How to Scrap the Two-Party System in Three Steps

[NorthCarolina]

It is quite obvious to anyone paying attention lo the past couple of decades, that neither national political party truly represents the best interests of the citizens who empowered them by their vote. What we essentially have is the Best Democracy Money Can Buy. Very few elected officials head to DC with the thoughts of how can I best help my constituents, but rather, how can I best maximize my personal lot in life.

Lets face it, the two party system is broken. Trading votes for gold is the new American way. It needs to change, and in that vein I offer this article by Carl Gibson.

(For those of you not familiar with Carl, here's some info: Carl Gibson, 27, is co-founder of US Uncut, a creative direct-action movement that mobilized thousands against corporate tax dodging and budget cuts in over 100 cities during the months leading up to Occupy Wall Street. Carl and other US Uncut activists are featured in the award-winning, Sundance-selected documentary We're Not Broke, which is available on Netflix. He is also author of the book, How to Oust a Congressman, about his experience organizing the ouster of a corrupt member of Congress in New Hampshire during the 2012 elections.)

Lots of people feel understandably hamstrung after the midterm elections. It's obvious the Republicans don't represent anyone but the billionaires who bought their seats for them, and everyone is sick and tired of Democrats taking bribes from those same billionaires, and curling up in the fetal position to get kicked around without putting up a fight. As a matter of fact, 42 percent of Americans identify not as Democrats or Republicans, but as Independents. Even though the media doesn't make it seem that obvious, we really are the majority.

But on the flipside, everyone is afraid to vote for Independent candidates who actually propose real solutions and refuse to be compromised by big money. So how do we get around that? It'll take three steps. They aren't easy, but if we can accomplish these steps by 2020, our country may start to finally look like a real democracy.

<snip>

Link: http://www.opednews.com/articles/How-to-Scrap-the-Two-Party-by-the-web-Billionaires_Corporations_Democrats_Elections-141111-813.html

[Agnosticsherbet]

1. The only one of the three that is even possible by 2020 are ballot initiatives.

Because each state has its own regulations on how ballot initiatives work, even that would be unlikely. He calls for two Constitutional amendments to be past and approved by 2020. That is just flat impossible.

[NorthCarolina]

2. Possibly, but he is at least attempting to offer solutions.

Maybe it will take a bit longer, maybe the state of affairs is already too far down the rabbit hole and it will prove impossible, but he is putting forth ideas that should seriously be discussed.

[merrily]

11. A solution is at least colorably realistic. The Constitutional amendments proposed are not.

[drm604]

4. Agreed.

I despair of finding a way to fix our broken system. Many of the Republican led states are considering changing how they assign electoral votes so as to gerrymander the 2016 Presidential election. It will take a large effort just to somehow prevent that.

What's the answer? How do we undo the growing right-wing and corporate control of our government? Part of it is getting the masses who vote Republican to see some sense, but how do we do that?

[Agnosticsherbet]

5. Every state has different rules for third parties.

A set of initiatives that works to create identical set of laws and regulations in each state would make more sense than calling for Constitutional Amendments. The laws that make it difficult for third parties to get any traction were created by Democrats and Republicans to cement their power.

I like what California has done as far as elections and redistricting. It works quite well.

Realistic change can not chase after the pipe dream of Constitutional Amendments.

[merrily]

10. No constitutional amendment that is even a tiny bit controversial has been adopted since Ike.

The amendments that this guy described will never make it past a filibuster. Moreover, predictions are that Republicans will hold the house for at least a decade (during which time they will get another shot at re-districting).

It's very hard to take this author seriously.

The article is on the level Steve Martin's routine, You can be a millionaire and never pay taxes. "First, get a million dollars."

[Agnosticsherbet]

23. Yes.

[sabrina 1]

29. And that happened in this election. People went out and voted for Progressive Ballot Issues. He is

offering solutions, something those satisfied with the way things are, are always for. At least he's presenting something concrete and as I pointed out, the Ballot Initiatives were a success in this election.

Working locally is what people are now doing, seeing that they have no say in DC at all.

Rebuilding the party from the ground up. How long will it take? A long time, it took a long time to get to where we are and WE HELPED, I am sad to say.

Now people are coming up with new ideas other than the stale old 'vote for the lesser evil and then be quiet until the next election' routine.

Anyone with better ideas is free to make THEIR ideas known.

The young are amazingly aware of the future they face if they don't take matters into their own hands.

He is an example of how aware they are and of how motivated many of them are to change that future before they find themselves living it.

[AgingAmerican]

3. Get rid of the electoral college

Priority 1

[Agnosticsherbet]

6. Requires a Constitutional amendment.

So that isn't happening.

[AgingAmerican]

9. Then we are doomed to the two party system for eternity

Without one person, one vote.

[Agnosticsherbet]

21. I think doomed is a bit too strong a word.

Constitutional amendments are very difficult to push through. Thinks can be done at the state level. Also, the electoral college only effects the President. It is not an hopeless system.

Only four of 44 Presidents have failed to win the popular vote.
• John Quincy Adams who lost by 44,804 votes to Andrew Jackson in 1824
• Rutherford B. Hayes who lost by 264,292 votes to Samuel J. Tilden in 1876
• Benjamin Harrison who lost by 95,713 votes to Grover Cleveland in 1888
• George W. Bush who lost by 543,816 votes to Al Gore in the 2000 election.

It, fortunately, remains rare.

All other offices are by popular state wide or district wide votes.

[AgingAmerican]

31. Problem is

In a 'Red State' Democrats don't turn out in large numbers in the presidential election. In a blue state many Republicans don't turn out because their presidential vote is largely wasted.

If we had one person, one vote, everyones vote would count and there would be much larger turnouts. There are many more red, than blue states. The difference would be a game changer, and there would be reason to vote for a third party.

The electoral college squeezes out the possibility of a third party and we are now stuck with the result.

Just my two cents.

[merrily]

12. Yes and no. Quite a few states are agreeing to vote their electoral votes

the way that a majority of their voters voted. Sadly, those will probably be blue states. The right despises majority rule--unless it's an issue where the majority is being bigoted against one group or another.

[Agnosticsherbet]

22. Republicans tried in California to rapportion Electoral votes to Congressional districts.

Which would mean that California's trove of votes that in most elections is reliably Democratic would be split. They did not suggest doing that in Texas.

[merrily]

32. Yeah, they focus on California a lot since it, thank goodness, went Democratic.

Within the memory of people still living, in Presidential elections, Texas always went Democratic and California always went Republican. Then, both flipped. Had California stayed Republican in Presidentials, Democrats of the day could pretty much have kissed the Oval Office goodbye for a lifetime. Indeed, that fear may have jump started the rapid success of the DLC--but that is just speculation on my part.

AFAIK, the states that have signed up, or that are prepared to sign up--for the electoral vote commitment are not signed up for apportionment, but don't write that down. I have not looked into it.

[LanternWaste]

24. If we can do it for booze, we can do it for votes...

"Requires a Constitutional amendment."

If we can do it for booze, we can do it for votes...

[Agnosticsherbet]

25. Progresives and women fought hard for prohibition.

The world was different then.

A Constitutional amendment requires a two-thirds majority vote in both the House of Representatives and the Senate, a signature by the President, and then must be accepted by 2/34ds of the states. You could amend with a constitutional convention called for by two-thirds of the State legislatures.

The hurdles are so high that it simply will not pass.

[merrily]

34. And prohibition didn't last long, either.

[Agnosticsherbet]

36. Far longer than it should have, from the stories told by my Grandparents.

[merrily]

33. That was before the country got so divided. At this point, I don't know if there is a chance

for a Constitutional Amendment to leave D.C., let alone get ratified.

Besides, making the sale of liquor legal again appealed to everyone but bootleggers, the 99% drinking to forget their troubles and the 1%, making a bundle on dealing in booze...and other things.

[Agnosticsherbet]

37. The prolem is that it is not "we" that do that.

We would need to elect a House and a Senate with 2/3rds majorities to pass an amendment.
In theory, every Senator elected in 2016 and 2018 would have to be Senators who would vote for that amendment.

Then, it would need to be ratified by 38 states.

Any solution that requires a Constitutional Amendment is wishful thinking. Real change requires a lot of time and hard work to build a movement. It also requires a huge amount of money.

Ballot initiatives in states, I support, though they will be extremely expensive.

Movement building where people actually go out to picket, protest, and pressure their elected representatives.

Hell, I'll get behind primary challenges to Republicans or Democrats who oppose liberal laws and institutions.

But Constitutional amendments are not going to happen.

[FrodosPet]

7. "Trading votes for gold is the new American way."?

What's so new about that? It's been happening since the beginning, to one degree or another. The only thing that changes is scale.

[L0oniX]

8. Everyone change their voter reg to independent ....hurry.

[merrily]

13. Will that help?

In Massachusetts, the largest registered group is registered "unenrolled," aka indie.

My first registration was Democratic. However, when I moved to Massachusetts, I joined the crowd and registered unenrolled, as well. Then Dimson was re-elected and I changed my registration to Democratic.

[Ampersand Unicode]

14. Wickit pissah! I'm a member of that group!

If you get your license at 18, you can register to vote at the DMV through the license application form. That's what I did -- got my license at 18 and also registered as Unenrolled on the DMV paperwork.

My father is a union man so he's a registered Democrat. My mother is unenrolled. He's the only "official" party member (and sadly, he doesn't even bother to vote). My brother is unenrolled too.

The only goobs in the family are my two senile Fox fan aunts (both of whom have nice private-sector pensions and hate the fact that "we even have to pay for other people's kids to eat during the summertime when they're not in school, why don't you get a damn job or heck, EAT YOUR KIDS AND TAKE THEM OFF THE DOLE!"

My grandmother is 97 (arguably nowhere near as senile as her other two daughters!), and switched to Democrat in the 1960s when JFK came along. He was a good friend to the Portuguese community. It was largely because of JFK that the racist immigration quotas implemented in the '20s ended: he helped open the doors for thousands of displaced earthquake victims on the Azorean island of Faial to come to the U.S. in 1958. Up until Ike she was a Republican, but a "New Deal Republican" if such a thing exists (she always liked FDR).

Massachusetts is known as a Democrat stronghold; more precisely, we've always been a liberal stronghold (well, not counting Salem, but that's going quite a ways back). If tomorrow the liberal-leaning party was called Martians, we'd be Martians. It's the ideas that matter, not the party name.

Personally, I wish the U.S. would be like the rest of the world and just call the liberal party the Liberal Party and the conservative party the Conservative Party. But then, I've always hoped we would adopt the metric system and other international standards and stop pretending we're "special"... not like that's going to happen anytime soon...

[merrily]

15. " EAT YOUR KIDS AND TAKE THEM OFF THE DOLE!"

I've heard older women in Massachusetts being pissed off because Gates was vaccinating kids in Africa, when he should be spending all his money in the US. Didn't bother them a bit when I pointed out vaccinations were a life and death issue.

And yeah, if your parents don't feed you, you should starve already.

You have to wonder how human people who say these things are.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

16. Results of the inevitable alert:

Juror #1 voted to LEAVE IT ALONE
Explanation: Skinner let 3rd party Crist supporters campaign here in 2010 against the Democratic nominee. They helped to split the vote and gave us Sen Marco Rubio!
Juror #2 voted to HIDE IT
Explanation: this violates TOS
Juror #3 voted to LEAVE IT ALONE
Explanation: No explanation given
Juror #4 voted to LEAVE IT ALONE
Explanation: Tsk. Tsk. God forbid we should have political discussions about a political party on a political website. Maybe we should limit discussion to choruses of "Happy Days are Here Again".
Juror #5 voted to HIDE IT
Explanation: No explanation given
Juror #6 voted to LEAVE IT ALONE
Explanation: Doesnt look like RW stuff to me. The guy sounds like a lefty. This alert is unclear at best.
Juror #7 voted to LEAVE IT ALONE
Explanation: No explanation given

[MisterP]

17. they have been rolling back Dems' "permissible" field of action since the FL heist

2001-2 no third parties!
2002-4 no competitive primaries! no criticism of IWR backers!
2006 no defending McKinney! (this was from the Admins)
2007-8 no "purge" of incompetents and turncoats!
2009-13 no demands for anything! take what you get!
2014 no not voting!

but the real question is, what's next? "no demurral from Reagan's policies" 2016? "no opposition to voter purging" '18? "no criticism of the plan to raise the voting age to 21" '20?

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

18. Yep. And, they'll tell you it's for your own good.

[Ykcutnek]

19. Heh, heh.

[MisterP]

20. Latin America for over a century had the problem of feckless party duopolies

that served only the same elite strata

they're vestigial parties today, because people stopped voting for them

[Fix The Stupid]

38. A little help for a confused canuck...

"2006 no defending McKinney! (this was from the Admins) "

- Was that Cynthia Mckinney? What happened there? Why would admins tell us not to support a democrat?


Same thing with the 'suppported Crist over the Democratic nominee" upthread...

Can you help me understand this as well? Did the Democratic Party and DU actually support a republican over a Democratic nominee?

Or am I missing something here?

Thanks

[NorthCarolina]

27. Thank you for posting that. I had no idea

an alert had been issued on this post. Not sure why, but it is what it is. I guess the site doesn't message you when that happens. Very interesting though. How does one go about locating that information on this site?

[merrily]

35. Wow.

Which TOS is juror 2 talking about?

What grave sin did the alerter cite?

The party was supporting then Republican Crist for the Senate over the Democratic candidate, just like it had supported Republican Chaffee for Governor over the Democratic candidate. (At least Chaffee knew how to win when the party supported him.) The party also supported Lieberman over his primary challenger, Lamont. Lamont may have been corporatist, but at least he probably would not have campaigned openly and hard for McCain/Palin--and Democrats of Connecticut wanted Lamont.

Among several reasons my money now goes only to specific candidates, not the DNC.

[Le Taz Hot]

40. Someone actually alerted?

Oy vey! Somebody doesn't want a discussion board, they want an echo chamber. To the Alerter: Try the BOG -- I think it's just what you're looking for.

[Tarheel_Dem]

26. Sigh. The "left" still doesn't understand that their dreams are even further away today than they..

were a week ago. Ten more state houses flipped from Dem to GOP control. Start there, and good luck to ya!

[appalachiablue]

28. I get it unfortunately. I'm in VA, land of Cuch, Gov. Ultrasound, Brat the libertarian.

MA, MD, WI, others with with Red governors. The post election, very Red MAP w/ 'Ring of Fire' video with Farron Cousins, posted on DU was disturbing. Might be 10 years before anything can move but a Presidency, maybe. After 8 yrs. of Bush disasters, 2 wars, the 2008 burndown, Dems. should be well in power. But corps control all- media, stink tanks, SCOTUS, economy. It's frubar..Only way is to get really active at the local level, create a giant grassroots mvmt. as many folks say. More difficult things have happened.

[Tarheel_Dem]

30. Unfortunately for "the left", their Pied Pipers spend all their time preoccupied with what the WH...

may or may not do. Meanwhile, the states are where the action is really happening. That very red map we're looking at today, is going to get a lot redder before it's over. As the GOP has wrested control of these state houses, they also get to draw their own congressional districts, and you know who'll benefit from how those districts will be chopped up, right? We may see some court challenges, but if they reach the current USSC, we know how that'll play out.

[Le Taz Hot]

39. Excellent article.

I think some are more doable than others but it's better than doing what we're doing now which is absolutely nothing. That allows the oligarchs an even tighter foothold on what little is left of our Democracy.

Another suggestion is that candidates voluntarily refuse to take corporate money and announce it early. That's one that would quickly weed out the serious candidates and those who are interested only in their own wealth and/or ego.