I’ve just read another piece suggesting that Eliot Cutler would truly show his love of Maine if he would only drop out of the governor’s race and make our choice so much more simple (“Maine Voices: Eliot Cutler should set a date to get out of the race if he can’t win,” Oct. 4).

This idea hangs on the belief that there are two true political parties entitled to field candidates in Maine and that having more than two candidates in a race is unnatural, although we do have a fair history of electing independents.

Almost everyone has an opinion on how to run things, but there are not many people who actually step up and run for office, and I think voters should have the widest choice of interested candidates.

What we should have been doing since our current governor was elected was changing our system of voting to allow for multiple candidates. Instant-runoff voting was successfully used in 2010 to elect the mayor of Portland.

It is used for elections in Minneapolis, San Francisco, London, Ireland and Australia, and in the selection of the Academy Awards.

There are other systems of preferential voting to choose from if instant runoff isn’t your taste, but I think that now is the time to make a change.

You shouldn’t need a strategy to decide who will get your vote.


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