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In the sense that alternative voting allows one to have more than one candidate from the same party without crowding each other out - the party primary can be simultaneous with the general election. So, under alternative voting you can have a Louisiana Primary. And instant runoff means that you don't have to have a first round where you select the top two candidates and then a second round but you can resolve the election with just one vote.

En un viejo país ineficiente, algo así como España entre dos guerras civiles, poseer una casa y poca hacienda y memoria ninguna. -- Gil de Biedma
by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Tue Dec 15th, 2009 at 06:48:45 PM EST
[ Parent ]
But a large part of the function of the primary is to determine who gets the organised backing of the party machine.

This decision will not - for reasons that are hopefully obvious - be left until election day...

- Jake

If you only spend 20 minutes of the rest of your life on economics, go spend them here.

by JakeS (JangoSierra 'at' gmail 'dot' com) on Tue Dec 15th, 2009 at 07:28:42 PM EST
[ Parent ]
... you said it made a primary redundant, but what a primary does is the same thing that a membership branch (caucus in the US) or central party candidate selection does elsewhere - it selects the official party candidate.

Indeed, it is more likely to get put into place in general elections if it is put in for primaries first, where it has the advantage of offering for primaries an advantage that has so far been reserved for caucuses. So one avenue for getting started is as a way to replace traditional caucuses in states where they have fallen out of favor.

Indeed, the institutionally easiest way to get a second-preference IRV adopted would be in a so-called "firehouse caucus", which is just an election but run by the party rather than the regular board of elections system.

I've been accused of being a Marxist, yet while Harpo's my favourite, it's Groucho I'm always quoting. Odd, that.

by BruceMcF (agila61 at netscape dot net) on Tue Dec 15th, 2009 at 10:52:51 PM EST
[ Parent ]
Yes, because it's five lines as opposed to one sentence.

En un viejo país ineficiente, algo así como España entre dos guerras civiles, poseer una casa y poca hacienda y memoria ninguna. -- Gil de Biedma
by Migeru (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Wed Dec 16th, 2009 at 03:02:13 AM EST
[ Parent ]
OK, then, permit me to put it like this.

This:
"Introducing IRV into the general election would make the Primary superfluous."

... claims far more than this:
"So, under alternative voting you can have a Louisiana Primary."

You can have a Louisiana primary, but that does not make the primary superfluous, since the primary purpose of the primary is to select the party nominee by a more democratic process than branch membership committee selection or central party committee selection.

You cannot render something superfluous while failing to accomplish its primary task.


I've been accused of being a Marxist, yet while Harpo's my favourite, it's Groucho I'm always quoting. Odd, that.

by BruceMcF (agila61 at netscape dot net) on Wed Dec 16th, 2009 at 10:02:42 PM EST
[ Parent ]

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