Complete Breakdown of Two Party System?

[Stunt]

What would happen if a moderate Candidate; someone with appeal to both parties, ran in the Republican and Democratic primaries and won BOTH.

I mean there are several candidates who have views outside of the party they represent (ie. Guiliani on abortion, Romney on medicare, Paul on military, Clinton on foreign policy, and the list goes on). It wouldn't be abnormal for a guy like Lieberman to run as a republican, or a guy like McCain to run as a democrat. I mean these guys wouldn't appeal to the party's base...but there's far more independents out there than either party and they now have a ton of influence.

What would happen if a candidate ran in both primaries, collected funding from both party's coffers and won both nominations. Would that put an official end to the two party system? Would there even be a general election?

Comments?

 

[Rainsford]

Originally posted by: Stunt
What would happen if a moderate Candidate; someone with appeal to both parties, ran in the Republican and Democratic primaries and won BOTH.

I mean there are several candidates who have views outside of the party they represent (ie. Guiliani on abortion, Romney on medicare, Paul on military, Clinton on foreign policy, and the list goes on). It wouldn't be abnormal for a guy like Lieberman to run as a republican, or a guy like McCain to run as a democrat. I mean these guys wouldn't appeal to the party's base...but there's far more independents out there than either party and they now have a ton of influence.

What would happen if a candidate ran in both primaries, collected funding from both party's coffers and won both nominations. Would that put an official end to the two party system? Would there even be a general election?

Comments?

Interesting idea, but it could never happen. While average Americans might go for someone with broad appeal, both parties would rather shoot themselves in their collective head that nominate someone like that. Not because of any particular views, but because in our current atmosphere, even appealing to "the other side" is evidence of wrongdoing and unsuitability to lead. After all, if liberals hate America, and they like your candidate, there MUST be something wrong with him.

 

[db]

It's strange; Clinton started pushing many traditional Republican tenets (ie balanced budget), while with GW Bush the Republican party is hardly recognizable as such anymore. It wasn't until lately that a moderate Republican even dared to speak his mind, for fear of not supporting the president. Now it's refreshing and encouraging to hear from moderates. They seem so damn reasonable.

 

[Rainsford]

Originally posted by: db
It's strange; Clinton started pushing many traditional Republican tenets (ie balanced budget), while with GW Bush the Republican party is hardly recognizable as such anymore. It wasn't until lately that a moderate Republican even dared to speak his mind, for fear of not supporting the president. Now it's refreshing and encouraging to hear from moderates. They seem so damn reasonable.

It's actually a decent strategy on Clinton's part. The 2004 election seems to largely ignore the middle, and the Republicans have apparently not learned very much from that. Many of the Dems haven't either, but the Republicans are STILL trying to run like this is "Bush country"...any Democrat who leans towards the center AT ALL is going to cream them.

 

[SirStev0]

your scenario would never happen... they'd have to be members of said party to run as one...

but personally I feel the two party system may do much more harm to the us than it helps. I would love to see it breakdown.