Member wishes to be unnamed: ===== I hadn't seen news of this through the National LP so perhaps people aren't aware of this. I'd suggested to a few people in the LP hierarchy that the Johnson campaign needed to do an approval voting (or other alternative voting method) poll. Imagine how different the argument for getting more press coverage or pressure to be included in debates would have been if they could have demonstrated 32.4% approval, showing its a public service to cover the campaign? Perhaps people might pass this along now: http://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2016/11/25/13733322/i nstant-runoff-ranked-voting-2016 Would a different style of voting have changed the 2016 election? We tested 5 alternatives. ...Lastly, some voting experts have argued that neither rankings nor first-past-the-post voting methods are ideal, and instead favor what’s known as “approval voting.” <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Approval_voting> Voters who find a candidate acceptable or somewhat acceptable: Hillary Clinton: 48.4% Donald Trump: 46.7% Gary Johnson: 32.4% ....Some ranked voting systems *would* change the result of the election, however. One common method, used for determining the winner of the Heisman Trophy and the MLB MVP awardee, is the Borda count <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Borda_count>, ...This is a somewhat ham-handed way to compute results, and it gives some very weird results; like instant-runoff voting, it doesn't always elect the candidate who'd beat all the others. In the 2016 election, it would’ve resulted in *Gary Johnson* winning the presidency: Unfortunately it doesn't give the raw data, and its methodology for "approval voting" isn't quite what it should be, but it gives the idea. I suppose there are enough sports fans that the Borda count isn't too academic. The public could be told that "Many today are objecting to the current electoral college method of electing the president. If we were going to make changes, an alternative voting scheme might result in very different results, if it were done like the way the Heisman Trophy or MLB MVP were awarded..". Unfortunately people are a bit skeptical of polls now, this would have been more effective before the election, but its still useful. Its still possible for the figures to be used to argue for future media coverage, suggesting that various ethical guidelines journalists claim to follow (i.e. their standards, not merely begging for coverage) were violated to perhaps try to get debate in the media over the issue, perhaps finding some journalism profs and SPJ members to argue that case. I'm not sure why the campaign didn't do this sort of poll before the election (or any of a list of other things that might have had an impact). Although most libertarians engage in rational thinking about policy decisions, I'm not sure Libertarians always applies the same rigor to their strategic thinking, not taking time for it even though sometimes thinking things through saves time in the long run. ===== -- *In Liberty,* *Caryn Ann Harlos* Region 1 Representative, Libertarian National Committee (Alaska, Arizona, Colorado, Hawaii, Kansas, Montana, Utah, Wyoming, Washington) - Caryn.Ann. Harlos@LP.org <Caryn.Ann.Harlos@LP.org> Communications Director, Libertarian Party of Colorado <http://www.lpcolorado.org> Colorado State Coordinator, Libertarian Party Radical Caucus <http://www.lpradicalcaucus.org>