Opinion Should America have more political parties?

Aegon Spengler

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Would the country be better off if there were more viable political parties?

What about a far right party, a right wing party, a center-right party, centrist party, center left and far left?

All these are encompassed in the two party system and it really muddys the waters. More choices for voters might make things more complicated but people would also have a better idea of what they were specifically voting for.
 
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This is a good way to get yourself labeled a crazy conspiracy theorist bro. Just a heads up.
 
Of course we should have more. 6-8 would be ideal
 
Yes of course - this country is dominated by a center-corporatist party and a right-corporatist party. Liberals have no true representation in this country and I think you could make the case that true ideological conservatives don't either.
 
Would the country be better off if there were more political parties?

What about a far right party, a right wing party, a center-right party, centrist party, center left and far left?

All these are encompassed in the two party system and it really muddys the waters. More choices for voters might make things more complicated but people would also have a better idea of what they were specifically voting for.

Ideally, there should be four parties:

A far right, a conservative right, a center right and a social democratic left party.

And every election is winner-take-all.
 
They have like 50 political parties in the US. The options are there, there's just little to no support based on registered supporters and from that, funding.

Better question is should the US have a parliamentary system and would that open up access to other parties
 
No. All of the countries with more parties suffer problems of their own. It's a fantasy to believe that merely adding names on the ballot will cure or address the underlying divisions. A caveat of the multi-party system is that it is what allows for strident minorities to gain a plurality because all of the moderates are fractured. That's how Hader rose to power in Austria.
 
Ofc. Theres a reason the rest of the world uses a Parliamentary style system and not the Murkan retard system.

But it will never happen because with two parties, it makes it much easier for Big Business to infiltrate both parties, keep their agenda secure, and maintain a corporate plutocracy.
 
No. All of the countries with more parties suffer problems of their own. It's a fantasy to believe that merely adding names on the ballot will cure or address the underlying divisions. A caveat of the multi-party system is that it is what allows for strident minorities to gain a plurality because all of the moderates are fractured. That's how Hader rose to power in Austria.

We currently have a party with absolutely no good faith public policies and whose core policies even their supporters largely don't support - regressive tax cuts, deregulation of environmental regulations, deregulation of campaign finance, union busting - that is still dominating government because they have a captive market of 40% of voters who are convinced that the other side is a bunch of evil, satanist, race warriors.

Yes, the US would benefit immensely from augmenting our system to allow for third party viability.
 
Dude, America doesn't need more crooked politicians and the bureaucracy that comes with it. Trust me.
 
Ofc. Theres a reason the rest of the world uses a Parliamentary style system and not the Murkan retard system.

But it will never happen because with two parties, it makes it much easier for Big Business to infiltrate both parties, keep their agenda secure, and maintain a corporate plutocracy.

There's a reason the Marshall Plan didn't set up post-WWII Germany with our system. The only time that our government has been effective was during the Cold War.
 
The United States does have more than two parties. They are dominated by the purple paradigm both institutionally and in popular consciousness.
 
Unless you have a totally proportional voting system -- which will never happen in the U.S. because one of your parties is deeply committed to the idea of some people's votes counting more than others -- you will likely end up with a de facto 2 party system anyways. Canada has first past the post and 5 (perhaps 6, with Maxime's new party) federal parties that can win a seat. But only two parties have ever formed government.

This is why people want proportional representation. If our government were structured the way it is in the U.S., I would even agree with it. But essentially, as it stands, we'd reap the worst of it with no real benefit.
 
Would the country be better off if there were more viable political parties?

What about a far right party, a right wing party, a center-right party, centrist party, center left and far left?

All these are encompassed in the two party system and it really muddys the waters. More choices for voters might make things more complicated but people would also have a better idea of what they were specifically voting for.

Tbh no. Our system kind of makes two parties a necessity. Also party=ideology is a new concept, two parties doesn't have to mean two ideology's, that's just the modern perception. Even in parliamentary systems you've got the party's that do represent ideology's uniting to form coalitions which are basically like our parties with extra steps.

I don't believe that it would change anything for better or worse just that it's a solution in search of a problem. Us having two parties is not one of the many problems our country has.
 
Absolutely. The whole point of political parties is that they represent the desires a sizeable demographic somewhat accurately. As we've seen from the election of Donald, a lifelong Democrat who switched to being a far Right populist, and the popularity of Bernie and the women of "The Squad", most Americans don't feel truly represented by either party. Especially since the values our parties are currently conflicting and incoherent. That's part of why we have such shit voter turnout for a supposed democracy.

I'd most align with a socially conservative, fiscally liberal party that focusing on investing in families and communities. Such a party would be really popular, imo, especially among immigrants and working class Americans.

Instead, the current party that cares about families is racist af and wants everyone to die penniless and the current party that cares about communitues is morally dilapidated.
 
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No. All of the countries with more parties suffer problems of their own. It's a fantasy to believe that merely adding names on the ballot will cure or address the underlying divisions. A caveat of the multi-party system is that it is what allows for strident minorities to gain a plurality because all of the moderates are fractured. That's how Hader rose to power in Austria.

This is what I was going to say. I think that splitting into more parties would just fracture the current parties and open the door for something more extreme to win an election with only 28% of the vote or something. As it is now, you have to get a very large number of people to vote for you. Almost the majority of the country.

But my opinion is rooted in a fear of extreme politics. I'm somewhat boring when it comes to politics. To me, even Bernie Sanders is too extreme.
 
I like the idea of a multiparty system beyond just two but it’s unlikely to happen based on how much we’d have to overhaul elections. It would have to start at a very local level imo.

There are cons that you can get more extreme parties with more power than our normal system but in our system you can also get a failed party that’s able to continue on with substantial power until it fixes its platform. There’s also a concern that government power being that divided would give the private sector much more control as a result.
 
Sure, but would have to be tournament style voting to prevent someone winning that only like 20% of the voters wanted.
 
How would you suggest making that happen? I don't find the problem to be there aren't other options. There are. I find the biggest problem being other parties having a 0% chance to realistically win anything relevant because they don't have the financial backing. You'll never see a Green Party/Constitution Party/etc President because the Dem/Repubs have all the money. Unless that's seriously addressed there could be 100 parties and you'll still see two parties dominate the system.

You’d have Ranked Choice voting elections or a run off election with the highest two parties advancing. That would eliminate the “throwing your vote away” fear. There’s instances of this in local elections. I’m unsure if any state wide elections have it but that would be huge if it started happening.
 
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