A voting system designed to be a more fair way of handling a Representative Government like the one in the United States.

As currently stands, at any given election people vote for the person (or choice) they find preferable. Now, it doesn't matter if 99% of the voting population found this choice preferable or simply 50.000001% found it better, the person with simple majority gets it outright. This is clearly unfair, and weighted lottery voting allows more realistic approach to selecting the people's choice.

First, each person would go to the polls as usual and cast his or her vote. Rather than simply going to a tally, however, each person's vote is given a number. After all the votes are in, all of the numbers are put into a lottery machine of some sort, either manual a'la bingo or computerized, and a single vote is picked out. That person's vote is considered the deciding vote, and that vote is the vote which wins the election.

This way, votes that candidates get STILL matter greatly, but rather than 55% of the votes ensuring victory, it simply ensures a 55% chance of gaining the position.

Even when mediated through an electoral college system, this method of voting would provide the clarity evidently needed (as evinced by the US's past presidential election).

This would also give third parties a much more realistic chance at success, lowering the massive barriers of entry slightly.
-- Sand Jack, Nov 26 2001

This would be too easy to rig, in part because of the huge logistics problem. Putting all the votes in a (very) large container and drawing just one out would stretch the credibility of events. Imagine the scrutiny if it was vote pulled came from the same area each time, even if it was completely random.

I remain a big fan of human-readable pencil voting systems that are carried out with the potential for a recount in the case of problems and the flipping of a coin only in the case of a dead heat after 3 recounts.
-- Aristotle, Nov 26 2001


This is not an appropriate way of choosing the President. What if a vote for the Ultra-Right-Wing Extremists Party comes up, but only 1% of the population supports it? We'll be stuck with an ultra-right-wing president and yet the 99% who didn't vote for him won't be able to succeed in kicking him out.

This method might be appropriate to choose the members of, say, Congress, though. If a member of the Ultra-Right-Wing Extremists Party does get in, there will probably only be one.
-- andrewm, Feb 22 2003


Wrong. If you don't want your president selected this way, why would you want your congressional representative selected this way?

Clever idea.
-- snarfyguy, Feb 22 2003


This probably wouldn't work. First off, it's too easy to rig, and secondly, anyone and his dog Bobo would have an easier time getting into elections, even if they have no (*&^&^%) idea what the *&$% they're doing! This idea just has too many bugs to work.
-- red_ensign_chris, Jan 31 2004



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