h a l f b a k e r yWhat was the question again?
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In the 2000 election, Nader cost Gore the
election. If you don't think that, then
allow it as a premise for discussion.
In New Hampshire, Bush won by less than
the number of votes Nader received.
What
if Nader would have been allowed to
assign his votes to Gore? Then Gore
would have
had a majority in NH and
enough electors overall to win the
election.
(NH is more interesting than Florida in
that Nader had a larger percentage.
Thus, if there was a cut-off for vote
pledging at say 4%, Nader would still
have been OK to pledge his votes)
Presumably, people voted for Nader for a
reason, not just to thank him for his
consumer advocacy. Those voters
should
have been entitled to have their voice
heard too. The system in which a
candidate may pledge his votes would
allow that candidate to make a deal with
the majority candidates. In the case of
Nader, it could be to allow him a cabinet
post, e.g., secretary of the interior.
In most other western democracies (the
UK being a notable exception) smaller
parties have a much greater percentage
of
the vote. Why? because even if they are
not elected, they receive seats in the
parliament. Thus, if you have opinions
that are congruent with the Green Party,
you can vote for the Greens without
feeling that you are throwing away your
vote. In 2004 most environmentalists
voted for Kerry. Thus, the dismal
performance of Cobb-LaMarche is not
indicative of that there are that few
people
supporting Green Party agendas, but that
they were afraid of throwing away their
vote or helping Bush get re-elected.
With
the system of allowing candidates to
pledge the votes they receive to other
candidates, I suspect that people would
vote their conscience and not for the one
of two electable candidates they dislike
the least.
Sorry about the convoluted post - I have
the flu - when I am well, I may rewrite it
to
be more cogent.
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The reason people voted for Nader, is that they didn't want to vote for Gore, or Kerry. For all you know these voters would be upset with such a solution. |
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Also, saying that they should get a second chance at winning, after knowing the potential results, would give them an unfair advantage over other voters. |
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It's not very different then people who didn't vote at all -- what if 1000 people who provably did not vote showed up in Florida, and said they wanted to vote for Gore? |
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I have to say nay to this, because even
though I am all for supporting third
parties this seems somewhat immoral,
and more than a little dangerous. The
only way I see this working would be
"run-off" voting, where the second
choice is left up to the voter, not the
candidate |
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It's immoral because while i'm sure
quite a lot of Nader voters would have
happily taken Kerry, I doubt it was
100%. And in future races the third
party split might not be so clear, and it
wouldn't reflect the true intention of
the voters. |
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It's dangerous because this seems like
an easy way to cook up vote fraud.
Independent or third party candidates
could be run as Democratic/Republican
"puppets" and plan to toss their votes
one way or the other from the start, out
of their own ideology or as extensions
of the party. Sure they can already be
used like puppets, like where
republicans in some states signed
Naders' petition to get on the ballot, but
cementing it into the system seems like
a bad plan. |
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// while i'm sure quite a lot of Nader voters would have happily taken Kerry, I doubt it was 100%. // |
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Nor was it anywhere near 100% for Gore, which is why Nader didn't cost Gore the election in 2000. |
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Is there a way to know that? |
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