decision. Though the EC members are usually the party faithful that would support the party's designated replacements, simply having the parties nominate replacements that get the job automatically might not be the best solution. (Actually I don't think that replacements after the election would even be legal!) Human judgment should be a factor.
I suppose we could also just change the date of Election or Inauguration, though I haven't considered the possible ramifications of that. Did you know that Election Day is a Tuesday so that people (possibly going long distances by horse or foot) wouldn't have to travel on Sunday?
I feel much the same, but my solution would be different. Let 436 EC votes be decided by the people, by district, just like the House is. Let the other 102 be decided by "the States" just like the Senate is supposed to be. How exactly to go about this is still a good question, though. Electors were to be chosen at that time for the express purpose of electing the president - I don't think letting the sitting State legislatures appoint them fulfills that goal.
Therefore I would use those extra two votes to adjust the State's total toward the proportional result for that State. In NE, for example, all three districts may be won by Republicans by 60%, leaving about 40% for Democrats. Obviously they get the other two votes. In MN, the eight districts will be won by various parties, and the Green party may make a strong (10%) showing statewide without carrying any district, so they get one of those two votes.
Pure proportional allocation is not the federal design, IMO. This idea is a compromise between regional interests and more abstract philosophies. It's a little more complex, yes, but if you are a supporter of Condorcet you understand that accurately and fairly reflecting the wishes of the electorate is not always simple. Selecting the president is an important decision, and the process should be thoughtfully and soberly considered.
Agreed, social programs should be at the state level. The Constitution provides no authority for them.
I'd go even farther, and eliminate income tax competely. As long as there is even a hint of "justification" for it, it's a hand in your pocket grabbing an arbitrary amount of your money. This is wrong in principle. Allowing it "just a little bit" will always cause problems. Tariffs/duties and apportioned taxes can pay for all the Constitutional functions of the federal gov't.
Because approval voting is not strategy-free? You might approve of Nader and Gore, but approval doesn't express any kind of preference between the two. Others who agree with you but have a preference might select only one or the other in order to tip the results to that candidate. You are rewarded for voting dishonestly.
I consider Power/i to be the two tiers. The eMac can almost be neglected altogether - is one product enough to be called a tier? It's for a very small market niche.
I believe both vMac and Basilisk II will run System 6. Both have OS X versions.
If they just carbonized System 7.1 so it could run on a G5, that would be sweet. In many ways 7.1 was the "sweet spot" of the MacOS prior to X. Decent features, pretty stable, little bloat. It would run most any Mac app written up to that point, and with just a few extra extensions it could run many apps written in the OS 8 and 9 days too.
If I can get my hands on a Color Classic, this is what I'd do with it. (More fun if I could do the Mystic mod, too!) My SE/30 (80 MB, 9 GB, ethernet) is running NetBSD as my web/file/ntp server.
I can't get there right now. (Dang corporate web filter.) I remember reading about Aleph One quite some time ago, when I was looking for new Marathon scenarios. What is it? If it lets me run Marathon in OS X I'll be thrilled - Classic doesn't like 1 or Infinity, and 2 is the weakest of the three. If it does that and still networks to players with the original Marathons I'll be truly ecstatic.
The C610 had a 20MHz LC040, the C650 used a 25MHz full '040.
All the Quadras used the full '040 except the Q605 and Q630, which used 25MHz and 33MHz LC040s respectively.
Theoretically yes, but the difference was more marketing than anything else. My C650 was faster than my friend's Q700. Of course, shortly after I bought it they rolled out a new Quadra that was faster, but still.
The "Centris" name was canned in less than a year. (Three tiers was too many product lines.) The 610 and 650 got a speed bump to 33 MHz and were relabeled as Quadras.
Using iceWM on my SE/30 (NetBSD) is tolerable for light work. Mostly I just have a couple xterms open (they nearly overlap on the tiny screen) so I generally use screen/dt instead and skip X. Blackbox might have shown a bit of an improvement but I couldn't get the latest version to compile.
I always check my \. messages. :)
I feel compelled to stop the backhoe, too. And Michael Peroutka would stop it, wouldn't he? It is unfortunate, but understandable, that you are letting fear override conscience as decision maker.
The PBA ban does nothing to stop abortion. Those wanting them will still get them. The doctors will just advise getting them earlier to avoid prosecution. It's like saying it's not OK to steal my car between 12 and 4 AM, but it's fair game the rest of the day.
Bush campaigned for the pro-abortion Arlen Specter over the more pro-life Pat Toomey during the primaries. Specter will preside over the Judiciary Committee if he wins reelection. Do you really think pro-life judges will make it through this committee?
Slowing down the decay does not reverse the decay. Voting for Republicans still achieves the overall goals of the Left. They just throw you a bone in hopes of distracting you from the fact that everything else is getting much worse.
What's wrong with Marathon and Spectre? That's why I'm keeping around a couple of my beige Macs - a Q840AV and G3/300 to be exact. There a dozens of fan-made Marathon scenarios I have yet to play. In terms of storyline and gameplay I still think the Marathon series was the best FPS I've ever seen.
I'll donate my Quadra 840AV. 40 MHz, bay-bee! Ought to be able to get the boot time down to about 4.5 days with that!
And here we are, already shooting a missile at it. ;)
I don't like the idea of "none of the above" actually being able to win. Many small parties don't have that many qualified people to run, and couldn't field a candidate for a 2nd round. The uninformed and uneducated that vote NOTA as a protest out of dissatisfaction with the Dem/Rep hegemony would boot these candidates off the ballot without even knowing what they stood for. It's highly possible that they actually could agree with one of the 4 alternate candidates (looking at the presidential race as an example). You'd end up with even less-qualified Dems and Reps in office rather than giving everyone a fair chance, which is exactly what Condorcet is trying to do.
Practically, it's a huge waste and expense for all your fellow citizen-taxpayers to bear, as well. Thanks a bunch, man.
Mathematically, you can't rank NOTA (which is a multiple selection) in a slate against individual candidates. What sense does it make to say A, B, NOTA, C. You're trying to simultaneously say you prefer A and B over C, but you also don't prefer A or B over C.
We do need Condorcet voting, we do need less restrictive ballot access laws, we do need less restrictive campaign finance laws, we do need lower barriers to participate in debates, we do need to give the media a swift kick in the pants to give 3rd parties some reasonable coverage. Those would all help elections in general. Also we do need States to allocate EC votes by district, and we do need to repeal the 17th Amendment. Those would help the Senate and Presidential races.
It's a slightly expanded Approval voting. The addition of a -1 option doesn't change the concept much. Instead of results ranging from 0 - $POPULATION, the results can range from -$POPULATION - $POPULATION.
How about not letting people in the employ of government vote at all? This would send a clear message that bloated government is a drain on society.
Besides, if you're employed by government, there's going to be a natural tendency to vote for more/bigger government. It probably means a bigger paycheck for you. Congress does it directly, other gov't employees have to do it a little more indirectly, but it's the same.
If it's basically a volunteer job, having 400 people makes sense. Maybe a bunch of people are actually busy making a living at a real job back home. The small geography makes that possible.
In NE, it's only $12k a year - below the poverty line for a family of 4. Here, too, we have the retired and the independently wealthy running. (The candidates in my district, where the incumbent is not running again, are a retired guy and a young-ish lawyer.) You can't live on that, and you can't do it part-time because of the geography. It discourages a lot of qualified/interested people. Heck I'd like to give it a shot - but I couldn't even support myself on that, much less my family.
I've come to the conclusion that it's nearly impossible to be a citizen-legislator like I used to hear about - when the legislature had to wrap up in time for the farmers to get back to plant their fields. If gov't were small and the duties only required about 3 months, then maybe I could get by being a computer consultant for the rest of the year. That can't happen when you're in session for 6 months and frequently have special sessions at any time.
The Dems and Reps will always be whipping the electorate into a frenzy, saying this is the most important election ever, etc. I'm sick of it. The two candidates are so similar on so many views that it's disgusting. Neither respects the Constitution. I voted for Phillips, and will vote for Peroutka. If I don't stand by my principles, then they don't count for much. Bush will not restore the republic, he'll just chip at its foundation with a pick rather than a backhoe like Kerry.
A tiny state like NH has 400 people in the legislature (or is that just one house)? We only have 49 in NE (unicameral, so that's total) and we're bigger in area and population.
So how's the campaign going? Heck I think \. should interview you. A slashdotter running for office - that's got to be interesting.
(Technically I guess I'm up for election. I'm a presidential elector. By voting for my candidate you're actually voting for me to go vote for him.)
This happens every time. Each election becomes "the most important/critical of our lifetime!" This way the parties whip us into an incoherent frenzy, creating a bitter partisan rivalry (between two sides that are really not all that much different) so that they can entrench their power that much more. Drive home that identity, so that it becomes more important than actually thinking about issues. "Damn the issues, my team must win no matter what it takes!"
Meanwhile, third parties like Libertarians, Greens, and Constitutionalists peacefully and thoughtfully debate real issues with very little rancor between them. Where else do you see a candidate defer to another who is probably the most ideologically removed from him to explain a point?
Independently thinking Americans are anathema to the Duopoly - a threat to their power. Why do you think they try to marginalize third parties through ballot access restrictions, debate exclusions, not addressing the voting system shortcomings? The Duopoly likes voters who blindly believe whatever they're told. Do yourself, and America, a favor on Nov 2 - vote third party.
Well I used to live in Norwalk IA. It qualifies as "Smallville" I think.
But then so do thousands of midwestern towns, just like the one I grew up in.
OK, now I wanna be Superman too!!!!
True, that, about Fort Sumter. But with Lincoln sending reinforcements and supplies to it, what were they to do? But you're right, in the court of public opinion and the annals of history they would have looked better.