Will the real loser in 2008 be the two party system?

[OmahaBlueDog]

Poll question: Will the real loser in 2008 be the two party system?

With the Democrats,it's the DLC versus the DNC. With the GOP, it's the supply sider/low tax/anti government crowd versus the evangelical/social conservative bunch. I'm wodering where we will be in 2010?

[zonmoy]

1. figure that the best case scenario is that people will figure out that

what we call democracy is little more than a scam and all write in nobody for the candidate in the national election.

[sunflower7]

4. Finally

There is a person who agrees with me. Obama and Hillary are both too far to the right.

[MonkeyFunk]

2. In a winner-take-all system

it's just about impossible to have a third party.

[bemildred]

3. You need a "I sure hope so, they've fucked the country up enough" option. nt

[MasonJar]

5. I am sick of DUers claiming that dems are no different than the cheating

and scandalous GOPers. Y'all sound just like a bunch of Rovians (the most damning insult I can conjure up) or Naderites. This was the Nadar dogma of 2000 against Gore and he was ohhhhhhhhhhh so wrong and look where that philosophic sophistry landed the US... So all I can say is support the Democratic Party or get off DU.

[zonmoy]

7. I will support the democrats when instead of sliding a little bit farther

to the right every time there is an election. they start moving in the opposite direction. simply because the repukes are galloping towards fascism doesn't mean that the democrats have to follow slower.

[Greyhound]

6. I don't think we'll be hurting enough for any change this cycle, but give it

2 - 4 more years...
:kick:

[zonmoy]

8. in that amount of time

we might be replacing our constitution with something that makes mien kamph seem radical left by comparison.

[Greyhound]

10. You may be right, but as a people, we're not really that bright anymore.

We never act, only react, and so it's usually too little too late.

Here's hoping I'm wrong...:toast:

[Elwood P Dowd]

9. We don't have a two party system!

We have a one party system called The Money Party. You, I, and 99% of the US voting public have no influence with The Money Party.

[SmellsLikeDeanSpirit]

11. I would love to have a 3rd party or hell even a 4th party.

[DFLforever]

12. I think a realignment is going on right now

in the Democratic party - we're seeing the tip of it this primary season.

[leftofthedial]

13. nationally, the corporate owners of our privatized electoral system

are far too dependent on the current two-party system for it to change.

It is flat out impossible for a third party to do more than very occasionally win one or two house seats. A third party winning anything at the federal level can't happen, not even theoretically.

Third parties can succeed on a local level though.

[OmahaBlueDog]

14. I'm going to disagree to this extent...

If a third party can succeed locally, they can succeed nationally IF the leaders have the patience to build from the ground up. If a viable third party could win even as few as 10 seats in the house, they could be a force to be dealt with in with whom they choose to caucus and whom they will select for key committees.

[JackRiddler]

15. Why are you raising false hopes?

What's going to change the duopoly? The open part of the U.S. political is a one-dollar, one vote system and the dollars aren't going to change how they vote, or move to reform the system into anything like a democracy. Meanwhile, most policy is made by permanent and often secret bureaucracies, we tolerate covert operations by unaccountable and unknown actors. The people have near-zero consciousness of their own economic interests and are largely ignorant of the world or of the real challenges their civilization faces. The one-winner system makes third party victories impossible, almost everyone's stuck in the "can't waste my vote" mentality. The two parties have full control of the funding, the legal structure, the media and the false ideological duality going back for more than a century. One hope might be that one party collapses altogether by discrediting itself as utterly alien to reality - please let that be the Republicans, and please let the issue that does it be the truth about 9/11. Then there might be room for the rise of at least a social democratic challenger. Good luck.