At 12:55 AM 11/26/2008, Kevin Venzke wrote:
You can easily deny that you have an internal concept of "approval," but you can also deny that you have an internal transitive ranking of the candidates. Maybe it's harder to believe, but it can't be disproven. (Though, I don't really think it is harder to believe, since "approval" has a plain English meaning.)
Yes. That's why it's a poor name. I just suggested "Open Voting." The point is that it is simply voting, but with slightly different rules, allowing what is usually a minority of voters -- usually a small minority -- to add additional votes if they desire. It's Open. It's not restricted to one vote per ballot, but only one vote per candidate, max.
The latter restriction is why it still satisfies reasonable interpretations of one person, one vote. (This was well expressing in the minority opinion in Brown v. Smallwood, and the weird thing about the majority opinion was that they gave the basis for concluding that there was no violation of one person, one vote -- considering the number of *voters* expressing support, rather than the number of marks on the ballot -- and then proceeded to do the exact opposite, to count the number of marks and then give that as a reason the method was a constitutional violation. Truly weird, and that, my friends, is a sign of a decision that was motivated by other than what is being stated. The reasons given were rationalizations, not the true cause. They had sound arguments before them, and they simply set them aside to render a different conclusion, one which they knew was contrary to the precedent from other states, and contrary to the large majority of legal opinion at the time. And, indeed, no other state followed this decision.
So the amazing thing is that this is still law in Minnesota, currently it's being challenged in its application to IRV and STV. Almost a century later. I know that the political process is slow, but that's ridiculous!
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