Boy, is this right on point! The Republicans are too far-right and complain about being not far-right enough. The Democrats are all over the loony left-wing map. What we need is a third party that takes the best ideas from both that actually work regardless of rhetoric and ideology. One that wants to restore the freedoms we’ve lost to Big Brother ‘protections’, keeps religion out of politics, ends corporate influences, produces a balanced budget while cutting taxes, is a floor wax and a desert topping and so on. Yeah, I know I’m dreaming…
Americans’ desires for a third political party are as high as they have been in seven years. Fifty-eight percent of Americans believe a third major political party is needed because the Republican and Democratic Parties do a poor job of representing the American people. That is a significant increase from 2008 and ties the high Gallup has recorded for this measure since 2003.
The finding, based on an Aug. 27-30 USA Today/Gallup poll, comes at a time when Americans are widely dissatisfied with the way things are going in the United States and give relatively weak approval ratings to the president and Congress.
[…]
Election results in recent years and polls from this year indicate Americans are frustrated with the job the two major parties have been doing. […] Given the lack of alternatives, it perhaps is no surprise that Americans’ desires for a third party are as high as they’ve been in at least the last seven years. And while the formation of an official third party is not imminent, that desire may be manifested in voters’ strong anti-incumbent sentiments this year.
#1: But what about an alternative to the Republican party?
With his soaring rhetoric Obama presented a vision of what, effectively, was a new Democratic party and a new America. Unfortunately it proved to be “just words” and he stole that line.
If nothing else the Tea Party is shaking things up. I don’t see much from either mainstream party.
You should change to a westminster model anywhere. They are hardley any advantages for the US to stay as a two-party system and I find it odd as an outsider to notice that the president seems to have hardley any power over the country that voted him in.
(And on that you should have a PrimeMinisters Questions type thing, but with PM been replaced with President obvously)
We already do. It’s called the Libertarian Party, and you probably agree with many of its ideas. If you’re tired of drug wars, high taxes, deficits, bloated military adventures, government intrusion and the police/nanny state, there ya go. Your third party.
Problem is that there are too many crazy people in it.
What we need is to bring back the liberal party. Anybody who thinks the present day Democrats are left-wing, doesn’t understand politics. The Democrats at best are centrist. If they were liberal we would have had true national health-care by now. The Republicans vary from right-wing (so-called moderates) to reactionary nut-balls (Tea-party). Their so-called “less government” is actually government of the wealthy, by the wealthy, and for the wealthy.
This is just what I have been thinking. How did we elect al these extremist view politicians? Whatever happened to moderates? If you have moderates on both isles then its much easier to get policy made. But when you have so much left and right wing politics they can’t even agree with their own parties let alone the other party.
there is one party and only one party no matter what they call themselves..
all of them are in the money party…
a third party will not bring order to government they are all bought and paid for by corporate america.
It all boils down to having choices. And when you think about it, the voters really have very little choice. The primaries are like some kind of sport’s semifinals. Where two candidates for each party gets pared down to one. Then the final election (the “secondary”?) has however many parties there are, competing for the position, each has a candidate for. The problem is, who chose the candidates in the first place, and what party they represent? At times, some voters would like a certain candidate, in s different party, to run in their particular party. But the crossing over isn’t allowed, until the next election cycle. Even though “write-ins” might say otherwise.
There’s nothing in the original Constitution about a party system. So what we now have has been improvised over time. Mainly to accommodate the powers-that-be. And not to give the voters more choices. The rule about one of two parties needing to have a two thirds major vote in Congress, seems to imply that there can be only two parties, EVER. And so it’s very unlikely that any third party, voted in to Congress, would have an effective vote there. Unless they have the choice to cast their vote in with either of the two major parties. The system doesn’t allow Republicans or Democrats to vote across party lines. But why shouldn’t the American voters be able to do this, in some fashion, during the primaries? Like, if so-and-so doesn’t win in the republican party, can he be considered in the green party, or the orange party?
Might it be nice if you could vote the loser of say the democratic party, to a position under the republican party flag? Or vice-versa? Or some neutral third or fourth party? Why does a good and decent man or woman have to give up, just because the idiots in their party didn’t like them? Or more likely, the moneyed backers behind their rivals out Tv advertised (and out LIED) them.
It was just recently, that I’ve heard that some voters wished a candidate in a different party, could have been chosen to run in theirs. But the party system doesn’t allow this. It’s all wrapped up for the convenience of those running the major parties. And they’re afraid to give voters any more choices, than can be so easily influenced and manipulated by money and connections.
We need no other party, just people interested in serving all of their constituents; not just the filthy rich and not just the incredibly lazy/stupid.
I think it would be fair to say that (at least right now) the MIDDLE class has the most people.
The problem with parties is that some big/popular/filthy rich fucktard develops the agenda and you’re some kind stupid idiot if you don’t agree. Again this would take some fucking balls to pull off.
In New York State, there are a bunch of minority parties you can vote for. Of course, they usually nominate a candidate that is in the mainstream party, but by voting for these minority parties (instead of the mainstream ones) voters can theoretically exert more political pressures to candidates. Thus, I rarely vote Democrat/Republican AND have my vote “wasted”.
#10 “Whatever happened to moderates?”
Whatever happened to civil discourse?
Simply change the voting system to require a true ‘Majority Vote’ of the electorate… for any candidate to win the election & take office. {..gotta get at least 50% of votes from the vote eligible citizenry; Australia uses this system}.
99% of politicians elected– take office with the approval votes from only a small minority of the American electorate…even U.S. Presidents rarely get even a third of American citizens to vote for them,
That ain’t ‘democracy’ nor fair ‘majority-rule’.
Fair and just elections would immediately break the Democrat/Republican Party (..they are really just branches of the exact same ‘ruling party’) strangle-hold on the nation.
Forget all this ‘political-party’ nonsense — concentrate on FAIR elections !
What we really need is a mob and a guillotine in Washington D.C. Then maybe a Constitutional convention once we have disposed of the trash.
Both parties have realized that they can get away with the “say anything to get elected but do anything to advance personal wealth and opportunities.” Our system is no longer about doing what’s right for the country. Rather, it’s about doing what will result in a long-term political career.
It’s not just the government to blame – the people who keep putting them in office year after year are equally culpable. Our representatives buy their vote based on how much pork they can bring home from Washington, what kinds of deals they can cut for employers in their districts, etc. On this note, despite all the yammer about why term limits violate free speech, they may be one of the few practical solutions.
I suspected the day Obama won that something like this would happen. Why? Because it always does. Oh it was great that the good ol’ USA showed it was finally demonstrating to the world that whoever looks like they actually CAN do the job should get the job, regardless of what they look like or where they came from. (and it’s rather interesting that the military has been–sort of–doing this for decades).
That it would dissolve into a lot political hoo-hah is to me simply an obvious sign of how utterly complex governance has become, no matter who tries to steer it.
Jesse Ventura was selling his book on C-SPAN and someone asked him if he was a Libertarian. “Yes but with a lower case ‘l’.” was his reply. Funny, that’s how I see myself these days, too.
(actually I did go to a Libertarian party meeting once, but I saw the crackpot meter pegged and was out of there long before it ended).
We have many parties in Brazil. They all suck.
Politics is a perfect workplace for crooks, all the requirements and perks are there, no party is going to fix that.
After they get elected, the crooks either jump from one party to another or just strike very friendly deals with members of opposing parties. Deadly enemies today are photographed smiling and shaking hands tomorrow. And they are the ones who make the laws. Foxes taking care of the henhouse.
They prosper, the nation gets screwed. No party is going to change that.
Actually I’d just like to say that I don’t believe the “party” system is very helpful at getting anything done in government. More often than not, instead of elected representative voting on the merits of an issue, then vote according to their party’s demands. They issue becomes polarized by politics, rather than whether the bill is a good thing to do, or not. At least, that’s what Congress and the Senate want us to believe, they’re doing. I suspect that secretly, they’re juggling the vote behind the scenes, according to what lobbyists want. And the partisanship is all an elaborate sham. I’m betting they really don’t give a hoot which party is voting which way. So long as some bill passes or fails, to accommodate the desires of the lobbies that pay the most.
Like WWE wrestling. It’s all be carefully choreographed theater. You don’t really think multi-billion dollar corporations are going to leave any to chance, that effects their bottom lines, like some Congressional vote, do ya? Or that a bunch of guys that spent millions to run for an office, are going to ignore the piles of money offered to them change their votes? This is America, not Fantasy-Democracy-Land.
It is true we don’t have much choice since all the candidates are in the pocket of the wealthy. They keep talking about the middle class… Voting for the wealthy and corporations. Meanwhile, almost everyone is lower class now, how about some love for the majority of Americans? How about some actual more social than center candidates? Today there is only center-right and loony-right as far as candidates who get chosen to be on TV, etc.
I guess we need to tune out any candidates who get on TV because odds are they have to be corrupt to get there at all.
“Actually I’d just like to say that I don’t believe the “party” system is very helpful at getting anything done in government.”
And there is nothing in the Constitution that requires them. Many local governments operate under “no party” rules. Perhaps the national government should operate in the same fashion.
Terriffic comments from all–except for Alfie of course, and Pedro hitting his 50% average.
That said, in practice the two party system has developed into an anti-Constitutional attack on our country. The house and senate are designed to represent the various interests of the people and the states: not the political machines that got them into office.
A good attorney-general would start prosecuting politicians who vote straight party line, aka filibusters for political purposes. When you introduce a bill 4 years ago as a Puke, and then vote against a near identical bill now because it is supported by Obama, then you ought to be in jail for subverting the US Constitution. And Obama should be impeached for being Puke light, but thats a different issue.
While an excellent post pointing out that the moderates of either party ((used to)) have more in common with one another and the American Party than the extremes of either party that actually hold the power, this jumped out at me: “produces a balanced budget while cutting taxes.”
Whats this fervor for cutting taxes??? Ha, ha. Stand too close to the sick, and you get sick yourself. Normally, most normal societies should be close to the norm is spending/taxation issues for normal functioning in normal times. Just look at what a society “needs” to function, and what nations on average normally spend, it looks to me like taxes need to be a bit higher, and spending a good bit lower, in order to achieve justice, stability, pragmatic equity?
Its what elections/government is supposed to be all about: not politics or morality.
Silly Hoomans.
We need to abandon the anti-UK style of democracy: Winner takes all. Third parties would be taken more seriously while sitting in Congress with votes to horse-trade, not just as sound bites for the MSM to belittle/ridicule. There is a lot of UK politics I don’t like. I just think this is fairer representation.
You really need to learn the meaning of the word “liberal”. It does not mean Left Of Centre. It means In The Centre.
You Have Liberals and Conservatives. A third party might attract the Left of Centre. There may be more of them than you think. They just haven’t had anything to vote for.
Your Democrats are not left wing. They are rumoured to get on well with the UK Conservatives. They are so right wing that they cannot find decent allies in any other country in the EU. What does that say about people that find them left wing?
Alfie the shill–so close and yet you keep your head buried in the sand up to your ass.
WHAT candidates are you actually for?????
Only an idiot would be “for” Palin or O’Donnell or either of the Paul’s.
“Extremists” ARE NOT A CHOICE EXCEPT FOR OTHER EXTREMISTS: aka not a rational choice.
Right now, the only reasonable alternative candidates are those with so little money/popular appeal they are irrelevant. Nader too old, or is he?
Who else is anti-corporatist, anti-religion posing as public policy, anti-religion posing as science, anti-business as usual/remaining bound to carbon based energy?
Sounds like the green party????
But tell us Alfie==who do you think is a “good” candidate??
VOTE ALL INCUMBENTS OUT OF OFFICE.
# 7 Dan Barker “you should have a PrimeMinisters Questions type thing” We do but the questions are all planted by the left.
# 9 C0mdrData “If they were liberal we would have had true national health-care by now” According to Jimmy Carter, the reason we don’t have health care is because of Ted Kennedy.
My personal opinion is that we don’t need another party we just need term limits and an end to the post-term perquisites of serving. We need to get rid of the pro-pols and get back to the Framer’s concept of a volunteer Congress.
Oh, and take away Pelosi’s plane!
No, I don’t think you’re dreaming, I think you’re stoned! Many Americans consider religion in politics to be important. The ones who don’t like this are mostly lefties, and a handful of Libertarian types. I don’t know if this is bad or good (it is all subjective) but you shouldn’t confuse what you want with what everyone wants.
“The Wall Street Journal has an excellent article entitled….”
An elitist New York lamestream media rag controlled by a foreigner. Alfred, go back to Cuba where you belong comrade.
I am with the one above who said we don’t need the parties. All you need to do is to have an open primary. The top two vote getters goes on to the election no matter what party they claim. It has the advantage to push the candidates in the middle at the primary.
Their bank accounts should be locked down and restricted to only the pay provided them no contributions permitted. Any and all contributions made would go towards funding schools, law enfocement, health care etc.. Then their actual pay should be based on a performance rating done by their constituency.
I lived during the age of George Carlin!
http://i.imgur.com/BSDcQ.jpg
“Americans’ desires for a third political party are as high as they have been in seven years. Fifty-eight percent of Americans believe a third major political party is needed because the Republican and Democratic Parties do a poor job of representing the American people. ”
LOOK! HERE IS THE REAL PROBLEM PEOPLE!
OVER HERE!!!!!
READ IT AGAIN.
US citizens are SO stupid that they WANT a third party and they have dozens.
They are SO dumb they can’t count.
There should be NO MORE wonder, at all, WHY we are in the very bad state we are in.
58% of US citizens cannot COUNT. How can we expect any of them to vote?
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