iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Reposted by David Binnig

but it is likely that progressives will break the 25% threshold in every key race, which means a fraction of your vote will go to your lower ranked candidates. and it is not hypothetical that it could end up influencing those races: progressive reallocations helped put zimmerman above arnold in 2024

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David Binnig @binnig.bsky.social · 6m

On incumbency, I would mostly expect incumbents to lose if & when they lose the support of the people who supported them last time—which is fine. Being potentiallyless swing-y than all at-large council seats isn’t a bug, imo.

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David Binnig @binnig.bsky.social · 9m

& the mayoral election system (instant runoff) I think is genuinely simple & intuitive (it’s like a series of runoffs). The council system (single transferable vote) is genuinely kind of confusing on the back end, but the way you vote (rank your choices in order) is straightforward.

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David Binnig @binnig.bsky.social · 14m

Tbh I think “rank your preferences in numerical order” is pretty simple! It’s frustrating to me that people keep looking for some secret alternative strategy; that’s why I keep posting about it.

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David Binnig @binnig.bsky.social · 1h

@amb.fyi , if a friend asked you personally what they should do, and they thought Morillo and TKL were good, Leon was eh, Novick was bad, and Torres was a disaster— Would you recommend that they vote (A): 1. Morillo 2. TKL 3. 4. 5. 6. Or (B): 1. Morillo 2. TKL 3. Leon 4. Novick ?

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David Binnig @binnig.bsky.social · 1h

Actually this is next on my list

Book :
SENATOR
MARK O.
HATFIELD

NOT QUITE SO
SIMPLE

A POLITICIAN
RE-EXAMINES
THE
TEMPTATIONS
AND DANGERS OF THE EASY
ANSWER

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David Binnig @binnig.bsky.social · 1h

Looks like it’s twice as long with fewer jokes, though.

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David Binnig @binnig.bsky.social · 2h

Yeah, this is a problem (and a consequence of Portland only allowing 6 ranks). If there are six candidates you like and you don’t know which ones have a chance it’s fine to fill your ballot that way.

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David Binnig @binnig.bsky.social · 2h

Although really this was what prompted my post: bsky.app/profile/binn...

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David Binnig @binnig.bsky.social · 2h

Yeah 25%+1 is the correct threshold and at most three candidates per district can meet that bar, as a matter of mathematical possibility. I don’t know what people are even asking for here; you can’t have three people all be the first choice of 60% of the population of a district.

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David Binnig @binnig.bsky.social · 3h

I think the correct individual strategy is basically “accurately rank your preferences among candidates with a nontrivial chance of winning.” (Even ones you don’t love.)

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David Binnig @binnig.bsky.social · 3h

Yeah, I’m not saying P4A should have endorsed him, at all. I am saying that actively telling people *not* to rank Novick is an error if you think Torres would be a disaster.

Portlandforall.org:

Don't Rank in District 3: Steve Novick had a reputation as a maverick, but since returning to Council, he has voted to spend millions in our tax dollars on Moda Center renovations, with only modest rent and taxes paid by the Blazers' billionaire owner, Tom Dundon. He also voted against common-sense safety regulations for the oil trains traveling in Northwest Portland and against police accountability. He has lost his way from his maverick days, which we miss.

Also, Kellie Torres is being championed by the corporate donors and the Portland Police Association, which signals to us that she will not

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David Binnig @binnig.bsky.social · 3h

Sure, but then they should probably make sure to rank Clark, to prevent both Arnold and Zimmerman from winning seats. Et cetera; if you truly don’t have a preference between candidates it doesn’t matter, but if you do you should rank your preferences.

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David Binnig @binnig.bsky.social · 3h

If you are perfectly indifferent between all candidates outside your preferred faction, there is no reason to rank them (or to avoid ranking them, for that matter). If you think some would be worse than others, you do have reason to try to influence that outcome. bsky.app/profile/binn...

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David Binnig @binnig.bsky.social · 3h

If you’re someone who’s ranking left-leaning candidates at the top of your ballot, your lower-rank votes don’t register at all till those candidates have already been elected or eliminated. “Leaving lefty candidates unelected” isn’t part of the calculus here because it has already happened (or not)

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David Binnig @binnig.bsky.social · 3h

People who think Zimmerman is worse than Arnold would be should definitely rank Arnold, in that case! There’s just no upside to leaving that choice entirely to people who disagree with your goals.

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David Binnig @binnig.bsky.social · 3h

Yeah would agree that “let you” is good & “have you” is bad. bsky.app/profile/binn...

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David Binnig @binnig.bsky.social · 5h

If you have different preferences you can swap out the names but it’s still true that if there are six or fewer candidates with a non-negligible chance of winning you should rank all of them (optionally excepting your single least favorite), even if you oppose & dislike several of the others.

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David Binnig @binnig.bsky.social · 6h

Not the best political memoir I’ve read but some fun anecdotes for Oregonians.

“TOM McCALL:
MAVERICK
an autobiography with Steve Neal”

McCall is in waders, holding a good-sized fish.

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David Binnig @binnig.bsky.social · 6h

To be fair I think you can go wrong in the other direction: Australia used to *require* ranking every candidate, which is hard & probably led to more spoiled ballots.

Victoria House of Representatives ballot with 22 candidates. “Remember ... number every box to make your vote count.”

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David Binnig @binnig.bsky.social · 6h

I like the new system pretty well so far, I just wish people weren’t so intent on refusing to learn how it works.

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David Binnig @binnig.bsky.social · 6h

Governor Tom McCall had a helicopter loaded with rose petals to deploy in case of rioting:

Tom McCall:

“I had a helicopter on call for crowd dispersal, but instead of loading it with tear gas, I had it filled with rose petals. Since Portland is the City of Roses, I thought this would serve as a friendly warning to overzealous demonstrators. If a crowd had persisted, the tear gas would have been utilized.”

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David Binnig @binnig.bsky.social · 6h

“Blitz-Weinhard, Oregon's only brewery.”

Tom McCall: Maverick (1977):

“At our big Boston rally for the Bottle Bill, a retired Coca Cola executive said he purchased glass for the company on the basis of a bottle being good for 35 trips. Vice president William Wessinger of Blitz-Weinhard, Oregon's only brewery, disclosed that one bottle among their 1976 returnees was manufactured in 1933.”

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David Binnig @binnig.bsky.social · 7h

And this site has literally almost no possible function except minimizing progressive influence on the next Portland City Council: sites.google.com/view/donotra...

sites.google.com

DoNotRankthePMCpdx2026

Make sure our City Council represents the people of Portland — NOT police, developers, or other corporate villains.

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David Binnig @binnig.bsky.social · 7h

I'm not sure what the intention is when groups like Portland for All tell people not to rank any of the moderate candidates in D3/4, but the *effect* is that it's telling progressive voters to throw out whatever influence they have over which moderates get elected.

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David Binnig @binnig.bsky.social · 7h

*Not a plausible assumption, I just wanted numbers to work with.

Portland small donor elections numbers for D3, https://openelectionsportland.org/?startDate=Wed+Jan+01+2025+00%3A00%3A00+GMT-0800+%28Pacific+Standard+Time%29&financing=all&offices=+Councilor+District+3

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David Binnig @binnig.bsky.social · 7h

But if the TKL/Morillo/Leon voters had ranked Novick somewhere in their 4th through 6th ranks, TKL and Morillo still win, but those surplus votes + transferred elimination votes put Novick above 25%, shutting out Torres. (Whether they rank Torres below Novick or not at all is immaterial.)

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David Binnig @binnig.bsky.social · 7h

But none of these voters ranked choices beyond their top 3, so their ballots are exhausted and thrown out. Now the remaining seat hinges on how Sollitt voters used their ballots. If most of them ranked Torres 2nd (because they wanted change), Sollitt is eliminated and Torres wins the third seat.

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David Binnig @binnig.bsky.social · 7h

For convenience, assume that first-choice ranks follow the small-donor elections numbers.* TKL and Morillo win easily with 31% and 29%, then Leon is eliminated. At this point the surplus votes (above 25%) for TKL and Morillo, plus transferred votes from Leon, would be 15% of the vote—

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David Binnig @binnig.bsky.social · 7h

As a simple example: assume that there's a bloc of D3 voters who like Morillo and TKL, are Leon-curious, and don't like Novick, Torres, or Sollitt, but dislike Torres the most of those 3. Assume they rank only candidates they like, and that other candidates have neglible support.

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David Binnig @binnig.bsky.social · 7h

It's totally understandable that people think you shouldn't rank a candidate you don't want in office; the city & county are telling them that. Here's why it's wrong: 1. Ranking a candidate you don't like *can't hurt* a candidate you ranked higher. 2. It can help block a candidate you hate more.

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Reposted by David Binnig

Fischer 🛠️🚇 @fischer.bsky.social · 05/10/2026

corrupt big developer is mad about neighborhood rezonings that will enable more affordable housing development and more small builders to enter the market. tremendous messaging gift

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David Binnig @binnig.bsky.social · 05/10/2026

So far as I can tell the Swole Jesus motif in American Christianity really gets going with Bruce Barton’s “Man Nobody Knows” (1925).

“As His right arm rose and fell, striking its blows with that little whip, the sleeve dropped back to reveal muscles hard as iron. No one who watched Him in action had any doubt that He was fully capable of taking care of Himself. The evidence is clear that no angry priest or money-changer cared to try conclusions with that arm.”

Bruce Barton, “The Man Nobody Knows” (1925).

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David Binnig @binnig.bsky.social · 04/10/2026

I think this is the correct assessment of the case you’re probably asking about: bsky.app/profile/fisc...

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David Binnig @binnig.bsky.social · 04/10/2026

Endorsing a limited number of people as top choices makes sense, and in practice 2 is the most seats any faction is likely win in a district. But telling people not to rank anyone except those top choices doesn’t do anything functional; if it does anything it’s worse for those voters interests.

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David Binnig @binnig.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

Although the first place I really got the “just like things” message was Bertrand Russell.

Bertrand Russell, The Conquest of Happiness:

Suppose one man
likes strawberries and another does not; in what respect is the latter superior? There is no abstract and impersonal proof either that strawberries are good or that they are not good.

Bertrand Russell, The Conquest of Happiness:

But the man who likes them has a pleasure which the other does not have; to that extent his life is more enjoyable and he is better adapted to the world in which both must live.

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David Binnig @binnig.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

The part of Fargo Rock City that stuck with me was Klosterman rejecting “ironically” liking Iron Maiden and acknowledging that he just thinks Iron Maiden are good.

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David Binnig @binnig.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

I think my intuition is that a goal should be something like a Condorcet-winning slate, where voters would prefer that 3-member set to every other 3-member set, and that’s just hard to design elections around. pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC...

pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

How hard is it to tell which is a Condorcet committee?

This paper establishes the computational complexity status for a problem of deciding on the quality of a committee. Starting with individual preferences over alternatives, we analyse when it can be de...

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David Binnig @binnig.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

Maybe this is proportional representation working as intended, though

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David Binnig @binnig.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

I guess I’m assuming that the most centrist of the centrists (relative to the whole electorate) can get squeezed out because they’re less preferred within the centrist faction? (But I don’t actually want to make a strong claim about relative positioning among these three.)

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David Binnig @binnig.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

(Maybe especially if each faction is following a “don’t rank” strategy for everyone except their own champions, because then each faction is in effect having its own isolated runoff.)

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David Binnig @binnig.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

I think districts with many more members would make it less of an issue — you’d get “proportional representation,” which is in some sense the goal. But with three members I think it’s still on the table.

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David Binnig @binnig.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

Yeah, speculation was prompted because I saw this on Reddit; if Clark is at best a third-place pick for everyone she’s shut out and you get something like Green+Arnold+Zimmerman as the D4 councilors.

“Future Portland” endorsements via Reddit:

SUPPORT ONLY THESE THREE FOR CITY COUNCIL • DISTRICT 4
Rank exactly three candidates. Leave every other candidate unranked.
ELI ARNOLD
1
Common sense. Real solutions.
2
ERIC ZIMMERMAN
Experience that delivers.
3
OLIVIA CLARK
Proven leadership. Strong values.

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David Binnig @binnig.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

I kind of expected a center squeeze in the 2024 mayoral race and then it didn’t happen. (That Wilson would have won any hypothetical head-to-head contest but would be eliminated before the final round as fewer people’s first pick.)

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David Binnig @binnig.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

I don’t think it happens this year but to the extent that factions harden I wonder if we could get a “center squeeze” in Portland’s STV council elections?

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David Binnig @binnig.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

Yeah, I’ve been with Kaiser in Ohio and Oregon and preferred it to the other insurers I’ve had (because I didn’t have to mediate between my doctor, insurer, and pharmacy about which inhalers are covered this year.)

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David Binnig @binnig.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

The college I went to banned single-sex social organizations, starting in the early ‘90s, which I do think helped.

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David Binnig @binnig.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

Having a preschool-age kid was definitely how I learned that hand, foot and mouth disease is different from hoof-and-mouth disease.

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David Binnig @binnig.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

To expand—if you want more progressives on city council you can: • Pump up turnout among latent progressive voters • Sell more people on progressive ideas • Flip previous mod voters through charisma and/or triangulation. You can’t just truncate your preferences harder.

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