There are so many 3rd parties as it is I just don't see it working, let alone being in line with the founding fathers and the framing. Not that they supported a two party system, just the representative gubment was supposed to be just that - which supports the term limits are the ballot box. I know it's been bastardized however and why we stopped the president by setting term limits.
Time to do the same with congress.
I think some of the founding fathers would be aghast at how things have turned out. Washington was against political parties period. You'll recall his speech regarding that. I tend to agree, but political parties are a natural development of having freedom of association and choice. That doesn't mean that the two party system is ideal. It's merely a politically Darwinian result, where one party alone would constitute an effective dictatorship, and more would result in an unstable equilibrium of sorts. Many people spending effort to differentiate themselves instead of consolidating power. Two are therefore the best "thermodynamically stable" configuration of politics, if you understand what I mean. Most bang for the buck.
Well if it were nature, then that's just how it has to be, and if candidates were to put their office before other considerations it would also work.
Unfortunately we have come to a state where the good of "The Party" has come to be the most important consideration. The process of being able to run for office is controlled by people who's very job is to look out for the party, i.e. keeping it in power and opposing the other.
Great for them, bad for us because their replacements will be whoever the party blesses. Sure they can sound different, but once in office they are Dems or Reps first. I contend that this is the major reason that government officials are so unresponsive and out of touch with the electorate. They simply do not need to be, because you have no choice but to vote for whomever they select or the other party get's in.
A perpetual choice of the lesser of two evils.
The obvious solution is to have more choices. A third party would seem to be the way to go, but in practice the system guarantees one could not come to power. Why? Because it upsets the equilibrium of the system.
Example. You have a new Party X who contends they are a better choice than the other two. What has to happen for them to win? They have to split the vote of the other two parties, and gain enough support from the independents to win control, which is a daunting (and I risk using the word impossible) task.
Now the voter has three choices. Voters tend to have preferences between parties, and whether it's to get someone in office or keep someone out, that's how they vote. If they go with a third option, even if they like it, they most likely realize it may drain enough votes away so that the people the voter in question really doesn't want wins.
The choice becomes whether to "throw away" one's vote to choose who he or she would like and perhaps guarantee the worst of all options wins, or select from Hobson's choices, one of which wouldn't be as bad as the other (hopefully).
That doubt is the deciding factor in elections, and it's a legitimate one. Consider what happened with Nader and Ross Perot.
In the end we have the same two parties who know you have no real choice but to put one in office, and they take us for granted.
How does one counter such power? By removing it, but not in perpetuity. That way others who do not meet the "standards" (read mindset) of the Dems and Reps have a chance and we have alternatives. We could make it so that Dems and Reps AND the new parties have to sit it out, giving yet another set of people a shot.
If we did that the Dems and Reps can run again, but there is a new twist. Their complete hold on politics is tenuous at best, and they had better be listening to the people or they will be beat when it's their turn by an upstart. Even if they bested their opposition, they had better enact policies in tune with the nation or be forever consigned to the dust bin.
IMO it would introduce a bit of chaos into the system, however that is preferable to the status quo we will have forever.
Replacing one cookie cutter politician with another will not gain us a thing.
Facebook
Twitter