Plurality-threshold or majority-threshold? At least one Democrat gets it
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Mike Ridgway
Oct 29, 2009, 10:41:06 AM10/29/09
to Election Integrity
Excerpt:
Joe Lieberman. When he lost the 2005 Democratic primary for the US Senate, he didn't let "THE VOTERS" push him around. He formed the Connecticut for Lieberman Party and won the old-fashioned way -- by splitting the Democratic vote."
Thankfully, because there weren't any second choice votes allowed, no one lost because someone's first choice votes defeated their second choice in a final "instant runoff" round.
Sounds pretty nonmonotonic to me...
But as I was trying to suggest in an earlier post, the chance of this "bug" surfacing in real life was apparently greater than 1 in a million, after all.
The chance of this outcome effecting the Democrats' ability to block a Republican/Lieberman filibuster of the health care bill?
Apparently greater than 1 in a million.
Now that second set of odds sounds okay to me. I don't like the Democrats' health care bill.
Still, when taking in the bigger picture, I can't help but be troubled by this outcome and by the willingness of so many members of this group to discount the impact of plurality-threshold elections on what some people refer to as (visualize my air quotes) "democracy."
No need to worry. My (detractor)s would tell you that there are are better alternatives out there that solve the plurality bug, just none that are being promoted in a viable way by anyone.
My personal favortite? "Parliamentary systems."
Confused? You're probably not the only one.
Mike Ridgway
Oh, I guess I should state: The one Democrat who clearly gets it is obviously Stephen Colbert. Too bad he's a pundit instead of a reformer. Do you think Lieberman gets it? I think maybe he does.
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