Ranked-Choice Voting Ever heard of it?

This is outrageous.

Guess what state uses it?

Idaho... Lol just kidding

It's Maine

With this new system you can get the most 1st place votes and lose. Sounds like a progressive dream right?

Democrat Jared Golden has defeated Maine Rep. Bruce Poliquin in the nation’s first use of ranked-choice voting for a congressional race, according to state election officials. The Democrat won just over 50 percent of the vote in the ranked-choice tabulation, meaning he’ll be the next congressman from the 2nd District unless Poliquin’s legal challenges to the voting system prevail. A Golden win in the 2nd District, which President Donald Trump carried in 2016, mean Democrats have picked up 35 seats and wiped out all New England Republicans in the House. Poliquin led Golden by less than a point on the first count, but since neither candidate received 50 percent of the vote, the state’s ranked-choice voting system kicked in to determine the winner.

www.rollcall.com...

sound confusing? It is.

This might clear it up a little,

A Democrat who finished behind Republican Rep. Bruce Poliquin in the first round of balloting has come from behind to flip the seat in the second of its two U.S. House races.

A computer algorithm reallocated the second-place votes, giving Golden a lead of nearly 3,000 votes.

www.nbcboston.com...


Goodbye America it was nice knowing ya

Yeah- I live here. Still scratching my head over why yesterdays thread on the topic over our local stolen election was canned.
I was writing a pretty involved reply to it, but didn't save it... figured it wouldn't come up again here.

Ranked choice voting- yet another democratic scam for screwing over the many to help the few.

dp

a reply to: lordcomac

My OP was and I quote "lousy"

In truth I was just pressed for time so it was lousy. LOL

This time, your source is different. In the last one, it pointed out something that I was not aware of- something that was never openly mentioned in discussing the ranked-choice voting. We voted that option in a few years back, and then the state said "wait this is dumb" and made us vote for it a second time... which we did, and once again told the state to allow it.

In neither of those vote-cycles did I ever even once hear anyone say that ranked choice voting actually goes against the Maine state constitution, and it won't be used for all elections- only some. Specifically, any votes used to send representatives from our state to the federal level.

It's things like this that make me wish the world would hurry up and collapse so we can start over without lawyers.

I have. It's called a Borda Count I think.

You are basically given a ballot with all the options and you rank them from your personal preference to your least favorite choice. Then the results are tallied up. Sort of like a track meet is scored.

1 = 8
2 = 6
3 = 4
4 = 2

You get the idea. So each candidate has their results tallied and the one with the highest overall score wins the election. It is possible for someone to have the most high rankings but be beat by someone who is more acceptable in terms of more 2 and 3 ratings with a mix of 1s in there.

The theory is that the Borda Count arrives at the most overall acceptable candidate, not just the most overall popular.

a reply to: lordcomac

I couldn't find that article. It was scrubbed along with any other that stated the 1st place vote winner lost.

At least as far as I looked (12 google pages or so)

I did see the below which helped me understand how it works a little better.

Remember that a "majority" in this case is defined as: a number or percentage equaling more than half of a total

Ranked choice voting lets voters rank their choices based on individual preference. First choices are counted, and if no candidate has a majority of the vote, an "instant runoff" occurs in which the candidate with the least support is eliminated. Voters that picked the eliminated candidate as their first choice have their vote counted for their next choice. In a three-person race, we now have a winner with majority support in the final round of tabulation. In a race with more than three candidates, this process is repeated until one candidate has a majority.


Maine's RCV results

a reply to: ketsuko

Sounds like common core voting

Insane

Local elections matter. Don't like it? Vote, Maine. I'm serious. Vote.

I don't agree with it, but this is what you ended up with.

originally posted by: Sostratus
a reply to: ketsuko

Sounds like common core voting

Insane

Yea, and no. It's an interesting idea, but I'd like to see it in practice to see how it goes on a local level first.

Think about it in terms of the Republican primary for the last presidential election. There were 16 candidates. What if you had to rank them from your top choice to your least favorite choice?

Arguably, Trump is so polarizing, that it's hard to see him winning a Borda Count because while I can see his fans ranking him top, I don't see people who voted for Ted Cruz or Marco Rubio or Ben Carson (the other top candidates) rating Trump in the top three or four choices of their personal preferences. Heck, a Borda Count might have actually seen Jeb! bounce out ahead of Trump although he was pretty universally disliked by most Republican voters.

You likely would have seen one of the other three I named running for president with a Borda Count system in play.

Is this anything like this?

CPG grey has some great videos

m.youtube.com...

a reply to: ketsuko

If it was used for the presidential election we would have Gary Johnson or That albino Chick for president

originally posted by: Aallanon
a reply to: ketsuko

If it was used for the presidential election we would have Gary Johnson or That albino Chick for president

I don't think it would work well for a two choice vote which is basically what the president is. I could see it more for the primary. Take a one day primary in all areas and use a Borda Count to figure out who the least objectionable candidate is to a base. Maybe assign runner-up as veep.

But I think you keep the old system for president unless we had something more like a European parliamentary election with lots of parties.

originally posted by: Aallanon
This is outrageous.

Guess what state uses it?

Idaho... Lol just kidding

It's Maine

With this new system you can get the most 1st place votes and lose. Sounds like a progressive dream right?

Democrat Jared Golden has defeated Maine Rep. Bruce Poliquin in the nation’s first use of ranked-choice voting for a congressional race, according to state election officials. The Democrat won just over 50 percent of the vote in the ranked-choice tabulation, meaning he’ll be the next congressman from the 2nd District unless Poliquin’s legal challenges to the voting system prevail. A Golden win in the 2nd District, which President Donald Trump carried in 2016, mean Democrats have picked up 35 seats and wiped out all New England Republicans in the House. Poliquin led Golden by less than a point on the first count, but since neither candidate received 50 percent of the vote, the state’s ranked-choice voting system kicked in to determine the winner.

www.rollcall.com...

sound confusing? It is.

This might clear it up a little,

A Democrat who finished behind Republican Rep. Bruce Poliquin in the first round of balloting has come from behind to flip the seat in the second of its two U.S. House races.

A computer algorithm reallocated the second-place votes, giving Golden a lead of nearly 3,000 votes.

www.nbcboston.com...


Goodbye America it was nice knowing ya

Here's the description of Maine's ranked choice system, from Maine's website:

"On Election Night, all the ballots are counted for voters’ first choices. If one candidate receives an outright majority, he or she wins. If no candidate receives a majority, the candidate with the fewest first choices is eliminated and voters who liked that candidate the best have their ballots instantly counted for their second choice. This process repeats and last-place candidates lose until one candidate reaches a majority and wins. Your vote counts for your second choice only if your first choice has been eliminated."

This doesn't look like Borda voting, as such, because in Maine's system, first, second, and third preferences all have the same weight.

I'm not sure why you find this confusing. It ensures that whoever wins has a majority of the votes that were counted. It also ensures that everyone's vote is counted in the way they intended. It's basically like having an instant runoff vote, without having to reschedule a vote.

The Maine website goes on to say:
"Ranked choice voting does not advantage one political party or faction over another. It’s why cities and towns with Republican, Democratic and Independent majorities have adopted it. It’s why Republican parties, as well as Democratic parties across the country use it."

It prevents the least popular candidate from getting elected in a multi-way race. Governor LePage was elected with 37% of the vote, meaning 63% of voters didn't want him. So Maine adopeted ranked-choice voting.

It's not a hard concept, I don't know why you oppose it.