Answer to the 'wasted vote' problem

Vote Buddy ^ | 02/18/2007 | Mike Renzulli

[MARenzulli]

The VoteBuddy idea: "You don't vote for that Republican and I won't vote for this Democrat; then we can help build third parties!"

[GSlob]

So now one has unassimilating illegals seeping back. The aftermath ought to have included raising much more serious cultural barriers. Placenames are only a minor part.

[Verginius Rufus]

If it weren't for the Mexican War, you'd have to go to Mexico to visit the Grand Canyon or Disneyland...

There were two immediate causes of the Mexican War--the dispute over the boundary between Texas and Mexico, and the Mexican government's refusal to sell California to the US. If the US had waited, we would have gotten California pretty soon anyway as a result of the Gold Rush...no way would Mexico have managed to hold on to California once there were a couple of hundred thousand Americans there.

Without the Mexican War, there might not have been a US Civil War, and without that, the abolition of slavery might have been long delayed...so Polk's decision to go to war with Mexico hastened the end of slavery.

[x]

There's also the "pairing" that's done in Congress.

A Senator or Representative from one party or side of an issue may miss a vote on the understanding that a counterpart from the other party or side will do the same.

The classic example of it happening -- or not happening -- was when John Kennedy, in the hospital during the vote that censured Joseph McCarthy, didn't "pair" with a Republican Senator, which would have announced his opposition to McCarthy.

Is the VoteBuddy idea a good one? I don't know. If there's a really good third party candidate, but one doesn't want to tip the election to the Democrats, there might be some sense to it.

One possible outcome is that people will vote as carelessly for a third party candidate as they now do for major party ones. I don't see that Badnarik or Peroutka were really better choices than Bush in 2004, or that they would have deserved the extra votes.

[KevinDavis]

I find nothing wrong with the Mexican War...

[Verginius Rufus]

As an American I grew up thinking of the Southwest as part of the United States, and of the Rio Grande as the natural border of Texas, so I don't have much to quibble about over the outcome of the war...but if the US had acquired the same territory without war, the people who were killed in the war would have enjoyed longer lives. Maybe one of them would have invented something useful, or written a good book, or had a son or daughter who would have.

And Zachary Taylor would never have become President...whether someone better or worse would have been President instead, I can't say.

[DugwayDuke]

"I think I'd be the perfect candidate, but since I'd only get one vote, I'm not sure I could win."

Actually, I have so many 'principles', I wouldn't vote for myself.

[staytrue]

The winner are polarizing candidates (that would be Hillary). The losers are the moderates.

Basically, the pro extremists will vote for the extremists (the pro hillary will vote for hillary) and the anti extremists will vote against hillary and for a possibly 3rd party.

The moderates who might attract the anti extremists (anti Hillery) will lose the anti extreme votes to a third party.

In a normal election, the moderate will attract the moderates and the "I don't like the moderate, but I hate the other guy" vote. With this scheme, the "i hate the other guy vote might go to a non moderate"

Put another way, a polarizing figure (hillary) has strength in that a lot of people like her and weakness in that other people hate her. If the anti hillary vote has many outlets, she can more easily win.

Polarizing candidates win and non polarizing candidates lose by this scheme.