Many Mainers are vexed and perplexed by the twice-chosen gubernatorial presence of, one of a kind and largely disrespected, Paul Richard LePage.

Democracy happens.

The reason Paul LePage is governor of Maine is because he got more votes than those that ran against him. Simple as that. He was legally elected to office. More people bothered to go into a voting booth and choose him to govern than those opting for the other choices before them.

The first time around, his plurality was only 37.6 percent of the voting electorate in a 5-way race. Independent Eliot Cutler came in a very close second choice with 35.9 percent. Libby Mitchell, a distinguished veteran of elected Democratic leadership, came in a far distant third at 18.8 percent.

Second time around, after four years of take no prisoners battling with both parties of the legislature and back-to-back outrageous personal excesses causing wide public outrage, LePage was reelected by a very near majority of public approval via the voting booth. This time up to bat, LePage managed to come away with 48.2 percent of the vote against Democrat Mike Michaud’s respectable 43.4 percent. Eliot Cutler’s return engagement embarrassingly achieved only 8.4 percent support at the polls.

How could this happen? Yet again. Only worse. How could Maine find itself in such politically uncharted waters, without a paddle. Certainly, this mustn’t ever happen again. Never. Fortunately, LePage can’t run for a consecutive third term. Imagine the humiliation if, three’s the charm, he actually managed to win an outright majority consensus on his conduct. Despite what people think, mandatory term limits do exist. An imperfect system at least has that consolation.

For some, however, that isn’t near enough of a safeguard against another scenario such as has been inflicted upon Maine these last two election cycles. Some think Maine’s election process needs amendment to avert another catastrophe rivaling that of our current governorship. For them the concept of ranked choice voting is seen as the solution. Enough Mainers apparently think it’s worth serious consideration, as a sufficient number of initiative signatures have enabled it as November’s ballot Question 5.

The purpose of ranked choice voting is to assure that Maine’s governor and U.S and state senators and representatives get elected by a majority vote rather than by a mere plurality. This would be accomplished by instant-runoff vote counting of preferential choices, sequentially dropping last placed candidates until only two remain and one therefore wins by a majority.

Somehow, a majority victory in and of itself will be some sort of magic bullet that will provide a respected mandate for constructive and unifying leadership. Voting by ranking one’s choices will also eliminate the conflict of “strategic” voting, or feeling that voting one’s conscience will result in a “wasted” vote, and, because of instant-runoff eliminations, the “spoiler” effect will be removed.

Somehow, but without any certainty, it’s argued that if this system had been in place in 2010 we would have had Eliot Cutler as governor. Failing that, Michaud, in 2014, would have benefited sufficiently enough, as a second choice to Cutler, that Paul LePage would have been unseated.

Maybe. Maybe not. “Somehow” is right there next to wishful thinking.

I prefer the stand-alone argument that ranked choice will incline more candidates to enter more races. Third party alternatives will get a leg up in public consideration because, no matter how many candidates are fielded, eventually all races will come down to a two-way split. Whether its implementation would have denied LePage his victories remains pure conjecture

The most contributing factor to LePage being elected, twice, was simply that the Maine Democratic Party ran sufficiently poor candidates, twice. If there was a spoiler effect in 2010 it wasn’t caused by Eliot Cutler’s candidacy but by Libby Mitchell’s refusal to bow out.

Cutler, however, was indeed a spoiler in 2014, but not as most voters likely think. As revealed during a statewide televised debate, and then astonishingly ignored by the press, Eliot Cutler had been offered the 2014 Democratic slot for the governorship and he refused. Mike Michaud was their plan B. That bombshell spoke volumes about both Democratic shadow politics and Cutler’s go it alone hubris. As the Democratic nominee, Eliot Cutler would very likely have defeated LePage in a one-on-one race. The Democratic Party, at least, obviously thought so.

That said, even if LePage had lost reelection the progressive concept of ranked choice voting may still have been put forth as a 2016 people’s initiative. Maybe, but unlikely. If Cutler had been elected governor, Maine’s political landscape would likely still be rife with partisan unrest, but there would fairly assuredly be no calls for impeachment or changes in Maine’s constitution to more readily allow the unseating of Maine’s chief elected official.

As an “indirect initiated state statute,” Question 5 is a legislative can kicked to the people to decide directly. Sufficient desire for change of that indecisive status quo was what really elected Paul LePage. Change, however, in how we arrive at electing our leadership shouldn’t therefore be summarily rejected. Elections as presently done aren’t providing sufficient leadership at any level.

Gary Anderson lives in Bath.