Hint: the real goal of Instant Runoff Voting isn't really about eliminating the "spoiler effect", or obtaining a better majority or helping third parties. In fact, it is arguable that IRV does none of those. The goal and real result of IRV is to force a radical, drastic change to our electoral system right here in North Carolina, and ultimately our entire country.
A group fighting STV (Single Transferrable Vote) in British Columbia has put up a very succinct video on You Tube that explains it well. Single Transferable Voting is similar to the IRV method but is used in multi seat elections.
GET THE ANSWER IN 60 SECONDS OR LESS, WATCH THIS VIDEO
Connect the dots, watch the video.
It becomes all to clear in under a minute. Ultimately, with STV, you end up losing local representation, and number of districts are way fewer but much larger. Less or no accountability to constituents.
Canada has managed to fend off efforts to computerize voting so far, but the push for the complicated STV elections will incentivize the use of unreliable voting machines. STV was the trojan horse that brought computerized voting to Scotland in 2007.
At least right now, in North Carolina we CAN accomplish some things at the state level that we could never do at federal level. That would change with STV. Instant Runoff Voting paves the way for its multi seat version, STV. The same groups pushing STV and IRV are also working at end runs around the US constitution on other issues. The same groups pushing IRV in North Carolina also peddled STV in Scotland. Fair Vote even had the gaul to say Scotland's first STV election was successful, while the media reported 100,000 spoiled ballots and called that election "A National Humiliation".
From the "NO STV" website:Do some of the talking points for STV sound familiar? The lie that IRV is "as simple as 1,2, 3"
Adoption of BC-STV would merge the 85 single-MLA constituencies that will be used in the 2009 election into 20 multiple-MLA electoral areas with populations of 200,000 to over 300,000. With STV's electoral areas it is possible to elect all the candidates for an area from one community, leaving others with no effective representation.
It is easy to understand our current system where there is one MLA to be elected and the winner is the candidate who receives the most votes.
Supporters of STV say voting is as simple as 1, 2, 3, but the numbers are not separate votes. Two to seven MLAs would be elected in each of the 20 areas, but you only get one vote, hence the word single as the first word in STV. The numbers are used differently for each voter in the complicated counting rules in which fractions of some votes get redistributed (transferred) but the voter doesn't control the size of the fractions.
If Instant Runoff Voting IRV can get a shoe horn into North Carolina, the next step is Single Transferrable Vote/STV. (Same groups promoting both). Forget the weird way of casting and counting votes, just look at the you tube video to see what happens to electoral districts and how you lose local representation.
Citizens in North Carolina are hardly clamoring for instant runoff voting:
In the first IRV pilot, only 2 cities out of a state with 5.8 million registered voters and 100 counties - volunteered. In the second IRV pilot, only 1 town has volunteered.
Alot of outside money is being spent to gin up interest in a voting method that is incompatible with our voting systems and government.
Now you know why.
