Warning! Carpet baggers are heading to a town near you with Instant Runoff Voting talking points and misinfo. Just this May, Nebraska and South Carolina papers ran twin - pro instant runoff voting Op Eds for Fair Vote Director Rob Richie and local "co author". These twin opeds contain many of the same inaccuracies. The "co-authors" apparently did little more than allow their name to be signed to the OpEds. RR had to get local "co-authors" as the papers usually won't run OPs written by out of staters. That policy is intended to prevent carpet bagging. Is Instant Runoff Voting really a good idea if promoters have to use mis-leading talking points? Here are the "twin" op/eds:
May 5th 2009 Larry R. Bradley and Rob Richie:
To increase voter turnout, try a more efficient election process Omaha World-Herald Op-ed by author Larry Bradley and FairVote Executive Director Rob Richie on why Omaha should dump its low turnout primaries in favor of instant runoff voting....
May 21st 2009 Herbkersman, Richie:
Time to run off runoffs The State Runoffs after primaries can mean big plunges in voter turnout. Rob Richie and SC State Rep. Bill Herbkersman explain how IRV can achieve both majority consensus and eliminate separate, expensive runoffs....
See Island Packet/Beaufort Gazette link to view article and post comments
See The State link to view article and post comments
Most claims in the PRO IRV OpEdS are wrong.
1. SC's voting machines DO NOT have the software to tabulate IRV. I called the South Carolina election commission on May 28 to verify that fact.
2.IRV DOES NOT SAVE MONEY. IRV has hidden but very expensive costs. See fiscal analysis by other states
3.North Carolina DID NOT adopt IRV. NC lawmakers set up a voluntary pilot for IRV, and only one town in all of NC has volunteered for 09. Cary NC tried it in 07 but City Council voted not to do it this year.
4. IRV often fails to find a majority winner and often the final winner is the same candidate who had most votes in the first round. See majority failure
5. Roberts Rules does not recommend IRV. See Roberts Rules explained
6. The South Carolina and Nebraska OPs are near clones, yet co-authored by two different people and contain the same misinformation. Just a few data are changed.
2.IRV DOES NOT SAVE MONEY. IRV has hidden but very expensive costs. See fiscal analysis by other states
3.North Carolina DID NOT adopt IRV. NC lawmakers set up a voluntary pilot for IRV, and only one town in all of NC has volunteered for 09. Cary NC tried it in 07 but City Council voted not to do it this year.
4. IRV often fails to find a majority winner and often the final winner is the same candidate who had most votes in the first round. See majority failure
5. Roberts Rules does not recommend IRV. See Roberts Rules explained
6. The South Carolina and Nebraska OPs are near clones, yet co-authored by two different people and contain the same misinformation. Just a few data are changed.
Just say NO to IRV Kool-Aid. Read more about IRV at these links:
Center for Range Voting http://www.rangevoting.org/rangeVirv.html
