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A review by nharkins
Gaming the Vote: Why Elections Aren't Fair (and What We Can Do About It) by William Poundstone
5.0
Giving this 5 stars, because I think the subject is VERY important, especially now, and I'm not (yet) aware of another book about the topic that's even half-remotely consumable by the public at large, despite this one being a bit dense at times.
The first third of this book is about history of plurality voting (i.e. what the US has today ––electoral shenanigans aside) and its biggest flaw: spoiler candidates. My eyes started to glaze over a bit here because it's the exact same story over and over again (both sides have been bitten, although lately the right seems to do a better job of reigning it in than the left, which is depressing). Power through this part, or skip it. The Takeaway: our current voting method has a 11% rate of failure, which would be unacceptably high in any other government or commercial endeavor.
I was slightly annoyed at the author handwaving/choosing not to explain Ice Skating's "Great Flip-Flop" controversies, but as he recommends, searching the internet will turn up the admittedly complicated explanation: https://rangevoting.org/Skating1998.html
Before reading this book, I had heard of Instant Runoff Voting, and was convinced that the United States should reform in favor of that method. I now think Range Voting is the best, but IRV has the best chance of actually happening (although still remote, because corrupt politics knows how to cheat at the current game thus will do anything to defend it/lie to discredit any alternative), and Better Should Not Be The Enemy of Best. It's extremely disappointing that so many vain academics can't get their heads out of their asses thus are as vehemently divided as the general populace right now, and this is why voting reform hasn't happened yet. :(
PS - Hurricane Katrina was as horrible as it was because an corrupt official with KNOWN gambling debts was elected because of vote splitting bullshit, and unsurprisingly diverted resources from the army corps of engineers (overseeing the levees) in favor of riverboat gambling. Yay America. At least he's in jail now, after the fact.
PSS - Nader is a fucking egotistical asshole.
The first third of this book is about history of plurality voting (i.e. what the US has today ––electoral shenanigans aside) and its biggest flaw: spoiler candidates. My eyes started to glaze over a bit here because it's the exact same story over and over again (both sides have been bitten, although lately the right seems to do a better job of reigning it in than the left, which is depressing). Power through this part, or skip it. The Takeaway: our current voting method has a 11% rate of failure, which would be unacceptably high in any other government or commercial endeavor.
I was slightly annoyed at the author handwaving/choosing not to explain Ice Skating's "Great Flip-Flop" controversies, but as he recommends, searching the internet will turn up the admittedly complicated explanation: https://rangevoting.org/Skating1998.html
Before reading this book, I had heard of Instant Runoff Voting, and was convinced that the United States should reform in favor of that method. I now think Range Voting is the best, but IRV has the best chance of actually happening (although still remote, because corrupt politics knows how to cheat at the current game thus will do anything to defend it/lie to discredit any alternative), and Better Should Not Be The Enemy of Best. It's extremely disappointing that so many vain academics can't get their heads out of their asses thus are as vehemently divided as the general populace right now, and this is why voting reform hasn't happened yet. :(
PS - Hurricane Katrina was as horrible as it was because an corrupt official with KNOWN gambling debts was elected because of vote splitting bullshit, and unsurprisingly diverted resources from the army corps of engineers (overseeing the levees) in favor of riverboat gambling. Yay America. At least he's in jail now, after the fact.
PSS - Nader is a fucking egotistical asshole.