How To Break The Monopoly That The Democrats and Republicans Hold

Laws don't matter. It's the American people. They don't vote for 3rd parties. Period. In New York State, all candidates are invited to the gubernatorial debate. In those debates you will easily see 5 to 7 candidates debating. And people still vote Democrat or Republican.

You want to change the political system. Change the people.

 

The ONLY way to break up the criminal cabal in DC is to STOP FUNDING IT. but American's have been incrementally conditioned to be weak and cowardly in the face of authority....

so they'll continue to do just as they're told, and compliantly remit their enablement.

 

That's exactly what we used to have when the debates were organized by the League of Woman Voters, then the Bi-Partisan Presidential Debate Commission was formed.
But it's not enough to participate in debate, would have to go to proportional representation rather than the first past the post system we have.
That way if a third party got 10% of the vote, they might get 8% of the seats in congress, even if they didn't win a single race outright, they might get 30 or 40 seats.
And that would be enough to break two party rule. Because with a Green Party and a Labor Party and a Tea Party, coalitions would need to be formed to pass anything.

 

I like a lot of this, but libertarians best chance is changing the Republican Party. Start with economics. In the mean time get the democrats to go along with social libertarianism. Make them pass the policies we want. The socialists did it. Check out the 1928 socialist platform, you can find it via google. They have been immensely successful in the last century.

 

This is why Parliaments are a good idea.

 

The problem is the districting. When there is only one political candidate that can be elected per voting district, it tends to marginalize third party candidates. This is sometimes referred to as a "winner take all" system.

The solution is to make the voting districts bigger and have more than one candidate who can be elected.

 

You are partly right, the problem is with how districts are laid out and who does the required redistricting every 10 years. In most cases it's the state legislature that draws the maps and then enacts them into law. So the State Legislature is dominated by Republicans, that means that they will do their best to draw the maps to their own advantage, when the Dems dominate a Legislature, then they draw them to maximize the benefit to themselves. This gerrymandering has been going on so long now, that there are very few states left that are actually competitive. What we really need is to set up independent boards in each state that are by law required to draw a map that maximizes competitive districts for both the State Legislature and the U.S. House. There should be no district that can be considered safe for one party or the other. This would also encourage the rise of third parties.

 

You guys are barking up the wrong tree! The demographic trends will guarantee that America will NEVER accept Libertarianism as a valid way. Hell, they can't even get women interested! Doesn't that tell you something? Libertarians outside of the college dorms are just picking up the extreme scraps of the republican right as they charge into oblivion. The way we'll get a third party is by a collapse of the Republican Party into a minority party localized in the south. Then the Democratic party will pick up the scraps of whats left of the moderate republicans. Then the democratic party will split into a moderate party and a farther left party resembling the European Social Democrats or Christian Socialists. This will more accurately represent the modern American political landscape. The right wingers will stagger on on life support provided by corporate donations and gerrymandered districts. But its a game of musical chairs in the deck of the Titanic. The end of Libertarianism won't even be noticed when the ship sinks.

 

Make it a real monopoly and have only Democrats.

 

We can start by reforming the electoral college. We multiply the number of EVs by 100 and each state will apportioned the EVs representing the House among all candidates in proprtion to popular vote received and the 200 EVs representing the Senators going to the winner in that state. This will give third party candidates a fighting chance in Presidental elections. For Congress, I propose multi-member districts and a single transferable vote system. I also propose expanding the US House of Representatives to at least 1,000 members.

 

Considering the number of independents, it doesn't seem like our current situation is much better than the one you describe. The more parties present, the more the diverse views of the people can be heard in government. That means more representation, not less. I don't think we would have hundreds of parties in power with that new rule. That isn't the case in countries with third parties in government, and I don't see why it would be the case here.

 

What are nationals? Would they be the same persuasion as members of the Falconist Party? Http://falconistparty.us

 

The bigger problem is that the democrats and republicans control the entire political process. You think they are going to allow competition?

 

Aside from changes in the law, a strong new party must be well organized, well funded, and well massed. A party has to be bred, fed, and led. A new party must have thousands of dedicated people willing to work for ballot access, work on campaigns, and run as electoral candidates, A party has to be well financed. This can be accomplished by establishing a network of political action committees as well as party owned businesses. A party has to have leaders with a message that resonate with the people as well as have a disciplined party structure.

 

The general point is that in terms of represnetation, neither form is very good. Some countries exhibit greater stability than others, but this stability has nothing to do with representation of people in their government. For instance, monarchies can show great stability. Our country has not been stable either. We have been rife with wars, assassinations and social upheaval just like other countries. We have economic booms and busts. We have a fractured society that constantly clashes, but our one saving grace is that we don't come to arms in the heat of our certain passions...recently.

I'm not sure if stability was what you were referring to when you mentioned other countries though...

 

I'm not so sure. They are certainly rivals, but not on every issue. There will certainly be consensus, but for whatever reason (political or other) they will not publically shake hands on manyy things and risk upsetting their base.

Sometimes I wonder if it is a case of good cop versus bad cop. Like in Texas, with the Keystone XL pipeline being debated that will bring oil from Canada to the Gulf. It's being championed as a way to relieve America from being dependent on foreing oil, and being marketed as a "job creator" of course, cause that seems to be the grab-em phrase of Republicans. However, the jobs are transitional, the pipeline is owned by a foreign country, low-wage workers are likely to be hired for the most part (meaning a huge increase of jobs but with low pay and shoddy benefits) Instead of combating reliance on foriegn countries like the Middle Eastern states, and building local reserves, it will be largel sold to China, whom we are supposed to be at odds with (but we've been economic partners for decades, and that partnership has only grown more lucrative and far larger. The increasing trade-deficit is not a crisis, it is our countries economic policy, paronized by some of our counries biggest businesses; Walmart, Microsoft, Apple, etc...) As for reducing our dependence on hostile foreign markets, those, as well, are part of a long-standing and lucrative economic partnership. Two of our most recent Presidents have strong ties to the oil markets and the people involves, and many of our government officials do as well.

When you look at it like that, it's so easy for one side to dress up a thing like it's the holy grail our country, state, or whatever needs. Sometimes you see the bullcrap before, and sometimes, you have to deal with it after you bought it. Democrats do the same thing. But they seem to be much more sneaky about it where as the Republican's are upfront. Both are bad news, but I simply can't figure out the nature of their relationship in government...the real deal.

 

I wasn't really referring to stability, but your point about it is correct. I would say a system with more parties is more likely to better represent the diverse views of a population--it just seems like common sense to me.
I'm not sure if stability was what you were referring to when you mentioned other countries though...[/QUOTE]

 

I thought so too, at first, but when you think about it, how many directions can a ship go at once? Only one, right. There's no way you can address two different opinions at the same time, let alone more than that. A compromise doesn't really address either, it falls somewhere in the middle where both sides get some and lose some of their views or demands. A comrpomise among more than two groups would be even less appealing. In a government of so many parties, either the majority of them are largely impotent and politically inconseqeuntial, or they are quite capable, and because of that, the political process arrested between the coflicting viewpoints of multiple parties with the ability to monkey-wrench things. In eiter case, we actually do have a lot of parties in our government. They just don't take the forefront like the Republicans and Democrats.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_political_parties_in_the_United_States

Most of these parties are, as you can see, regional. They function on a state or district level and often work in tandem with the two political heavy weights- basically sponsoring and being sponsored in order to increase each others effectiveness.

Because of all this, political triage is very common. Politicians and political parties will pick which concern or which group of people they can capitalize off of or, perhaps, even serve faithifully, while at the same time hanging on to a favorable enough position to maintain office. You have to remember that our politicians are also career men, and it's not really about serving the country, they are trying to build their careers as keep a steady career.

 

When you have contradicting views in the populace, of your you cannot satisfy them all. What you are missing is that if neither party in a two party system holds your beliefs, you will have no chance to get your beliefs in any law. No chance to even get any sort of compromise. If there was a party with your beliefs, you have a greater chance. Not every party would have to compromise. You may have more popular parties that tend to be in the coalitions. But with multiple parties, there is always the chance that a smaller party can take over if they gain enough popularity. At the very least they could form a coalition on the grounds that some of their views are enacted as well that the larger party may be in agreement with. That is not the case when you have two fixed parties.

 

I can see what you're saying, but it still doesn't matter. If it was just two parties, you're right, you have very little chance of seeing your personal or local views represented. If you have many parties, you have a greater chance, but that's like risng froma 1% chance to, say, 11% if there were ten parties and if ech party had an almost-equal share of voters with your party possessing just the one percent needed to win. However, should you or your party win, the 11% that represent you now make the policy for the rest of the 89% (split into 9) who disagree with you. Or should you lose, you and 90% of the country now have to follow the policy of just 10% of the country.

So while you and your party may certainly drive your opinion to the top of the hill, it's horrible in terms of equal (or as near to as possible) representation in government.

 

That is not how multi-party systems generally work. You seem to be thinking in terms of a winner take all system. I am thinking in terms of a proportional system. If the country is evenly split between 10 parties, the Congress would also be evenly split among 10 parties. You wouldn't have one party in power making choices for the 89% it disagrees with. What generally happens is that parties form coalitions, finding common ground on certain issues and pushing those. If your idea of representation is "everyone get's what they want into law" then no form of government will ever have that because of the simple fact that people disagree, and two contradictory policies cannot be enacted at once.

 

In a multi-party system when one party forms allainces, groups, or coalitions to mitigate or overcome another majority they could not overcome on ther own, the action is returned by the other side, leading to a process where many parties begin a general consolidation into a few, large, super-parties. Basically, we'd be right back where we are now.

That's how the US started. What you are describing is not so much one country with differing parties, but a group of different, little countries or states connected by some common interest. A federation. The fractionalization or divisions allow for a greater sense of self-autonomy, but weaken the individual group and limit their overall effectiveness. To counter this, consolidation is inevitable. If these groups merge, than what's the point of having you group in the first place. The merge erodes the views, wants, needs, or demands of any one group and finds a hopeful compromise between them- which incurs some degree of sacrifice. If these are merely temporary alliances, then we are left with the fractionalization that occurs with different groups of people wanting to and having the ability to do differen things.

In politics, it's not really winner take all. At least, not inherently. But that is the aim and in any campaing, the consolidation of power is the surest path. Multi-parties never last. I'd go so far as to say that most of the multi-parties you come across other than 1 - 3 main ones are impotent or mere subsidiaries of the big parties. But that is a guess. I'll see if I can look up more into it.

 

I was talking about winner-take-all elections vs. proportional elections. They are different types of election systems. In a multi-party system, the coalition are not their own parties. Each party in the coalition is still an independent party with its own values. The point is the people who support that party will have a chance at their arguments being heard at the government level. Without such third party representation, the arguments would simply be ignored, with no chance of gaining the support of more people.

I am sorry, but to say that a system with multiple parties reflecting the diverse views of individuals is no more representative of a system with two parties that do not reflect the diverse views of individuals seems absurd. Your talk about fractionalization and stability touches on completely different topics--they are not relevant to representation.

 

Hmmm...if I were a worker at McDonald's, I am part of the McDonald's industry. Being a part of it, their is a chance that my interests and concerns can be represented at the highest level of McDonald's. What is the likelihood that this will happen. Or is it more likely that while they are part of the same infrasructure. the entire structure is centered around making money, and my personal issue are lost in that structure beyond the store level. For politics, the structure is centered around votes and the individualist concerns are increasingly lost at the level. Voter representation gives way to voter management. Rather than submitting claims, it is much more likely that you are receiving orders.

In our political process, these many smaller parties often receive orders from the higher ones. Rather than taking concerns and interests, they are instructed to set and support an agenda favorable to the larger party. Each of these smaller groups have become great managers of their repective bases, rather than representatives. They are skilled at handling these very individual concerns, but it is more centered around the concept of voter management than voter representation, much the same way the McDonald's workers individual needs are not entirely addressed by her manager, but addressed to the point where the smooth operation of the business is assured.

 

Best hope is massive social strife and economic meltdown. America needs a populist
movement with White leader who will "play the race card."