Ye Olde Libertarian Pub (2)

[durangodawood]

Hi Libertarians!

Any support here for ranked choice voting, or similar?

 

[durangodawood]

Oh and also, can I smoke weed in the libertarian pub?

 

[Eudaimonist]

Any support here for ranked choice voting, or similar?

I don't like ranked choice voting because it still has too much incentive for tactical voting. My preference is for voting that does the most to encourage the casting of a sincere vote.

I do sympathize with the idea of ranked voting. I really do. First past the post (the typical American voting system) is terrible. It greatly encourages the casting of a tactical vote. You might want to vote for a third party candidate Z, but major party candidate X is terrible and must not win!!! So maybe you hold your nose and vote for major party alternative candidate Y. Or you vote for the third party candidate Z, but then feel bad because candidate X won and you didn't do anything to stop that. Ranked voting at least involves a sincere vote and a tactical vote in your ranking. You could vote Z > Y > X, or maybe Y > Z > X.

Personally, I prefer range voting. In that case, you score each candidate you wish. For instance, you could assign Z a score of 10/10, Y a score of 5/10, and X a score of 1/10, if that is how you feel about them. If you don't know a candidate, you can refuse to give a score at all. In approval voting, the binary form of range voting, you could just give an approve/disapprove/no-opinion vote for each.

The benefit of range voting is that studies show that it has the lowest Bayesian regret value, which seems to be a measure of how little pressure there is to hide your sincere vote. Unfortunately, ranked voting can involve some tactical considerations that may cause one to rank one's sincere preference lower than necessary. Range voting has less of an incentive to do that.

So, my preference is to have range voting replace most first past the post elections. I wouldn't mind having a party proportional voting system for the House of Representatives, but that is another discussion.


eudaimonia,

Mark

 

[durangodawood]

I don't like ranked choice voting because it still has too much incentive for tactical voting. My preference is for voting that does the most to encourage the casting of a sincere vote.

I do sympathize with the idea of ranked voting. I really do. First past the post (the typical American voting system) is terrible. It greatly encourages the casting of a tactical vote. You might want to vote for a third party candidate Z, but major party candidate X is terrible and must not win!!! So maybe you hold your nose and vote for major party alternative candidate Y. Or you vote for the third party candidate Z, but then feel bad because candidate X won and you didn't do anything to stop that. Ranked voting at least involves a sincere vote and a tactical vote in your ranking. You could vote Z > Y > X, or maybe Y > Z > X.

Personally, I prefer range voting. In that case, you score each candidate you wish. For instance, you could assign Z a score of 10/10, Y a score of 5/10, and X a score of 1/10, if that is how you feel about them. If you don't know a candidate, you can refuse to give a score at all. In approval voting, the binary form of range voting, you could just give an approve/disapprove/no-opinion vote for each.

The benefit of range voting is that studies show that it has the lowest Bayesian regret value, which seems to be a measure of how little pressure there is to hide your sincere vote. Unfortunately, ranked voting can involve some tactical considerations that may cause one to rank one's sincere preference lower than necessary. Range voting has less of an incentive to do that.

So, my preference is to have range voting replace most first past the post elections. I wouldn't mind having a party proportional voting system for the House of Representatives, but that is another discussion.


eudaimonia,

Mark

Thanks. I hadnt heard of range voting.

My sense is that anyone with 3rd party inclinations ought to vigorously support voting proposals that would reduce the pressure to vote tactically.

I vote tactically because it makes sense in our first past the post system. Everyone except 2-party die hards should want to change that.

 

[Sarcoline]

I consider myself Libertarian. I would define being Libertarian as a political position that is able to distinguish the difference between social discussions and political issues in order to reduce the size of government.

I think this is what is most appealing about the Libertarian party for many people today is that it presents an objective to shrink the size of government because it doesn't depend on defending a position on the social issues that are creating the most division within political discussions today.

The government should be small and politicians should not be celebrities. Our elections should not be like a season of American Idol.

 

[Eudaimonist]

Incidentally, I mentioned that my support for range voting was based largely on the way in which it has the lowest "Bayesian regret". This link leads to a discussion on just what that means.

RangeVoting.org - Bayesian Regret


eudaimonia,

Mark

 

[Percivale]

Incidentally, I mentioned that my support for range voting was based largely on the way in which it has the lowest "Bayesian regret". This link leads to a discussion on just what that means.

RangeVoting.org - Bayesian Regret

I would like range voting except it is too much work to expect everyone to do. The presidential electors should use it. Ranked or stv with just first and second choice is enough to allow voting sincerely, not just tactical voting, for regular voters.

 

[Eudaimonist]

I would like range voting except it is too much work to expect everyone to do.

Too much work? I don't understand you.

It's no more work than ranked choice systems. It's barely more work than FPTP systems. One could even have binary range voting (approval voting) with just "pass", "fail", or "no opinion" for each candidate. What is the difficulty here?

Don't worry about the math behind Bayesian regret. No one has to understand any of that in order to vote, or to understand the results. That's just for political scientists.


eudaimonia,

Mark

 

[Percivale]

Too much work? I don't understand you.

It's no more work than ranked choice systems. It's barely more work than FPTP systems. One could even have binary range voting (approval voting) with just "pass", "fail", or "no opinion" for each candidate. What is the difficulty here?

Don't worry about the math behind Bayesian regret. No one has to understand any of that in order to vote, or to understand the results. That's just for political scientists.


eudaimonia,

Mark

I guess it depends on how many candidates there are and whether primaries would still be as significant. If there were more than five the average voter may not be familiar with all of them and could have trouble deciding how to rank them and might prefer to just select one or two, especially for lower offices. I had not considered binary range voting, it might be a good option.

 

[Percivale]

I've read more about range voting and now believe it is the best system, but it should be renamed 'score voting' for better clarity, that distinguishes it better from ranked voting.

 

[Percivale]

To explain my initial response to range voting, for some reason I confused it with borda, where you rank all the candidates and your first choice gets one vote, your second gets 1/2 vote, and so on.
Currently I'm not sure whether range or ranked choice voting is best, though range voting is simpler for voting systems to process.
In range voting the tactical vote is to score in a binary way, giving every candidate you dislike a 1 and every one you like a 9, so I'd recommend a binary range voting system to begin with; you can either approve or disapprove each candidate, or give no opinion on some.
To vote tactically in rcv (also known as stv or irv) is so complicated and risky that I don't think it is a real issue. It is very likely that nearly all voters will vote sincerely in RCV. It is important that the RCV system not require you to rank all the candidates, only the top two or three.

 

[SkyWriting]

The government should be small and politicians should not be celebrities. Our elections should not be like a season of American Idol.

So what is your solution? Celebrities get more votes. Nobodies get fewer. People are asking Oprah to run for office.

 

[VCR-2000]

Hey, libertarian here. I consider myself more libertarian, but in elections I still vote Republican as the lesser of two evils. Am I the only one in this boat?

 

[LloydK]

@VCR-2000, I'm similar. I used to favor Democrats somewhat, because they used to be more antiwar and for fair trade etc. But now they're more prowar and anti-fair trade etc. I voted for Buchanan in 2000, because he was like me. I voted Trump last time for the same reason. I also strongly oppose the Global Warming alarmism and am relieved that Trump does not support it, at least so far.

I post a lot of info (username Luck) at the FSP forum at The Friendly Forum . That's a libertarian forum. The Libertarian party seems to be controlled by the ruling class, so I don't vote for them. I'm not a creationist, but they have a lot of better science than the mainstream IMO and I post on "catastrophism" (Great Flood etc) at Thunderbolts Forum • View topic - Evidence of Ancient Global Cataclysm

 

[Albion]

Hey, libertarian here. I consider myself more libertarian, but in elections I still vote Republican as the lesser of two evils. Am I the only one in this boat?

Hard to say. All the Libertarians who I know vote Libertarian. Otherwise, how can the party ever be influential?

 

[Percivale]

Hey, libertarian here. I consider myself more libertarian, but in elections I still vote Republican as the lesser of two evils. Am I the only one in this boat?

I expect that a lot of people are in the same boat. I used to be, but now though I’m not strongly libertarian I’m closer to it than to either major party, and I dislike them equally, so I tend to vote libertarian when I can mostly.
I don’t think the libertarian party has much chance, but I don’t live in a competitive state or congressional district so my vote is not likely to count anyway.

 

[Albion]

You could look at it this way--if the election is crucial, maybe the lesser of two evils is important enough a consideration to justify voting for one of the major parties. Many people thought that way as between Trump and Hillary. A lot was riding on that election.

But for all other races and offices, vote your conscience and it only!

 

[Percivale]

You could look at it this way--if the election is crucial, maybe the lesser of two evils is important enough a consideration to justify voting for one of the major parties. Many people thought that way as between Trump and Hillary. A lot was riding on that election.

But for all other races and offices, vote your conscience and it only!

I agree, but people should pay more attention to whether they are in a swing state, those are the only ones where your vote might affect the outcome anyway. In other states it has only symbolic value, so a minor party vote actually makes more of a statement.

 

[Albion]

I'm in agreement, but even in a swing state, some races aren't that crucial. Who is the drain commissioner, for example, probably does not mean much from a partisan standpoint, but a vote for ones favorite minor party in that race can help build the party. If that is a poor example, look at the times when we are voting for one of the major party tickets but there is one of them--state representative, for instance--that you just do not think is qualified or trustworthy. Vote minor party there and let the chips fall where they may.

 

[98cwitr]

Hey, libertarian here. I consider myself more libertarian, but in elections I still vote Republican as the lesser of two evils. Am I the only one in this boat?

Exact same boat...and we both have oars I rarely have had a non-nut-case Libertarian on any of my ballots.