A true 3rd Party?

Published on January 31, 2006 By Dr Guy In Politics

Canada just had an interesting election. Conservatives won, but do not have any ideological partners to truly partner with to form a majority government. So they are going to have to tack left to come up with one. The closest (for you Canadians, I am taking the read on this from our Local JU Canadians) to them are their arch rivals, the Liberals. It will remain to be seen if they can govern that way.

In the US we have a nice staid 2 party system. The "them" vs the "Us". You can assign who you want to to each. But one of the parties is starting to fracture, and fracture badly. So far it is merely cracks, but some of the leading politicians in that party are now taking up the mantra of the extreme part of their party, while others, the more pragmatic ones, try to remain close to the center and hold on to the extreme fringe.

But if you have not guessed, the fracture is coming upon the left. And the fringe are the constituents that would never vote for a conservative (the other party could given the right circumstances), or anyone who compromises their extreme agenda. They are going to far as to heckle some of their most popular leaders and threatening to run against them.

The left is coming to a crossroads. And the choice they make may well define politics in America for the 21st century. They can tack back to the left and embrace their fringe, thus assuring that they will not lose them, but that assures they will lose any nationwide election. For their fringe is much too radical to the large center of American Politics, so they could never hope to gain any support from the ones right of their fringe.

While that is a feel good option for the left in the short term, it is a losing strategy in the long term.

The other option is to dump their fringe and tack more towards the center (note: I did not say tack across the center). They would then be able to win Nationwide elections, although they would doom their legislative - at least at the national level - to a minority status for the short term (for many years in all probability). But having the White house means a lot in politics in America, even without majorities in the house and Senate.

Will American soon get a new 3rd Party? We will see. But one thing is for certain, the fringe is not going to win the presidency in this century.

Comments

Dr Guy

on Jan 31, 2006

I think leaky Leahy should be the leader of the new 3rd party. He is a burden to the democrats anyway, and at least he is sober.

BenUser

on Jan 31, 2006

The fracture is coming from the right.

- Former House Majority Leader Tom Delay indicted for money laundering.
- Current Senate Majority leader Bill Frist investigated for securities fraud.
- Republican Randall “Duke” Cunningham pleads guilty to accepting bribes and steps down.
- Republican activist and lobbyist Jack Abramoff pleads guilty to defrauding Indian tribes.
- Several Republican congressmen connected to Abramoff’s illegal activities. (Not one democrat accepted money from Abramoff.)
- "Scooter" Libby indicted for lying to a Grand Jury
- Eight of the nine Iraq war veterans who are running for office are running as Democrats
- The majority of Americans don’t trust our president
- If it is found that the “wire taps” are illegal, Bush will be impeached.

And all this is with the Republicans controlling the House and Senate! Image what it would be if there were some checks and balances!

And so... the Republican sheep must jump on any and every little story that makes them feel like they aren’t going down the toilet, such as the Cindy Sheehan story. Soon the Republican Party will just be a bad memory.

stutefish

on Jan 31, 2006

In practice, I find conjoined legislative and executive branches weird and overly complicated.

One thing I like about the two-party system is that it forces all the special interests and minority factions to align with one party or the other. Everybody has to compromise a little bit. Everybody has to dig deep in their ideology and their convictions, and find something that the majority of the American people can agree with.

Then and only then, when you've got at least half the people in the country in agreement on a broad set of general policies, can your faction hope to make any kind of major, lasting change to the country.

And even then you probably won't be able to make the kind of extreme change you'd dreamed of, since the whole two-party process would have forced you to jettison (or hide) the extremist parts of your ideology, in order to get the consensus you need for political power.

I think the founding fathers established the three-branch system we use for practical reasons, and I think that such a system is best served by the two-party politics we've evolved into.

I think that countries that use parliamentary systems have evolved to do so, and that's why parliaments work so well in those countries, and seem so natural. I think that if Americans were going to evolve a parliamentary system, we would have done so already. And I think that a parliamentary system wouldn't work as well for us as it does for others.

bakerstreet

on Jan 31, 2006

The problem is I don't think the Dems can even really gauge where the center is. I *know* it is further to the right than dean, kerry, the clintons, etc., think it is. They might not have to move into Republican terroritory, but I think that they have deluded themselves for so long, and moved so far out there that they actually think "center" is mainstream Democrat ideals, and can't even remember what the true middle looks like.

singrdave

on Jan 31, 2006

The problem is I don't think the Dems can even really gauge where the center is. I *know* it is further to the right than dean, kerry, the clintons, etc., think it is.

That is the problem with the Dems approaching centrism: the inability to relate to actual people's actual needs.

And any Republican trying to cater to more moderate conservatives or centrist Dems? Well, they get 9/11 slapped in their face.

drmiler

on Jan 31, 2006

But one of the parties is starting to fracture, and fracture badly. So far it is merely cracks, but some of the leading politicians in that party are now taking up the mantra of the extreme part of their party, while others, the more pragmatic ones, try to remain close to the center and hold on to the extreme fringe.

The fracture is coming from the right.

- Former House Majority Leader Tom Delay indicted for money laundering.
- Current Senate Majority leader Bill Frist investigated for securities fraud.
- Republican Randall “Duke” Cunningham pleads guilty to accepting bribes and steps down.
- Republican activist and lobbyist Jack Abramoff pleads guilty to defrauding Indian tribes.
- Several Republican congressmen connected to Abramoff’s illegal activities. (Not one democrat accepted money from Abramoff.)
- "Scooter" Libby indicted for lying to a Grand Jury
- Eight of the nine Iraq war veterans who are running for office are running as Democrats
- The majority of Americans don’t trust our president
- If it is found that the “wire taps” are illegal, Bush will be impeached.

And all this is with the Republicans controlling the House and Senate! Image what it would be if there were some checks and balances!

And so... the Republican sheep must jump on any and every little story that makes them feel like they aren’t going down the toilet, such as the Cindy Sheehan story. Soon the Republican Party will just be a bad memory.

You sir are a cowardly clown. You come in and drop a turd and then run like a little "girly-man" when someone calls you on it.

Not if Ted "hic" Kennedy keeps falling apart on the senate floor.

Dr Guy

on Feb 01, 2006

You confuse made for TV non-scandals with fracturing. Best if you understand what a party is doing and what fracturing means. What you are describing is at best a self destruction, at worst just media hype and propaganda.

Dr Guy

on Feb 01, 2006

I think the founding fathers established the three-branch system we use for practical reasons, and I think that such a system is best served by the two-party politics we've evolved into.

What serves best and what is are not always the same. And in this case, what serves best is not what the democrat fringe has in mind as its all or nothing mentality attests to. If we are to get a third party, it looks like the DLC will be at the core of it, and rapidly assume the mantle of the old democrat party. The 19th century saw the collapse and creation of several new parties, while the 20th century has not had a really viable one since the Bull Moose Party. After 2 elections thrown into the house, and another where the victor got fewer votes, we thought that it could never happen again, and yet at the end of the 20th century it did.

I am not saying, without reservation, that it will happen. However if current trends maintain themselves, I do see it happening. A Big IF I know.

Dr Guy

on Feb 01, 2006

I agree, but then I think Bill Clinton and Mark Warner know where it is. As do some others. The split will not be clean, but those who realize that the center of the left is not the center of the nation will eventually be bumped from the party, or drag it back, and the fringe will create their own party. That fringe, like the NDP up north, will always get some votes. But never enough to govern.

Dr Guy

on Feb 01, 2006

And any Republican trying to cater to more moderate conservatives or centrist Dems? Well, they get 9/11 slapped in their face.

Republicans have catered to and grabbed the center. That is why they are running the place. If you look at the senate (the House is too numerous to easily quantify), you see that the only centrists are republicans. The democrats have abandoned it for the far left.

Dr Guy

on Feb 01, 2006

You sir are a cowardly clown. You come in and drop a turd and then run like a little "girly-man" when someone calls you on it.

Actually he is the epitome of the lunatic fringe. He is so far gone, that he cannot understand that he is committing suicide for his party.

ParaTed2k

on Feb 01, 2006

I'd rather see a government made up of people with convictions, who are elected based on those convictions and don't give them up once they've hit Washington.

Leahy, Clinton, Hutchison, Hatch, Dean or Bush, let them each vote their conscience! Somewhere along the way, we started believing that comprimise is a good thing. Comprimise is nothing more than letting someone talk you into something you know is wrong. How can that be a good thing?

What we need are 100 Senators, 435 Representatives and a President who each vote their conscience on a specific bill (not necessarily on the issue of the bill) and are willing to live with the outcome.

What we need is a "We the People" who are willing to vote our conscience and elect the people representing us and our states based on which candidate most closely matches our own philosophy.

That is what we need. Too bad all we have are people who think that their job is to fool us into re electing them.

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