In college, we had a ranked voting system for student government.

[YouDig]

I know, it's student government, means nothing, but hear me out, the voting system was good. You rank who you want from first to last. Whoever had the least number 1 votes gets bumped out. All the people who voted them number one, their votes go to the person they ranked number two.

Then you do that again, knock out the person with the least number of number one votes (including the new number one votes that used to be number two votes). And you bump up the number two votes of the knocked out person to number one again. You keep going like that until there are two people left, and then again the person with more votes wins like usual.

But the good thing is, you don't have the "spoiler" thing. Say it's Hillary, Trump, Bernie, and Bloomberg. I would vote Hillary>Bernie>Bloomberg>Trump. That way if it came down to anyone versus Trump, I would still be doing everything I could to stop Trump.

I think a lot of Bernie people who don't want to vote for Hillary would still vote Bernie>Hillary>Bloomberg>Trump. And it wouldn't be choosing the lesser of two evils, it would be choosing Bernie, but ranking the evils in order of how evil they are, which maybe some would find more palatable.

[Trust Buster]

1. And it wasn't free. Go figure......LOL

[think]

3. Are you sure you're on the right forum?

[YouDig]

4. No it was not. LOL

[oldandhappy]

2. Have read about this way of voting and like the idea a lot.

[YouDig]

5. It could really resolve a lot of the angry disputes, right?

You wouldn't really even have to have primaries. There's no "Bernie or Bust", or "PUMA" or whatever. Just rank.

[libtodeath]

6. This sounds similar to caucusing.

[YouDig]

7. It was done online. You go to the website and rank.

[libtodeath]

10. Sounds real secure.

[YouDig]

12. Probably not. But rigging the student election would not be worth the effort.

Unless you really care about the theme at the mixers they throw.

[Vote2016]

8. Outside of a couple battleground states, top of the ticket unity is not all that important. If there

is party rules reform, a progressive platform, a decent ticket, and a useful roll for the FDR-Sanders-Warren wing of the party at the convention and beyond, there will be unity.

If DWS and lobbyists continue to have dominance at the DNC, if the platform is all double-talk and centrist pablum, if the VP nominee is a neocon or a neoliberal, and if the HRC-DWS wing of FDR's party freezes out the FDR-Sanders-Warren wing of the party at the convention and beyond, there will not be unity.

The movement will go forward either way; the question is whether it goes on within the Democratic Party or parallel to the Democratic Party.

[nadinbrzezinski]

9. Hmmm...you are suggesting we adopt run off voting?

Like oh...the French do? I agree with you. Pigs are flying, I hear there is a nasty snow storm, white out conditions in hell. What is sad is that the college you went to did not explain where this came from. Or how these rounds work.

[YouDig]

11. Yeah, that's what I'm suggesting. I think everyone benefits.

The Ted Cruz people and Rand Paul people and Hillary people and Bernie people. I don't see the downside.

I don't know where it came from, it's not like it's a way-out-there idea, but in a university election where it doesn't matter, it's easy to just adopt things. Didn't know France does this. Good for France.

[nadinbrzezinski]

14. Go back to school and take a poli sci class in comparative government

California now uses a version of this for state level races. So don't say it is just school government

[YouDig]

15. No insults yo, not necessary.

[nadinbrzezinski]

16. It is not an insult

It is a well meant suggestion. Go take a class. It can be eye opening as to how backwards and obsolete Amercan "democracy" actually is.

[YouDig]

17. Yes it is. Cmon nb, don't play dumb. You're smart!

[Cheese Sandwich]

13. No shit. That's what Nader said. If the Dems are so freaked out about third party challenges they

should have started pushing for ranked choice 15 years ago.

Nobody has any cred to complain about "spoiler" candidates unless they are also demanding voting reforms like ranked choice that would end the risk of spoiler candidates.

[TheBlackAdder]

18. Duh.

.


Besides being self-affecting Common Sense 102, that is Introduction to Politics 101.


.

[YouDig]

19. So let's do it! Is Bernie talking about it? Where's the movement?

I'd be on board. I would contribute money. I haven't heard any candidate from either side even mention this.

[TheBlackAdder]

20. Your posts indicate a complete lack of knowledge about the political system. A complete lack!

.


I am not going to school someone who is so inept in the field of politics that they incessantly post drivel without knowing the history or how the institutions of politics work. It might behoove you to enroll in some college courses first, and perhaps you'll be better equipped to post relevant OPs during the next election cycle.

.

[YouDig]

22. Well, fuckin-a bubba, that wasn't nice at all.

I have been to college, hence the description of the college voting system. Yeah I know the history and the institutions. That's how I know that Bernie's plans for single payer and taxing stock trades and all that are not going to happen in a million years.

OK, maybe ranked voting won't either. But it's a good idea, it would make the country more democratic, and there's no downside I can see. Why the resistance?

[MH1]

21. I was very interested a while back. It is also called "instant run-off",

although when you get into the details there are several variations. If I recall correctly, "ranked choice voting" is the generic term, then there are different systems for how eliminations and re-allocating the votes work.

But anyway, I don't think you will see the two major parties promoting this any time soon. It would increase the power of third parties and they really don't want that.

The activists I was involved with felt that the best hope would be to work at the local level to get this adopted in more and more local elections. The theory being that once it is more common and more people are familiar with it, the better will be the opportunity to apply it to wider elections.