So, are you American types gonna get a third party?

[HEyHEY]

Seems to me that more and more people in the USA are frustrated with the Dem party AND the Republican party. Naturally, it would seem that, at some point, a real, viable alternative would emerge. It happens in Canada all the time. I don't see why it can't happen in the USA.

Anyone know if there's a movement of any kind for this?

[yurbud]

1. not yet, but Obama is close to driving educators out of the Democratic Party

[flvegan]

2. Not me. Kucinich is a Dem. No need for third party.

[HEyHEY]

3. what if he started one?

[nickinSTL]

32. he is, but

aside from his runs for President, I don't get to vote for him.

Fortunately, I do get to vote occasionally for Dick Durbin, who is decent.

Unfortunately, for Rep this year, I'll get another very unimpressive Dem to vote for, who will lose, as always, against John Shimkus. For a Dem for Senate, I get a guy tainted by a banking scandal. For Governor, I get a guy whose leadership in a time of economic and fiscal crisis has been nil.

If Kucinich was running - sure, I'd vote for him. Voting for some of the Dems I'm stuck with...not so excited with that.

[saltpoint]

4. There've been third party efforts for a long time in

U.S. history.

Very few of them do well. Some are crushed right out of the gate.

The more politically viable Perot was the more appalling he seemed.

Barry Commoner and LaDonna Harris were class acts but were almost totally ignored by media and voters both.

[readmoreoften]

5. It takes a lot of organization to start a party. Various social movements are in talks at the moment

I expect a Labor Party to emerge in the next 5-10 years. But there is no financial or organizational infrastructure to start an LP at this point and many of the bureaucratic elements in the "business unions" would likely oppose it. New, younger union, politically savvy, less "McCarthy-damaged", leadership is forming but it's going to take time.

[Sebastian Doyle]

6. You mean like our own NDP?

I suppose it's possible, but I'd rather see the Teabaggers form their own right wing extremist party, send the DLC'ers and Blueballed Cowards back to the Republican party where they belong, and restore the Democratic party to its former greatness.

Have a Liberal Democratic party and a right of center but not batshit crazy Republican party. Instead of two right wing parties like we appear to have now. Until we get rid of the corporatist influence and the electro fraud machines, there isn't going to be a third party, so we might as well put the burden on the right wing wackjobs to come up with one.

I'd be totally cool with two parties if it were FDR Democrats and Eisenhower Republicans. Anything to the right of that should have stayed in the lunatic fringe.

[Edweird]

28. +1

:thumbsup:

[Cleobulus]

7. I wouldn't mind the U.S. getting its own unabashed Socialist Party...

One that is at least viable on the local and state level, at least at first, and then growing from there.

[HEyHEY]

8. There's a municpal party in Vancouver

Fairly centrist, but by USA standards that makes them left. Anyway, they in city hall and talking about going province-wide. I hope they do.

[elocs]

9. Third parties here generally hurt the party for whom the voters would normally support.

A progressive 3rd party would hurt the Democrats and help elect Republicans. A right wing party such as the Tea Party would hurt the Republicans and help Democrats to get elected.

The United States by and large has a 2 party system and the winner of any given partisan election will generally either be a Republican or a Democrat. If either party wants to change those who run under its banner the place to do that is in the primaries and generally in a primary your vote carries a lot of weight because such a small percent of the electorate both to vote in primaries.

Our representatives are not imposed upon us by anyone, they are elected by the people.

[depakid]

12. "Our representatives are not imposed upon us by anyone"

Except that, as you implied- there's no choice beyond tweedledum and tweedledee in many cases, thanks to corporate control of both major parties.

[elocs]

17. In that case you use the primary to get rid of tweedledum or tweedledee.

In general, if you cannot get somebody elected in a primary you are not going to succeed in getting them elected running as a third party candidate. That's simply reality, as hard as it is for some to deal with.

If you were a hungry person and were given the choice of one of two foods, neither of which was entirely to your liking, a rational person would choose the lest objectionable food knowing that the other choice is to go hungry. We do not all get to choose our own pet candidates based upon whomever is closest to our person important issues.

Candidates are elected and therefore may wield power and pass laws because of an electorate that casts votes for somebody who actually has a chance of winning as opposed to making what essentially is a protest vote for a third party candidate thus denying the vote to in our case, the Democrat.

[depakid]

29. When all the corporate money and party establishment back tweedledee- it's not so simple

Then again, few cognoscenti would ever accuse America of having a functional Democracy these days.

[LostinVA]

26. "Our representatives are not imposed upon us by anyone"

Yes, they are.

[eridani]

10. No. There are none that actually take elections seriously n/t

[nofurylike]

11. by design, in the form of democracy here, added parties always

favor the most privilege-empowered class.

unless people will restructure the very foundation of democracy here, third and other parties will continue to be only more dangerous to the most vulnerable.

believe me, some of us have worked our whole lives trying to get armchair politicos (and egomaniacal so-called-idealistic-other-party presidential/federal candidates) sufficiently engaged to create THAT level of reform.

still always wishing and hoping though! true REPRESENTATIVE governing would be outstanding!!


solidarity

[Turbineguy]

13. We have a third party

republicans depend on it to win elections (what they can't steal).

[Ozymanithrax]

14. In our winner take all system, third parties are spoilers...

Very few in our history have had enough people to elect anyone to national office. The Libertarians tend to vote Republican because they do not have enough people to actually get their own elected. Greens tend to vote for Democrats, or run candidates that lose. Ron Paul is a Republican though his polices tends to right wing Libertarian. He could not win as a Libertarian.

What Third parties are good for is pulling enough votes from one of the big two to throw the election to the other side.

Also, parties are complicated. A party must be created in 50 states rather than the nation. Each state has different rules for establishing a party and getting someone on the ballot. This makes creating a new party very expensive and dificult.

[SoCalDem]

15. on the 14th of Never

:(

[struggle4progress]

16. The only way to get a viable third party at the national level in the US

would be to have a history of successful third party organizing at the local and state levels

If we had (say) four or five hundred good strong multi-issue groups, spread across the top (say) two hundred most populous counties in the US, working diligently to push local and state politics in a progressive direction by concentrating on local and regional issues, with monthly local meetings, quarterly multi-county meetings, semiannual statewide meetings, and annual regional multistate meetings, we might develop the necessary momentum in a decade or so: that's about how long it takes to push somebody from local municipal committees into statewide office

But as a general rule, Americans have been brainwashed into thinking politics is about opinion, rather than organization and activism: there's almost nobody who understands the notion of solidarity; there are very few people who have the political experience to think strategically; and there's not much of a cultural pipeline turning ordinary people into analytical, dedicated, informed, pragmatic, rough-and-tumble political workers

And Americans unrealistically expect change to COME FROM the top, rather than expecting to have to do the work of PUSHING change TO the top

So I think the short answer to your question is: it could happen, but I don't currently see a successful effort in that direction

[Junkdrawer]

30. +1

[NYC Liberal]

18. A third party would have to come from one of the two parties splitting up

Some very well-known figures from the party, along with a good chunk of the party's members, would have to split off for a third party to have a chance, in my opinion. It won't come from the ground up.

But it's not impossible.

[hfojvt]

19. We already have lots of 3rd parties

A viable one? What exactly is viable? Is 30 seats in the House and 10 Senators viable? How so?

You might say that the Senate would then need the 3rd party for cloture, but that depends on the rest of the Senate. It could be 60 D, 30 R, and 10 TP in which case the 3rd party is almost totally irrelevant. Suppose it is, in a DU wet-dream, 50 D, 40 R, and 10 G. Who is to say that it would not be easier to pick up 10 moderate Republicans for cloture than it would be to acheive cloture with the Greens? After all, if the legislation gets too far left you start to lose the more conservative parts of the D coalition. The G's are not likely to come from Montana, Nebraska or the Dakotas so you still have to deal with Baucus, Tim Johnson and the Nelson twins.

Besides that, once the G's unite with the D's in order to pass some less than perfectly liberal bill, then half of the Woodchuck coalition on DU is gonna be screaming bloody murder about how disgusting the Greens are an how there's not a dime's worth of difference between the D's, R's and G's and they will be sensibly looking for a fourth party.

Also never mind the logical inconsistency of
1) progressive candidate apparently cannot win the Democratic primary
2) yet, progressive is somehow gonna win the general by pulling in all those fiery liberals who are registered independent or Republican.

[LAGC]

23. I take offense to your "Woodchuck coalition" comment, sir.

While its true that even third parties like the Greens would have to compromise some in order to get legislation passed, I can't imagine the capitulation to be anywhere near as bad as Democratic capitulation to the R's has been as of late. The whole point of belonging to a third party is because you have certain principles that are inviolate, so I'd imagine there would have to be a lot of common ground in order to get even that simple compromise in legislation.

I just think it would be interesting to have coalition politics in play here in the States, with viable third parties allying up with the main two parties to form ruling governments like so many in Europe do these days. That way people wouldn't be afraid to vote their conscience and whom they really support, not just the lesser-of-the-evils as it so often works today.

I imagine it would be easier to put pressure on third party candidates not to compromise too badly, lest they lose the support of their smaller and more vocal voting bloc.

[hfojvt]

36. since we do not have a parliamentary system

it could lead to a certain amount of troubles. Here's a congressional district, a moderately liberal one, and here is the vote total
TP - 27, R - 21, D - 26, G - 26

Suddenly you have a Tea Partier in Congress 'representing' a district where the majority are liberal.

Then consider the other problem in American politics, the lack of viable candidates for even two parties. Three quick examples. South Dakota where Republican Senator Thune is running unopposed. Kansas 3rd where the Democratic incumbent dropped out. The only candidate the Democrats could come up with to replace him - his wife. Kansas 2nd with 3 candidates running for the Democratic nomination, none of them particularly viable.

How much harder would it be for 3rd and 4th parties to come up with candidates in all the districts?

[LAGC]

38. Well, in that example you gave...

If we had a parliamentary system, the Democrats and the Greens could team up to form a majority coalition to outmaneuver the Tea Partiers and Repubs. (52% vs. 48%) I don't see what the problem is. Your concern with lack of viable candidates is more compelling. Obviously in areas where there isn't a strong second party (minority Democrats in a Republican-dominated area for instance) there would probably be less demand for a third party alternative anyway. But I'm thinking more of areas that are majority Dem already, getting in more Greens to try to pull the coalition Democrats to the left. I just think it would be a better system, although I agree that the two corporate-dominated parties as they stand will likely never allow for it to happen, because it would upset their current balance of power. So yeah, seeing such fundamental change to the system is unlikely.

[slay]

20. The problem is the Repubs and the Dems are insanely well funded by corporate interests

to the point where yes, of course our congress is corrupt, bought and paid for. These same corporations own the media. Hell they own the voting machines. I'd love to see a Party of the People - kind of like the Dems used to be before they sold us out to large corporations for obscene amounts of cash. We're in big trouble politically here in the USA. I wish I knew the answer. :(

[BzaDem]

21. Under our current winner-take-all system, it is mathematically impossible for a third party.

A real, viable, alternative won't ever emerge until a real, viable, alternative election system is put into the Constitution.

[TheKentuckian]

22. I dunno about that. We're struggling to even have two other than a letter by the name

At best we have the two most conservative parties capable of running a liberal democracy and at worst a sham mostly differentiated by constituency rather than substantive differences in ideology.

You can't run on the southern strategy when you depend on minorities to get elected and you have to keep up racially charged rhetoric when you depend on bigots.

You probably should look at moving while there is still time because we are highly dangerous neighbor that are armed to the teeth and pretty damned delusional. We also have a highly toxic secular religion that is like a zombie plague.
You guys are way too close to completely avoid infection and our power brokers demand everyone play ball and playing ball requires adopting our secular religion wholeheartedly.

Been getting a little more Reichish up there slowly but surely hasn't it?

[Naturyl]

24. First we need Instant Runoff Voting

In the event that happens, which it never will, then yeah, other parties will be viable.

Or, in the infinitely more unlikely event that liberals decide to actually vote the conscience now, they could be viable tomorrow.

[Iterate]

25. It can't happen effectively.

It's an interesting problem, but winner-take-all, two party systems will remain that way until there is a major failure (as in total collapse) that forces or allows a structural change. Whether you look at it mathematically, through game theory, historically, or through political science, the result is the same.

The good news is that differences of interests tend to be compromised within the parties, and the bad news- big changes are nearly impossible. After all, the system evolved for the protection of slavery.

The 1860 election is pretty interesting because slavery couldn't be compromised, we ended up temporarily with four parties(and one group wouldn't accept the results). I would also argue that the defecting groups had opposite of the intended effect. The Bull Moose didn't make the Republicans more progressive and Nader didn't make the Democrats more green and less corporate.

The only way out that I can imagine would be for one of the states to allow proportional representation and have it work out so well that it was copied.

Short of that, we're faced with convincing each and every Tea Party Texan that their real enemies are the corporations that are outsourcing their jobs, and that they're better of drilling for geothermal than oil.

[marketbreakaway]

27. Rainbow Coalition, Libertarian, Blue Dogs, Tea Party...

I believe that our form of government, namely bi-cameral congress with a strong executive and an overriding judicial system, would not work well with multiple parties because we are already well divided against ourselves. Instead, we break off into groups withing the major parties.

[xchrom]

31. we actually have a sizable one here. they're called Independents.

we even have elected legislators who are members of this party.

and both political parties damn near run over themselves trying to woo votes away from them.

[woo me with science]

33. There is an opening for a third party if it focuses like a laser on one thing.

Americans are seeing their very livelihoods systematically dismantled and sucked away by the rich.

The murder of the economy and systematic destruction of the middle class are what will eventually pull enough people to a third party option. If a third party arose with a determined, single focus of stopping the economic rape of most Americans and ensuring that people reap fair rewards for their work again, that party would draw from the Left and the Right and could never be stopped.

[ProgressiveProfessor]

34. I doubt I will see a meaningful third party in my lifetime

Our current government model does not support them as well as a parliamentary structure does

[Romulox]

35. People need to read more history. So called "Third Parties" supplant existing parties with some

frequency throughout American history.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whig_Party_(United_States)

[jpak]

37. We already got one - The Teabaggers

yup

[DevonRex]

39. Different forms of government. Yours enables multiple parties.

Ours enables 2 strong parties, making third parties spoilers. Your parties can form coalitions. Ours can only compete, thus weaken.

[Ignis]

40. Never, ever, ever. The PTB have way too much invested in winner-take-all.

:shrug:

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

41. Viable? Maybe not. But, I'm not above voting for non-violable ones.

"Not as bad" just doesn't work for me anymore and saves damage to my nose..and, conscience.