The VERY Big Money Behind "Ranked-Choice"

The monicker "ranked-choice" has two extra letters.  It should be spelled "rank-choice"--because it stinks.

Anyhow.

MacIver points out that the wealthy/elite are the primary pushers of this deadly narcotic.  But first, a little background!

...What’s being proposed in Wisconsin is a mosh-pit, non-partisan primary advancing 5 candidates to the general where voters may rank those 5 in order of preference. They may choose to rank fewer than the five, but this will guarantee their ballots are “exhausted” or thrown out in later rounds of tabulations if their top choices do not survive. In other words, if a voter doesn’t wish to be disenfranchised, they are forced to cast one or more of their 5 votes for candidates whose beliefs they may detest, or for candidates they know little about. Those votes will count toward totals that purport to represent “majority support.”...

Don't worry about your confusion after reading that.  It is the point of Rank-Choice Voting.

So who's pushing this?

Austin Ramirez (son of Gus, heir to HUSCO hydraulics fortune) and Katherine Gehl, heir to the Gehl Ag Equipment fortune.

Big money, indeed.

What does Austin have to say about this?

... Ramirez said if elections don’t deliver more moderate candidates, then almost nothing else matters...

I dunno, Junior.  Personally, I prefer integrity of elections and candidates.  But you do you, fella.

As to Gehl:  she's a major-league (D) cash cow, and she co-wrote a book with a Harvard (!!!) prof on the topic.

... Their book, The Politics Industry, is a primer for how the wealthy donor class can change election outcomes to benefit more moderate elected officials, by spending money to elect state legislators who will in return use their positions to undo the flawed one-person, one-vote structure (which elected them) in favor of a RCV model that will benefit the goals of their funders....

If the odor of "Harvard" wasn't enough, the dripping condescension of her/their position re-re-inforces our first-graf contention:  the proposal stinks.  It is rank, like a corpse after a week in the sun.

As to the organizations behind this, one stands out:

 ...Fair Vote is another group spending to promote RCV in Wisconsin. Fair Vote lists their elected official supporters as Barack Obama, Elizabeth Warren, Bernie Sanders, and John Kerry. Their thought leaders include Jennifer Lawrence, Sam Wang (Princeton Gerrymandering Project), David Byrne, Katherine Gehl, Jon Fishman (Phish drummer), and Santa Claus (city council member in AK). It’s not exactly a list of moderates....

Here's a clearer explanation of Rank-Choice in case the first one (above) wasn't confusing enough:

 ... in practice, RCV can result in a complete fallacy of a majority even if you are willing to accept the nonsense notion that second, third, fourth and fifth-place votes are worth – and should count – the same as a first-choice vote. A 2018 Maine 2018 congressional race proves this:

In a 4-way general, the GOP candidate who would have won with close to a point lead over the second place under traditional voting lost the election to the next highest first-ranked (D) candidate, who picked up more of the third and fourth place voters second choice rankings – which count equal to the first-place rankings of every other voter....

See?  It's very simple!  /sarc

Your Leggie needs a note from you on the matter.  Of course, if you're a Ramirez or a Gehl, you could sent $10 grand instead.