The problem with that Australian ballot is that you run into trouble when people try to "beat the system"; for example, say everyone thought that only Gore and Bush were viable canidates. Bush supporters would put Gore last, and all of the third party canidates above him; Gore supporters would do the opposite. This could end up with someone NOBODY really wants being elected, simply because they weren't viewed as a real contender, and so they got second and third place votes. A better system would be the "approval vote" system, where you could vote for any number of canidates; you either give them one vote or no votes. Although you can still try to beat the system under that setup, an individual doing that has a lot less of an unbalancing effect. Especially since you're not comparing the canidates, only indicating who you believe would rule capably, you're letting people vote for 3rd party canidates without feeling that thier vote is "wasted" or risking ending up with a canidate nobody wants.
