Minnesota Republicans Want to Ban a Voting System That Gives Third-Party... - Polidicks

https://theintercept.com/2018/03/19/ranked-choice-voting-minnesota-republicans/ Lawmakers in Minnesota introduced legislation last week that would prohibit local governments from adopting ranked-choice voting, a system that can help third-party candidates’ chances for election and lead to a more representative government. The bill, introduced on March 12, would have the greatest impact in Minneapolis, which has used ranked-choice voting for municipal elections since 2013. The city has elected a Green Party city council member, and it currently has a nearly equal number of men and women on city council and the most ethnically diverse set of lawmakers in its history. Just last year, a well-funded socialist was a viable candidate in a city council election. St. Paul adopted the voting method last year, and a number of other cities are currently considering it. Poster's note: Sorry the thread title had to cut short due of site's new limiting down lettering mechanic.

Honestly this headline could be reduced down to "Republicans Want to Ban Voting" at this point. Democracy is not something Republican politicians desire anymore, because it means not having absolute control over everything for them.

As someone who typically votes 3rd party, that's really concerning.

Fuck off, RCV is the only way we can unshackle ourselves from the dysfunctional and corrupt shitshow that is the two-party system. There's nothing wrong with it and it results in perfectly fair election outcomes.

Was RCV fully blocked in Maine? There was a referendum for it I believe but the state supreme court shut it down. On topic: the Minnesota Senate has 34 republicans to 33 DFL members, doubt it will pass thankfully.

Having read through the article, Senator Koran sounds like a real charmer - ranked choice voting is bad because its unnatural. Classy.

I kinda agree on changing to be shorter, But I prefer to "Republicans Want to a Banned Voting System in Minnesota" to better and connected to article's news.

Yes please remove the possibilities of third parties winning so we can forever be stuck with the party that can't do anything because of the other party and the party that is comically evil.

Unfortunately yes, And if this toxic bipartisanship continue acts like insane and sadly corrupted to outdated Neoliberal and Nationalistic-orientationed Conservative beliefs in both them. In next few decades, these two predominant parties will begin acting more like literal politically theme-religions but more worst, Merged into New Democratic-Republican Party.

As someone who has never voted 3rd party this is bullshit.

Negative. Thanks to some remarkable last-minute signature gathering by Diane Russell, Mike Sylvester, and dozens of other progressive legislators and volunteers throughout the state we were able to force a "People's Veto" -- essentially the citizen initiative equivalent of the governor's veto power -- to overturn the Maine Supreme Court's repeal of RCV. What this means is that RCV will indeed be implemented on the state ballot come November 2018 with the exception of the governor's race (incompatible with Maine's constitution). In addition, a new citizen initiative calling for the official adoption of RCV in all future races (as well as an amendment the state constitution to allow RCV in gubernatorial races) will be added to the November ballot.

That is fantastic. Didn't know of a people's veto, a little concerning tbh, especially if it can overturn court decisions. Glad it was used for good.

I think ranked choice voting should be mandatory, nation-wide.

Agree, But soon most states and maybe presidential election have RCV while removing FPTP, We move on to other voting systems alternatives to both First-Past-The-Post and Ranked Choice voting systems.

I was just joking, I didn't mean to literally change the title I just meant that as a generalization because of the way Republican Politicians have been acting in general lately. I promise I'm not trying to be mean/rude in asking this, but is English your first language? I thought I was having a stroke in the middle of reading this and lost my reading comprehension

First, Ok Second, It's not your fault but I my brain is was raised with this problem.

Ah alright it's okay my dude. Just a general tip for posting/writing, at least for me, whenever I'm about to post something, I'll generally try to forget what I wrote entirely, and then re-read my post three or four times over just to make sure it sounds okay and that I'm getting across my point in an understandable way. It makes posting take a lot longer, but I like to think that I have a lot more understandable writing/posts because of it. Proofreading definitely helps.

Of course they do, they rely on a broken system to stay in power and anything which seeks to fix said broken system is going to earn their ire. This, congressional term limits, bans on gerrymandering and voter id law removal, all that sort of stuff flies in the face of GOP presence in the government and they won't allow it if they can help it.

Yea, But for second sentence is just about worrying about future of American politics, if both parties completely turned into Political religions or merged into One-party if their beliefs are close one another.

Honestly a party merge isn't the worst thing that could happen, if it meant that there was still democracy in place. If that were to happen (essentially the abolishing of the party system all together) it would mean that we could start voting on important things and everyone could have their own opinions again, instead of this 'political football' where you have to pick a side, and if you disagree with a single issue out of hundreds with your party, you're out. It sucks and its stupid and we need something better.

And also worshiped unrealistically on one of party's politicians. (*cough* most to majority all of Hillary/Trump supporters as exam. *cough*) Sure if US isn't transforming into Authoritarian nation and Democracy is continue decline, than sure this isn't bad thing.

Oppression, pure and simple.

didn't the scotus or some state court essentially rule that rcv can't be constitutional?

Thats Maine State Court and they literally believe that majority and plurality are different somehow despite sharing mostly same concept of getting over 50% of vote.

RCV is still shitty for third parties tho? Australia literally implemented it to stop the third parties from causing a ruckus lol. Don't blow your energy supporting something that only addresses the spoiler effect.

Although I absolutely support a better system than what currently exists, I remember someone bringing up one possible drawback of RCV. They said that it might be possible to negate the principle of anonymity, since one particular combination of ranked choices could potentially be rigged to be unique, especially if there's many uncommon choices on the list.

Ranked Choice is kind of shit. The most it'd do is prevent spoiler effect on the larger parties from happening, which is still better than FPTP I guess. But I wouldn't act as if this would be some big revelation for "taking down" the 2 party system.

Plurality is just the most votes, doesn't matter what percentage, so they are different. Bill Clinton won with a plurality, not a majority, bacause of Perot splitting the vote I'd imagine.

The Maine Supreme Court ruled that RCV is incompatible with the Maine State Constitution (not the U.S. Constitution) as it applies to gubernatorial races only. This is because the state constitution stipulates the governorship must be won with a majority of the votes cast, whereas RCV reallocates votes if necessary. There is currently no national precedent for whether RCV is compatible with the U.S. Constitution. Things will always be shitty for third parties. That's what being third party mans: you will always be at a disadvantage for fundraising and media exposure. That being said, grassroots campaigns are becoming less and less dependent on donors and media coverage thanks to the internet and social media. Under RCV, voters could take a chance on their favorite long-shot candidate (1st preference) without fear of spoiling the race for their establishment candidate (2nd preference). Political activism isn't a sprint meter that gradually drains as petitions accumulate signatures. As citizen initiatives go, RCV is relatively simple, and it already has overwhelming support. Lo and behold, after just two months of gathering signatures, RCV Maine had not only reached their quota, but shot past it—much to the surprise and frustration of the governor. If that doesn't seem like a worthwhile investment to you, then you underestimate the significance of the spoiler effect. Case in point: the last time we elected a governor with a majority of the vote was fucking 1966. Maine is a microcosm of the country. The partisan polarization we're seeing nationwide is perfectly encapsulated by our 1st and 2nd congressional districts (which split red-blue for the first time in history in 2016) right down to population density, socioeconomic status, religious affiliation, unemployment rates, gun ownership, and so on. Consequently, political solutions that work in Maine will also work for the country as a whole. RCV is the future of the U.S. electoral system. So yes, it's worth blowing our energy on. Because you're such an expert on RCV are you? Tell you what: after you've suffered for eight years under a racist punk of a governor who won with 38% of the vote, and who has done everything in his power to kill as many addicts as possible (up to and including closing down recovery houses and refusing to let police officers carry Narcan) then you can tell me all about how RCV is shit. In the meantime, feel free to think up a better alternative. People are dead because of Paul LePage. He's an absolute monstrosity of a governor, and he won because of the spoiler effect—just like every other Maine governor since 1966. Is RCV a silver bullet? Of course not. But it represents a significant improve over our current system, and it comes at practically zero cost.

Things will always be shitty for third parties. That's what being third party mans: you will always be at a disadvantage for fundraising and media exposure. That being said, grassroots campaigns are becoming less and less dependent on donors and media coverage thanks to the internet and social media. Under RCV, voters could take a chance on their favorite long-shot candidate (1st preference) without fear of spoiling the race for their establishment candidate (2nd preference). Political activism isn't a sprint meter that gradually drains as petitions accumulate signatures. As citizen initiatives go, RCV is relatively simple, and it already has overwhelming support. Lo and behold, after just two months of gathering signatures, RCV Maine not only reached their quota, but shot past it—much to the surprise and frustration of the governor. If that doesn't seem like a worthwhile investment to you, then you underestimate the significance of the spoiler effect. Case in point: the last time we elected a governor with a majority of the vote was fucking 1966. Maine is a microcosm of the country. The partisan polarization we're seeing nationwide is perfectly encapsulated by our 1st and 2nd congressional districts (which split red-blue for the first time in history in 2016) right down to population density, socioeconomic status, religious affiliation, unemployment rates, gun ownership, and so on. Consequently, political solutions that work in Maine will also work for the country as a whole. RCV is the future of the U.S. electoral system. So yes, it's worth blowing our energy on. That's nowhere near what I mean when I say RCV is shitty for third parties. Yes, third parties by definition means they don't hold much power. But what I mean is that even under RCV, third parties get less power than they deserve and a tendency towards two-party dominance still exists. The only way you can really solve that is by implementing some sort of proportionality. Getting rid of the spoiler effect just minimizes the damages third parties cause to politics. What a half-assed future that'll be. It's an upgrade, but it's nowhere near satisfactory.