There are alternatives other than instant runoff voting to our usual first past the post system (as I'm sure most of the list members know). Larry's concern could be real under one of those other approaches.
Consider the Condorcet approach. I'm sure a lot of list members know a lot more about it than I do but here's my understanding: Under the Condorcet approach a candidate who would defeat each of the other candidates in head to head competition is the winner. That seems a sensible result.
If a Condorcet voting approach were used (and if we limit consideration to three candidates), then there would have been, in effect, three contests in each state: Bush v. Democratic nominee, Bush v. Nader, Nader v. Democratic nominee. Voters would have been asked to vote for their preferred candidate in each of those three head to head matchups. If, in head to head voting, Nader beat Bush (because Democratic voters flocked to him as their second choice and because some Republicans preferred him to Bush) and Nader beat the Democratic nominee (because Bush voters flocked to him as their second choice and because some Democratic voters preferred him to the Democratic candidate), then Nader would be the Condorcet winner. It seems highly unlikely that Nader would have won either of those head to head contests, but I suppose it is possible he might have won them both.
Does anyone support such a Condorcet approach? Is it used anywhere in political contests?
One negative is that it can be cyclic, thus producing no winner: Democratic candidate defeats Bush, Bush defeats Nader, Nader defeats Democratic candidate. Thus there would be no Condorcet winner. But a cyclic result may be unlikely, and if it occurs there could be a tie-breaker like IRV or first past the post.
Also, the Condorcet approach can get complex if there are a lot of candidates, with the number of head to head matchups becoming large.
I've suggested using a Condorcet approach for voting by faculty on faculty candidates, with a Borda system backup (in which votes are weighted--1 for first choice, 2 for second, etc., each voter must vote on each candidate, low total score wins) to deal with cyclic results. Is that a bad idea as list members see it?
Mark Scarberry
Pepperdine