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"Third Parties in General would be aided by elections using instant runoff voting."

Unfortunately, this isn't true. IRV still has "spoiler" candidates. Example, with 3 candidates (A, B, and C) and 9 voters:

4 voters: A > B > C

1 voter: B > A > C

1 voter: B > C > A

3 voters: C > B > A

If this election is just A vs. B, then B wins. But when you add candidate C, the winner changes... to A! This is a spoiler, and it can happen anytime the 3rd party candidate gets near 25% of first-place preferences.

A better system, one that can ACTUALLY help third parties because it doesn't have this problem, is approval voting; which has the added advantages of being easy to explain (vote for as many candidates you want; the most-voted-for candidate wins; that's it) and doesn't require high-integrity computers (which Minneapolis is learning don't exist.)

Learn more about approval voting at http://rangevoting.org

posted 1 year, 9 months ago
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