Glad to see it making some headway, will watch this one to see how it is received, thanks.
The biggest threats right now to such a system are voters who try and play strategically with it, like they do now... the old rules don't apply, and you have to break the machiavellian mindset. If voters fiddle with the rankings just to try and stick it to someone (instead of voting their conscience), you can end up with a veritable unknown winning.
Assume that a everyone in the country is polarized to hate the 'opposing' candidate. (Not a stretch.) Now assume that Nader is a choice equal with the other two in Condorcet voting.
Repubs vote for Bush, then Nader, and not at all for Kerry, thinking "Well, I'll just give some points to Nader, and that'll put him in front of Kerry in the end... that'll show 'em!" even though they don't really want to see Nader in there.
Dems do the same, but Kerry, Nader, and none for Bush.
So assume 100 million voters. Kerry gets 50M * 3 = 150M pts. Bush gets an equal number. Nader gets 100M * = 200M.
Oops, Nader won. Nobody *wanted* him, but he wins *because people tried to strategically vote*. You simply can't do it with Condorcet voting, so don't try.
It'll take some voter education, but god knows we need that in this country anyway. :P
OTOH, if people genuinely felt that Nader (or whoever) was the best second choice, then everyone wins to some degree. They didn't get their first choice, but they also didn't get the guy they can't stand.
Nice.
The biggest threats right now to such a system are voters who try and play strategically with it, like they do now... the old rules don't apply, and you have to break the machiavellian mindset. If voters fiddle with the rankings just to try and stick it to someone (instead of voting their conscience), you can end up with a veritable unknown winning.
Assume that a everyone in the country is polarized to hate the 'opposing' candidate. (Not a stretch.) Now assume that Nader is a choice equal with the other two in Condorcet voting.
Repubs vote for Bush, then Nader, and not at all for Kerry, thinking "Well, I'll just give some points to Nader, and that'll put him in front of Kerry in the end... that'll show 'em!" even though they don't really want to see Nader in there.
Dems do the same, but Kerry, Nader, and none for Bush.
So assume 100 million voters. Kerry gets 50M * 3 = 150M pts. Bush gets an equal number. Nader gets 100M * = 200M.
Oops, Nader won. Nobody *wanted* him, but he wins *because people tried to strategically vote*. You simply can't do it with Condorcet voting, so don't try.
It'll take some voter education, but god knows we need that in this country anyway. :P
OTOH, if people genuinely felt that Nader (or whoever) was the best second choice, then everyone wins to some degree. They didn't get their first choice, but they also didn't get the guy they can't stand.