A fundamental principles of democracy is majority rule. That's why it's so great that the Martin/Chambliss race, in which neither candidate passed 50% of the vote, will likely head to a runoff to find a majority winner.
Unfortunately, we can't say the same for the Coleman/Franken race. Neither candidate garnered a majority due to the presence of a strong third-party candidate, Dean Barkley, in the race. Complaining about Barkley running, as some have done, misses the point. Barkley has a right to run and express his views, regardless of what we think of them. The bottom line is that we can and should have a voting system that doesn't completely breakdown when more than two candidates run. That's not too much to ask.
More below . . .
The exit polls reported that 30% of Barkley supporters would have voted for Franken if Barkley wasn't in the race, 24% for Coleman, and the rest said they wouldn't have voted. According to CNN, Barkley won 437,406 votes. So if the exit polls are correctly, Barkley voters would have given over 26,000 more votes to Franken than to Coleman in a runoff, way more than the 571 votes Franken now needs in order to win.
A runoff helps eliminate potential "spoiler candidates" like Barkley so the election can find a majority winner.But even better than a runoff would be to use Instant Runoff Voting for the Senate race. If that were in place, voters could rank their candidates in order of preference on the ballot, and the counting simulates a whole series of runoffs at once until a candidate reaches a majority. That way, voters wouldn't have to take time out for yet another election that would cost the state millions to run.
Interestingly, Instant Runoff Voting, or "IRV" for short, was passed as a ballot measure in Minneapolis. It has also been passed in numerous other cities in towns, including yesterday in Memphis, TN. The Minneapolis measure is currently held up by a stupid court case pushed by its opponents, but if it succeeds, as I'm sure it well, then hopefully IRV will spread throughout Minnesota, so that they won't have to experience another bad result again.
I hope Franken pulls in front during the recount, but with IRV, he would have been a clear victor today.