All this and more can be possible with a switch from the First Past the Post voting system many states use. No spoiler effect, no hands tied, just a arena of policies and ideas.
Some states have already made the switch, why not yours yet?
Meanwhile I got a letter from the police today telling me to clean up my yard or else... Apparently having a slightly unkempt lawn is a criminal offense now
Some states have already made the switch, why not yours yet?
Careful, because some states are switching back from ranked choice, because it does not eliminate the spoiler effect or strategic voting against your interest. STAR voting actually achieves those goals, but just promoting it fractures the movement and creates confusion.
We all know that our current system sucks. But what we replace it with matters, and we should be specific.
It works exactly like that, and their vote still counts. They pick one candidate, and give them all the stars. Every other candidate gets no votes and no stars.
The biggest advantage is that nobody's vote is exhausted, and you can put two candidates on equal ratings if you really don't care which one wins. Ranked choice, you vote might be thrown out entirely after the first round because of math.
A lot of states have local and municipal elections that use RCV, and it occasionally works out that the process allows a spoiler or tactical voting scenario which is giving credence to the people who oppose any change because they benefit from the status quo.
Oakland and San Francisco in California have had issues. Burlington, Vermont had that one disaster of a mayoral race in 2009 that caused a repeal, but now they are back to it.
North Carolina and Florida are both fighting any election reform efforts, but we know why that is.
There are a lot of states besides Maine, though. Alaska, Maryland, Colorado, Arizona, they all have some form of RCV to varying degrees of success.
And there isn't anybody having a problem with it anywhere that couldn't be improved by switching to STAR voting. It's just better in every single way.