Re: Sponsor this
[I'm replying to a number of Anthony's points off-list. Looking at how
much I wrote here, that's probably a good thing. I'll try to back off
and let other people discuss for a while.]
On Tue, Dec 19, 2000 at 03:26:31PM +1000, Anthony Towns wrote:
> > Once we've got the voting system fixed, we can tackle the DFSG issue
> > (Manoj and Branden have some proposals to make).
>
> And with all the above, I don't see any need to wait. It'd be nice to
> have all this non-free friction get actually resolved.
Yes, we might be able to squeak by. And, we certainly don't have to
fix every potential constitutional issue to tackle the DFSG issue.
[The DFSG issue is itself a constitutional issue.]
However, I expect that a lot of people care about the DFSG issue,
and have well-formed opinions about what should happen. That sort of
thing is exactly what brought into focus these problems with the various
interpretations of what the constitution says about how we should vote.
In other words, I think we can live with a sequential voting mechanism to
pick a somewhat better voting system. But, I think we'll need a better
voting system before we tackle the DFSG.
[I recognize that there might be a subtle flaw in my handling of the
smith criteria if we have a closely contested n-way vote involving
several different supermajorities: if we could have such a thing where
we have an "almost winning option" for each different supermajority.
I don't know that such a thing is possible, but I've not come up with
a proof that it could never happen. But that's certainly not going to
matter for the DFSG issue -- we have only one kind of supermajority to
deal with at the moment.]
I think it's worthwhile achieving some kind of immediate consensus about
how we should handle voting on the DFSG issue. Even if it's a consensus
which we might eventually throw away (to paraphrase Fred Brooks).
[Since I don't know, yet, what Norman's group will come up with -- nor
do I know when they'll have it ready, I'll just say that some or all of
what we come up with there may or may not eventually be better than what
we already have. And, that I hope it will be better.]
What I came up with isn't the ultimate "fixes-everything" constitutional
amendment which you and Buddha have been suggesting. But it fixes the
immediate problem where you've been arguing that the way we plan on
voting on the DFSG is unconstitutional.
Thanks,
--
Raul
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