What do you think of Approval Voting? See details.

Personally, I like the concept and would have no problem with it if it were implemented.

How many times have you heard someone say they would like to vote for several of the candidates or express the frustration that they cannot vote for who they want because it would mean the election going to someone they absolutely do not believe can do the job properly? I think these are universal complaints, not partisan ones.

Would it change the election process where I live? In the local elections it is very likely. In the national elections, not so much.

Why will it never come to fruition (pun intended)? – Because it could be of greater benefit to third party candidates than either faction of the present one-party system we now have.

It is not a bad idea. And it works in organizations, where there are not political parties per se.
I am not sure how it would eventually effect a legislative tradition, like in the US, that has become accustomed to two parties. Approval voting would encourage the emergence of a third, or more, parties. This would demand coalition building in Congress, before they even began thinking about legislation. Folks who think the US Congress is a dysfunctional quagmire now, don’t even know what they are talking about.
Not sure it would fly in the US. But not a silly idea either.

Doesn’t sound like a good idea to me. First we have way too many people that can’t seem to handle the ballot where they only have to pick one candidate. I would think the 2000 election proved that. The real problem however, is that it would increase the dirty politics we seem to have grown into. Make your opponent look bad instead of trying to sell what you believe. The whole election would depend on how bad you can make your primary opponent look. We have too much of that already. And finally, it would make it much more difficult to unseat the incumbent. That’s tough enough already.

Nothing is wrong with the one person, one vote concept. There’s a lot wrong when you try to change the process because you aren’t getting your own way.

@rojo I thought it sounded like an improvement as well. I think you’re right that the immediate impact would be mostly felt at the local and regional level, but I am guessing it would begin to build smaller parties even with national reach and would eventually play a part in all elections.

@josie Agreed regarding organizations, but I think the roadblock in Congress right now is exactly the two party system and how polarized and partisan they have become. In contrast, nations that have a multiparty parliamentary system do build alliances and get things done.

@Jaxk If’n yer agin it, I’m fer it.

Our politics right now is dysfunctional. Rather than just accept that nothing can ever be done to change that, I’m willing to try any reasonable idea. We can always hit the reset button if we find it makes things even worse.

@Jaxk I am not sure I follow your reasoning about the ability of the populace to pick from a multitude of candidates. How did the 2000 election prove that they can’t even pick one? By allowing multiple selections aren’t you actually giving them a larger input into the political selection?
Also, I would be interested to hear your thoughts on how it would increase the dirty politics. As you say we have that now, and other than providing pictures of your opponent having sex with other species, I am not sure how it could get any worse. I cannot see how this method would increase it, in fact, I would forsee just the opposite. Are you saying that it would increase the inter-party nastiness rather than that between parties? Could you expand on this?
And, I assume from your last paragraph that you think this is a process where a person actually gets more than one vote? I see it as voting one time with the possibility of doing away with runoff elections and, for that matter, possibly even eliminating the need for primary elections. In my opinion this would be a positive. From a personal point of view, there were candidates in both major parties I could have and would have voted for but these candidates did not make it through the primaries. If this system had been in place I would have had the ability to vote for these candidates. As it was, I was not given the opportunity. Would that be a negative in your opinion?

@rojo

Actually I see it as diluting the vote. If I vote for the one candidate I see as the best and you vote for six, You’ve gotten six votes to my one. Does this encourage everyone to get more candidates on the ballot? Could we end up selecting between 10, 100 or maybe 1,000 candidates on the ballot? How complex do we want to make this? Given the fact that most Americans don’t really follow politics, how likely are they to understand how this all works? Do we really want the guy with the least negative press to win?

Just a quick refresher on the 2000 election. It was never about ‘Hanging Chads’. It was about trying to interpret ballots. Trying to guess the intention of the voter from ballots that had been inserted upside down or backwards. Trying to find dimples that might mean someone tried to vote or maybe just changed thier mind. I was amazed at how so many peoiple could have mangled thier vote in such a simple process.

I see this as another massive influx of money into the process as well. Currently the PACs create mostly negative ads. That will escalate and broaden.

And of course let’s not forget, the election process is run by the states. There is only one candidate that is truly national and that is President. All other candidates represent a state or district. Do we really want to federalize this? I don’t.

@ETpro

I would expect no less.

But @Jaxk what if one of the six I vote for is the same one you voted for and, given the option, why did you not vote for more than one? That was your choice.
And, if I think candidate A is the best and you think candidate B is. The way we now do it your vote would cancel out mine and vice-a-versa. But what if we both think that candidate C could do an adequate job. maybe not as good as our first choice, but adequate. Would we, as a society, not be better off if “C” won. Less discord. Divisive candidate A is not in office in which case you would feel disenfranchised, nor is candidate B who would make me feel the same way. It would seem to me to be a win-win situation for both of us.
You may be right about the influx of money, although I fail to see why this would mean more, but that is a different problem that needs to be addressed.
I apologize, I do not follow you. What do you mean. Why would this federalize local and state elections? The federal government would have no more say in local and state elections than they presently do. They are all separate and I do not see how allowing more choice federalizes the process.
Personally, I think that we need to start on a local level and move from there to state and finally to the national stage.

@rojo

Probably not disasterous if you second choice is elected but what if it is candidate S or Z? Do we want the least offensive candidate elected or the best candidate?

As for federalizing, I made the assumtion that the intent here was to get more Democrats in Washington. That would require making the elections national. I’m not sure it would work that way but as @ETpro says, if it doesn’t just try something else until you get the desired result.

@Jaxk
Option 1, (present system)
Candidate A believes that Everything is Black. As do you.
Candidate B believes Everything is White. A view that you know in your heart could not be more wrong.
Candidate C is a middle-of-the-roader who believes that sometimes Everything is Black, sometimes it is White. Although he is not in agreement with everything they believe is important, 60% of the voters like him but 55% feel that if they vote for him the other scumbag candidate will get the majority and their vote will be “wasted”.
After the vote Candidate A has 47% of the vote, Candidate B has 48% and Candidate C has 5%
Based on a simple majority Candidate B is put in office.
Did the best candidate win? Not according to you and the other 52% of the voters
Will society benefit? Again, not according to a majority of the voters.
Happy members of society 48%, Unhappy 52%

Option 2 (approval voting)
Candidate A believes that Everything is Black. As do you.
Candidate B believes Everything is White. A view that you know in your heart could not be more wrong.
Candidate C believes that sometimes Everything is Black, sometimes it is White.
This time voters can vote for their main candidate (A or B) AND express their approval of candidate C without “wasting” their vote
After the votes are tallied Candidate A gets 20%, Candidate B gets 20% and Candidate C gets 60% of the vote. Based on voter approval, Candidate C is placed in office.
Same questions: Did the best candidate win? Will society benefit? Yes, according to 60% of the voters, no if you believe 40%
Happy members of society 60%, Unhappy 40%
Unless I am misinterpreting something somewhere, Option 2 would have a greater number of people with some degree of confidence in the system. It would appear that it could go a long way to breaking the deadlock and alienation we presently have.

A couple of points. In your scenario only 5% of the voters believe that the best candidate© won and your math is all off. If we had a third party with 60% that like candidate C he would win regardless of the system.

What is more realistic is the guy with 5% that no one attacks slides through the election with little notriety. When people vote, they ensure the guy they hate doesn’t get thier vote but they vote for everyone else. So the popular candidates get thier 47% and the inocuous candidate gets 60% as a result of 3rd or tenth choice from an uninformed populace. Maybe the Freedom party, That has no clue what to do.

We have a history of almost 300 years of opposing parties working together. Suddenly we have 4 years of stalemate. Blame whoever you will for this but it seems a bit premature to try and change the system for a short term issue. This whole idea of change it and let’s see what happens sounds pretty risky. And once changed going back doesn’t happen.

I don’t doubt the math might be off.

Perhaps a change of perspective. Or wording. What if we ask the question “Did the worst possible candidate win?”

Option 1 – 52% would agree, 48% disagree
Option 2 – 40% would agree, 60% disagree

As for the uninformed populace, they are there no matter what and most don’t vote. And, I would hazard a guess that the term “uninformed” has different meaning to different sides. Over the past couple of hundred years we have come to believe that it was not just landed white gentry that had a lock on wisdom and foresight. Again, a different matter that does need to be addressed.

I disagree with your inference that only candidates from the two major parties have the wherewithall to be in office. I would go so far as to suggest that in the minds of the majority there is actually only one party that that has the skills and knowledge. In my opinion you cannot judge the capability or suitability of a person based on what their party affiliation is.

Also, I thing the stalemate issue has a much longer existence than just the last four years. I would go back to before the issuance of the “Contract for America” and the Gingrich years. Although, I believe Gingrich had some skills at negotiation and compromise, I believe he and his contract were actually more obstructionist in nature. But I get off topic again.

First I think we need to bring things back into perspective. Only 10 Presidents have been elected with less than 50% of the popular vote.

Bush 43 – 48% (in 2000)
Clinton – 43% (in 1992)
Nixon – 43% (in 1968)

Then you have to go back to 1912 to get the next (Woodrow Wilson 42%) and into the 1800s. Most elections are decided by a clear majority, so I’m not sure what problem we’re trying fix.

As for the uninformed electorate, most surveys indicate a distinct lack of knowledge of the workings and positions of our government. I’m not sure why you chose to make this a racial thing. It’s not.

As for the parties, I merely used a name that would not typically invoke a negative response. Few if any would know who that party ran for any political position since they aren’t covered by the mainstream media.

And finally whether you liked Gingrich or Clinton, they were able to come to a mutual agreement on what could be done. They didn’t just sit back and call each other names.

I did not mean for this to be taken racially at all. My thought patterns were black/white/shades of grey. I could have used Yellow/Purple/shades of yellow/purple had I known it would offend.

And, as I mentioned earlier, I am thinking more in terms of local elections/state elections where the electorate has a much more working knowledge of the individual candidates. I also see it as a great asset in party primaries.
Do I think it would work nationally? Yes.
Do I think it is a more fair and equitable system that allows for more input? Yes

Would it be fair to say that your biggest complaint is that changing from our present system to this one is trying to fix a problem you do not see as existing?

@rojo

I don’t think you can say “not just landed white gentry that had a lock on wisdom and foresight”, is not a racially motivated coment.

No, it is not only trying to fix a problem that doesn’t exist, it is also inserting a problem we don’t currently have. Let me try to take a page from your example. Say you have three candidates, the first two are widely known and are either loved or hated. Candidate A has the supportof 60% of the population while candidate B has 40%. Candidate C has virually no support (maybe himself and a couple of buddies) but no one knows what he stands for. The voters vote for thier favorite but to insure the other guy, which they hate doesn’t win they also vote for candidate C since they don’t hate him. Candidate C wins with almost 100%. Candidate C is simply someone nobody knows so they don’t hate him. Is this a good decision?

@Jaxk Without trying to jump into your discussion with @rojo, my intent had nothing to do with getting more Democrats in Washington and I have no reason to expect that is what approval voting would do. What led you to include approval voting would favor any particular party over any other?

@ETpro

I reluctant to get into this since I really don’t want another heated debate and I’m not sure how to state my argumnet without pissing you off. Nonetheless, it not in my nature to ignore a question directed to me, so I’ll try.

If we look back, the 1992 election would definitely have swung to Bush with this system. Perot bled off enough conservative votes to hand the election to Clinton. I don’t think there is much doubt about that. It is quite likely that this system would also have handed the 2000 election to Gore. That election was incredibly close already. It may have actually swung the 2008 election to Hilary but that’s pure speculation. A lot of staunch conservatives would much rather have seen Hilary win than Obama (myself included). I know we aren’t talking about presidential elctions specifically but I have much more data available for them than I do local or even state elections.

Here’s where I think we’ll disagree. I believe the democrats/liberals are much better at sparking emotions. They play to the emotional voter. If you can destroy the person, no one cares what they say. That’s why words like Bigot and Racist are used so often by liberals. Once the charge is made it doesn’t go away. Whether you believe the democrats are better at this or not, I believe your proposal would escalate the value of hate. And it would play to the emotional voter more than to the issues at hand. As I said initially, I’m not sure it would work that way but it sounds like that’s the intention.

I like the idea of voting for the person I think is best to do the job. Win or lose, I’ve done my best. If I vote against the person I dislike the most, I don’t know what I’ve done and I’m likely to be disappointed, even if the jackass I voted against doesn’t win.

@Jaxk Aha. I see what gave you that concern. I really think the Ross Perot run was a one-of. And no approval voting system was in place then. Had there been one, the chances are Bush would have won, not Clinton. Most who voted Bush or Perot would have listed both of them on an approval voting ballot, and that would have handed George H. W. Bush a landslide victory instead of a loss.

My interest in the system is not that it would favor either of the two parties, but that it would weaken the hold of both on American politics, and I think that would be an enormously good thing.

@ETpro

Maybe but we’ll have to disagree on this. It would spread more votes around for sure. Maybe enough to get a 3rd party elected on ocassion. Hell we have two independents in the senate already, so it happens. Of course you can’t tell them apart from the Democrats.