Submitted by Rob Richie, Mar 27, 2007 07:53

Great to see your authors pick up on instant runoff voting as it gather steam around the country and around the world. It's working, voters are enthusiastic, and it speaks directly to real problems with our politics. As to Shentrup's post, he defines "majority" in a way that is inconsistent with political realities.

For clarity about how IRV works, consider the form of IRV that some jurisdictions have adopted where there is only one second round of counting between the top two finisher in the first round -- a system that exactly simulates what would have happened if a runoff election had been held that same day with the same voters.

In this form of IRV, if no candidate wins an initial majority of first choices, the top two advance, and the ballots cast firstfor the eliminated candidates are added to the runoff candidate who is ranked next on each ballot .The more popular runoff candidate will ALWAYS win. Period.

To me, that sounds like "majority rule." Perhaps a low-rated candidate with 5% tin the first round heoretically could win a runoff if they had gotten in the runoff, but a candidate with 5% hasn't earned a shot at the runoff. They lack the core support necessary to be a strong representative or a true leader.

Forms of IRV that only eliminate one candidate at a time from below act in this same understanding of politics. First, it's important to have core support. It shows seriousness and readiness to represent people. But second, you don't want a strong candidate's victory "spoiled" because of split votes.

Shentrup's range votiing would make a mockery of our understanding of majority rule. It would allow an intensely supported candidate who would get 35% (or less) in our current system to defeat a candidate who would get 65%. Voters who didn't understand the importance of voting tactically (e.g., the importance of giving artificially low ratings to candidates other than your preferred choice) would lose out to tactical voters who gave the top score to their favorite and a zero to everyone else. Corrupt figure skating judges may like range voting, but not too many other folks will want to see it in real elections for real offices.

IRV is an absolute no-brainer for New York City's citywide primaries and many other election., For more, see www.fairvote.org/irv

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