Checking out MinnPost this morning, I came across an interesting Dean Barkley story.
Dean started off the interview with one of his classic zingers.
"No, I don't want to be the senator of Illinois,'' the Independence Party's candidate for Senate said. "But with Franken's fundraising ability, he'd be a natural.''But it was the discussion of Instant Runoff Voting that caught my eye.
Additionally, Barkley will help push the IP goal of implementing an Instant Runoff Voting system in Minnesota. That system might have spared the state the current recount – and it might have made Barkley the winner because there's a strong chance he would have been the second choice of the majority of Minnesota voters.
Now, I'm not a fan of IRV but Grow is flat out wrong to think Barkley would have won if IRV were in place.
Gotta love wikipedia! This handy dandy wiki flow chart explains the IRV process.
As sad as it is for me to admit, following this flowchart, Barkley would have been eliminated after the first ballot. His votes that listed a second preference would have been recounted for that candidate and the process would have continued until someone attained a majority.
Just a thought here...police yourselves before you start to police us...
1 Response to "Who's Policing the Sheriff?"
> Grow is flat out wrong to think Barkley would have won if IRV were in place (...)
> Barkley would have been eliminated after the first ballot.
It is difficult to say what would have happened with IRV, but it's not correct predicting a IRV outcome using the votes of an election with a different voting system. The current voting system encourages tactical voting - Barkley might have received more first votes if people wouldn't have felt that they wasted their voting power with choosing him. For example, if someone prefered Barkley but most of all wanted to prevent Al Franken from becoming senator, he or she might have made a dot with Norm Coleman, because Barkley's chances seemed so slim.