Political Memes

No STVs are pretty simple: I vote my preferred candidate, it doesn’t win? My vote goes to my 2nd preferred candidate, and so on.

Do you mean IRV?

It does address it. The president can’t do shit without a parliamentary majority so even if it comes down to 2 people they still have to coalition (and therefore give concessions) to other parties if they want to achieve anything. Therefore people are still represented.

Okay, currently, the president can't do shit without a congressional majority, and unlike in parliamentary systems, voting outside of party lines is extremely common and won't get you kicked out of the party, so what is the effective difference in representation?

In a functioning parliamentary (which is where the parliament holds most of the power rather than the president) multiparty system yes it absolutely is preferable as it generally leads to a president that isn’t necessarily from a single party but rather someone either more technical, skilled and representative.

I'm gonna have to disagree here. Parliamentary election of the executive leads to situations like Netanyahu in Israel. Or Berlusconi in Italy, back when that asshole was alive. It's not a more meritocratic or technocratic way to elect the executive - it's just a smaller, and thus easier to bribe, coerce, strongarm, threaten, or flatter, electorate.