American political parties and primarys?

[Ignorant twit]

Do you see what I am getting at with your party structure and how it effects your election system? birds of a feather etc. you have effectivly ruled out any effective third party option, because such attempts are scuppered by the electoral system itself.

The third party option is ruled out only because any viable third party ends up being coopted by one or both of the two major parties. For instance many Green Party issues have been coopted by the Democratic Party, many of the Libertarian Party's have been coopted by the republicans. If a third party has even moderate success, heck even has good looking poll numbers, then the major parties take up their issues.

Ahh. now this is what I wish to deal with. So you would agree that a full {hypothetical} 15% of your populations veiws are irrelivant and not worthy of representation just because they do not all live in the one state?

If you were to have a proportional system this 15% would not represent any district they would represent 15% of your population.

Umm Stuart as I understand the Westminster system you have the same problem with this 15% (hypothetically). For instance in the UK MP's are elected by geographic locations, i.e. how Talyor was elected for Wyre Forest. We elect our representatives by districts, the English do the same. How is there any garuntee that they will represent this 15% and we won't?

I mean look at the last UK election, the UK independance party won 1.5% of the general vote, they have no MP's. Indeed Labour won 41.4% of the votes and controls 61.1% of the seats. I'm failing to see why Westminster is supposed to give a better representative government. Indeed going by the last election we are closer to being truly representative than the UK.

The only way to be truly representative is to have a government that is elected by direct proportion, i.e. the Knesset. Frankly governments such as those tend to end up fractured and give EXTROIDINARY power to the small kingmakers. For instance Shas has been able to extort massive amounts of funding and government backing for its policies ... even when the vast majority of the populace would like to tell Shas to take a flying leap. Of course the alternative sucks too, having no majority coalition government has a history of courting disaster - like say interwar Greece.

No matter how you build a government, be it a federal republic like the US, a Wesminster Parliament like the UK, or direct proportional representation you end up with disproportionate power and influence. No matter what happens a good portion of the minority will have no tangible effect on the government.

[RedImperator]

Ok, I see how your parties are organised. But that does not explain how it is that a full {hypothetical} 15% of your population can be without representation, now does it?
No one person in a Westminster style party will have the exact same veiw on everything either, but they will share broadly similar veiws and vote accordingly, more organisation in our system but the overall effect is the same. Do you see what I am getting at with your party structure and how it effects your election system? birds of a feather etc. you have effectivly ruled out any effective third party option, because such attempts are scuppered by the electoral system itself.

You've got cause and effect mixed up. The structure of the electoral system, the decentralized nature of American politics, and the nature of the Presidency all control how the parties are organized. The Constitution made no allowances for parties whatsoever--the Founding Fathers envisioned a system in which talented individuals would be elected from their districts to serve in Congress for a few years as part of their obligation as gentlemen to serve their state and country. The party system formed basically as it is on its own as early as the first Washington administration--one of the two that formed still exists, as a matter of fact. The positions, identities, and even the names of the parties change, but the two-party system, with a few gaps, has always existed since the Constitution was ratified (and those gaps are years where there was only one party, not more than one).

Ahh. now this is what I wish to deal with. So you would agree that a full {hypothetical} 15% of your populations veiws are irrelivant and not worthy of representation just because they do not all live in the one state?

What we get down to here is a fundamental difference in philosophy. The United States is and always has been highly decentralized by the standards of Britian's other daughter countries. If your hypothetical 15% (VERY hypothetical, since we're assuming that the members of this hypothetical minority that's so at odds with the mainstream they haven't been co-opted by one of the majors yet is so evently distributed there isn't a clump of them large enough to elect a single Congressman anywhere) is scattered too widely to elect representatives, then their views ARE irrevelant because they don't represent the majority in any state or district, which is more important than their numbers nationwide. Practically, your hypothetical 15% is an exercise in abstraction and little else, since any unrepresented group making up 15% of the vote would see its views adopted in short order by one of the majors (see, for example the Progressives of the early 20th century, the Socialists during the Roosevelt administration, or the social conservatives in the late sixties and early 70s), unless their views were so contrary to the mainstream it would be political suicide to do so, in which case a third party WOULD form and inevitably ascend to major-party status as soon as the existance of such an issue caused one of the majors to disintegrate (see the fall of the Whigs and the rise of the Republicans over abolition in the 1850s).

Fixed quoting tags.
-Rampant AI

[Durandal]

The third party option is ruled out only because any viable third party ends up being coopted by one or both of the two major parties. For instance many Green Party issues have been coopted by the Democratic Party, many of the Libertarian Party's have been coopted by the republicans. If a third party has even moderate success, heck even has good looking poll numbers, then the major parties take up their issues.

The third party option has been ruled out by the media, who are really the ones who decide who the viable candidates are. During the last election, Nader wasn't invited to the presidential debates, for example, which basically took any sense of legitimacy away from his candidacy. You'll never hear about the media giving any kind of serious coverage to a third party, so no one's going to give a rat's ass about third party candidates. Hell, wasn't there one third-party guy a while back who had a one-man debate because he wasn't invited? He just stayed on a stage with a TV and tried to answer questions.

[Ignorant twit]

The third party option has been ruled out by the media, who are really the ones who decide who the viable candidates are. During the last election, Nader wasn't invited to the presidential debates, for example, which basically took any sense of legitimacy away from his candidacy. You'll never hear about the media giving any kind of serious coverage to a third party, so no one's going to give a rat's ass about third party candidates. Hell, wasn't there one third-party guy a while back who had a one-man debate because he wasn't invited? He just stayed on a stage with a TV and tried to answer questions.

Oh cut the crap. The media actually loves the third parties. Ross Perot ring a bell? Hell look at how much FREE ADVERTISEMENT Nader got when these stories ran, again and again on him. Hell look at the media hype of Buchannan and Hagelin and the whole reform party fiasco.

The simple fact of the matter is people don't care about third party candidates because there is no issue they can claim that can convince enough people to care. Look what happened ever frikking time a third party makes a decent showing, one party co-opts their issue for the next go round. Be it Bull-Moose or Reform, if one guy polls high you will see one party or the other coopt the issues.

The reason nobody cares about Nader is because Nader has nothing to care about. There isn't a sizeable following that wouldn't rather vote Gore than Nader.

[Durandal]

The third party option has been ruled out by the media, who are really the ones who decide who the viable candidates are. During the last election, Nader wasn't invited to the presidential debates, for example, which basically took any sense of legitimacy away from his candidacy. You'll never hear about the media giving any kind of serious coverage to a third party, so no one's going to give a rat's ass about third party candidates. Hell, wasn't there one third-party guy a while back who had a one-man debate because he wasn't invited? He just stayed on a stage with a TV and tried to answer questions.

Oh cut the crap. The media actually loves the third parties. Ross Perot ring a bell? Hell look at how much FREE ADVERTISEMENT Nader got when these stories ran, again and again on him. Hell look at the media hype of Buchannan and Hagelin and the whole reform party fiasco.

The simple fact of the matter is people don't care about third party candidates because there is no issue they can claim that can convince enough people to care. Look what happened ever frikking time a third party makes a decent showing, one party co-opts their issue for the next go round. Be it Bull-Moose or Reform, if one guy polls high you will see one party or the other coopt the issues.

The reason nobody cares about Nader is because Nader has nothing to care about. There isn't a sizeable following that wouldn't rather vote Gore than Nader.

Really? So when Ralph Nader calls a press conference, the press actually shows up? Don't kid yourself. The media painted the last election as Gore vs. Bush. They define who the contenders are. The media gives some airtimes to third party candidates, but nowhere near as much as it does to the two major parties.

[MKSheppard]

Really? So when Ralph Nader calls a press conference, the press actually shows up? Don't kid yourself. The media painted the last election as Gore vs. Bush. They define who the contenders are. The media gives some airtimes to third party candidates, but nowhere near as much as it does to the two major parties.

Ralph Nader is a fucking nut, same as Buchanan, only Buchanan is slightly
more sane (although not by much)

Get a REAL candidate, who isn't a loony, and watch your vote count RISE and RISE

[Joe]

That's just not true, Ralph Nader got plenty of coverage in the 2000 election.

[RedImperator]

The third party option has been ruled out by the media, who are really the ones who decide who the viable candidates are. During the last election, Nader wasn't invited to the presidential debates, for example, which basically took any sense of legitimacy away from his candidacy. You'll never hear about the media giving any kind of serious coverage to a third party, so no one's going to give a rat's ass about third party candidates. Hell, wasn't there one third-party guy a while back who had a one-man debate because he wasn't invited? He just stayed on a stage with a TV and tried to answer questions.

Mass media has nothing to do with it. The only time a third party had had any kind of electoral success in the United States is when the two party system has broken down. It's in the nature of the American system for two major parties to form to the exclusion of all others, as I've explained in some of my earlier posts.

[theski]

Jesus, I think Ross P got more Tv time then the big 2. That is why Clinton won. Ross split the Repulican vote.

[Stormbringer]

Really? So when Ralph Nader calls a press conference, the press actually shows up? Don't kid yourself. The media painted the last election as Gore vs. Bush.

That's becuase it was. Nader never had a snowball in hell's chance so why should they pretend he did?

[theski]

I think the best tv during election time is C-Span2 showing the 3rd party debates.. here is a great link to every political party out there.http://www.politics1.com/parties.htm

[The Dark]

Really? So when Ralph Nader calls a press conference, the press actually shows up? Don't kid yourself. The media painted the last election as Gore vs. Bush.

That's becuase it was. Nader never had a snowball in hell's chance so why should they pretend he did?

Nah, the last election was just Bush. 75% of the media's coverage of Gore was negative (PEW study). Some liberal media influence that was .

[Durandal]

Nah, the last election was just Bush. 75% of the media's coverage of Gore was negative (PEW study). Some liberal media influence that was .

The vast Liberal Media Conspiracy(tm) at work again.

[Joe]

Really? So when Ralph Nader calls a press conference, the press actually shows up? Don't kid yourself. The media painted the last election as Gore vs. Bush.

That's becuase it was. Nader never had a snowball in hell's chance so why should they pretend he did?

Nah, the last election was just Bush. 75% of the media's coverage of Gore was negative (PEW study). Some liberal media influence that was .

PEW? I find those results extremely questionable.

[Stuart Mackey]

Do you see what I am getting at with your party structure and how it effects your election system? birds of a feather etc. you have effectivly ruled out any effective third party option, because such attempts are scuppered by the electoral system itself.

The third party option is ruled out only because any viable third party ends up being coopted by one or both of the two major parties. For instance many Green Party issues have been coopted by the Democratic Party, many of the Libertarian Party's have been coopted by the republicans. If a third party has even moderate success, heck even has good looking poll numbers, then the major parties take up their issues.

Ahh. now this is what I wish to deal with. So you would agree that a full {hypothetical} 15% of your populations veiws are irrelivant and not worthy of representation just because they do not all live in the one state?

If you were to have a proportional system this 15% would not represent any district they would represent 15% of your population.

Umm Stuart as I understand the Westminster system you have the same problem with this 15% (hypothetically). For instance in the UK MP's are elected by geographic locations, i.e. how Talyor was elected for Wyre Forest. We elect our representatives by districts, the English do the same. How is there any garuntee that they will represent this 15% and we won't?

NZ and Australia both have the Wesminster system and both of us use a proportional system. We have also found that a party that does not represent its electorate does no get back into parliment so to saty in parliment you need to stick to your election manifesto.

I mean look at the last UK election, the UK independance party won 1.5% of the general vote, they have no MP's. Indeed Labour won 41.4% of the votes and controls 61.1% of the seats. I'm failing to see why Westminster is supposed to give a better representative government. Indeed going by the last election we are closer to being truly representative than the UK.

Thats why NZ went to a proportional system as the above senario is not democratic.

The only way to be truly representative is to have a government that is elected by direct proportion, i.e. the Knesset. Frankly governments such as those tend to end up fractured and give EXTROIDINARY power to the small kingmakers. For instance Shas has been able to extort massive amounts of funding and government backing for its policies ... even when the vast majority of the populace would like to tell Shas to take a flying leap. Of course the alternative sucks too, having no majority coalition government has a history of courting disaster - like say interwar Greece.

NZ has a threshold to gain seats in parliment, 5% of the party vote or a actual electorate. We have not had stability problems or blackmail from small parties.

No matter how you build a government, be it a federal republic like the US, a Wesminster Parliament like the UK, or direct proportional representation you end up with disproportionate power and influence. No matter what happens a good portion of the minority will have no tangible effect on the government.

We have not found this to be the case. smaller parties have had influence, or a veto on a governments actions, this is the price a government pays for confidence and supply.

[Stuart Mackey]

Ok, I see how your parties are organised. But that does not explain how it is that a full {hypothetical} 15% of your population can be without representation, now does it?
No one person in a Westminster style party will have the exact same veiw on everything either, but they will share broadly similar veiws and vote accordingly, more organisation in our system but the overall effect is the same. Do you see what I am getting at with your party structure and how it effects your election system? birds of a feather etc. you have effectivly ruled out any effective third party option, because such attempts are scuppered by the electoral system itself.

You've got cause and effect mixed up. The structure of the electoral system, the decentralized nature of American politics, and the nature of the Presidency all control how the parties are organized. The Constitution made no allowances for parties whatsoever--the Founding Fathers envisioned a system in which talented individuals would be elected from their districts to serve in Congress for a few years as part of their obligation as gentlemen to serve their state and country. The party system formed basically as it is on its own as early as the first Washington administration--one of the two that formed still exists, as a matter of fact. The positions, identities, and even the names of the parties change, but the two-party system, with a few gaps, has always existed since the Constitution was ratified (and those gaps are years where there was only one party, not more than one).

Ok, that acoounts for your two main political parties.

Ahh. now this is what I wish to deal with. So you would agree that a full {hypothetical} 15% of your populations veiws are irrelivant and not worthy of representation just because they do not all live in the one state?

What we get down to here is a fundamental difference in philosophy. The United States is and always has been highly decentralized by the standards of Britian's other daughter countries. If your hypothetical 15% (VERY hypothetical, since we're assuming that the members of this hypothetical minority that's so at odds with the mainstream they haven't been co-opted by one of the majors yet is so evently distributed there isn't a clump of them large enough to elect a single Congressman anywhere) is scattered too widely to elect representatives, then their views ARE irrevelant because they don't represent the majority in any state or district, which is more important than their numbers nationwide.

So you would cheerfully ignore 15% of your population? as I said earlier, how can you call your representaion legitimate in such a case?..

Practically, your hypothetical 15% is an exercise in abstraction and little else, since any unrepresented group making up 15% of the vote would see its views adopted in short order by one of the majors (see, for example the Progressives of the early 20th century, the Socialists during the Roosevelt administration, or the social conservatives in the late sixties and early 70s), unless their views were so contrary to the mainstream it would be political suicide to do so, in which case a third party WOULD form and inevitably ascend to major-party status as soon as the existance of such an issue caused one of the majors to disintegrate (see the fall of the Whigs and the rise of the Republicans over abolition in the 1850s).


Well for one thing you do have third parties, but I would also seem that you have a very depolitisied public. Givent the overwhealming attitude of your two main parties I would think that the US public would have woken up to not having alternative vews represented and implemented. Maybe this is a good thing..you have Falwell and other like him

[Stuart Mackey]

The third party option has been ruled out by the media, who are really the ones who decide who the viable candidates are. During the last election, Nader wasn't invited to the presidential debates, for example, which basically took any sense of legitimacy away from his candidacy. You'll never hear about the media giving any kind of serious coverage to a third party, so no one's going to give a rat's ass about third party candidates. Hell, wasn't there one third-party guy a while back who had a one-man debate because he wasn't invited? He just stayed on a stage with a TV and tried to answer questions.

Mass media has nothing to do with it. The only time a third party had had any kind of electoral success in the United States is when the two party system has broken down. It's in the nature of the American system for two major parties to form to the exclusion of all others, as I've explained in some of my earlier posts.

The presidency aside, you get a proportional system and third parties have a chance. I have said it before in this thread, NZ was like you are now, but we changed. Why? because people got fucked of with being shafted by tweedle dum and his brother in different colour clothes.

[The Duchess of Zeon]

The presidency aside, you get a proportional system and third parties have a chance. I have said it before in this thread, NZ was like you are now, but we changed. Why? because people got fucked of with being shafted by tweedle dum and his brother in different colour clothes.

There's no need to change. The two party system works just fine for our Federal Republic. It's quite adaptable, and furthermore, the way our Congress is set up, the addition of multiple parties wouldn't have a major affect anyway - Which is part of why none have lasted for great lengths of time.

[Stuart Mackey]

The presidency aside, you get a proportional system and third parties have a chance. I have said it before in this thread, NZ was like you are now, but we changed. Why? because people got fucked of with being shafted by tweedle dum and his brother in different colour clothes.

There's no need to change. The two party system works just fine for our Federal Republic. It's quite adaptable, and furthermore, the way our Congress is set up, the addition of multiple parties wouldn't have a major affect anyway - Which is part of why none have lasted for great lengths of time.

Yah yah, that excuse was trotted out when we had our debate on a proportionl system or the then current FFP system. Mind you, you need a public that gives a damn either way .
As I said further up, if you have a public that has lost its confidence in the current set up, and does go for a third party, then you will have a legitimacy issue.

[Ignorant twit]

NZ and Australia both have the Wesminster system and both of us use a proportional system. We have also found that a party that does not represent its electorate does no get back into parliment so to saty in parliment you need to stick to your election manifesto.

Umm what is your definition of Westminster system? I always thought that had to do with the rules governing parliament, not how parliament itself was elected. Its been a while since I took civics, but we were taught that the UK was THE archetype of a Westminster system - hence the name.

NZ has a threshold to gain seats in parliment, 5% of the party vote or a actual electorate. We have not had stability problems or blackmail from small parties.

In other words you could theoretically have 94.9% of the population not represented. On a more practical level it is not hard to imagine numerous parties which poll around 0-4% and don't win an electorate - because that is optimistic for just about every third party in this country. I mean according to the statistics a full 4.9% and 6.02% (ignoring registered parties with no list and unregistered parties) of the New Zealand electorate was not represented in the last two elections respectively. Further several parties are overrepresented in parliament, holding more seats than dictated by their polling returns. In otherwords pretty consistent with events in the US.

We have not found this to be the case. smaller parties have had influence, or a veto on a governments actions, this is the price a government pays for confidence and supply.

Actually you have according to your government 5%, give or take, of the populace has no say in the government. Further I thought ever since you went to MMP you've always had minority governments, which has resulted in some of the minor parties getting a few extra perks. Like say a party with two MP's getting two cabinet portfolios.

You've only been working with the system for what 10 years now? And you are already seeing deals being made for portfolios, small party vetos, etc.

Really? So when Ralph Nader calls a press conference, the press actually shows up? Don't kid yourself. The media painted the last election as Gore vs. Bush. They define who the contenders are. The media gives some airtimes to third party candidates, but nowhere near as much as it does to the two major parties.

Ralph Nader got political coverage above and beyond his following. Let's be honest okay? The Green Party has pitifully few registered members and not that huge bloc of likely voters. The major networks devote airtime based on how much pull the candidate has with the audience, and any scandals/major news they can milk. The simple fact of the matter is Nader was a sideshow. His candidacy was doomed to failure. It isn't the media's fault that his chances of winning were a snowball in hell.

Compare Nader to Perot. Perot got vastly more media coverage because Perot was vastly more popular. Compare either of those two against Hagelin ... yep same pattern holds. The more popular you or your party is, the more likely you are to get elected, the more the media covers you regardless of your political standing.

[RedImperator]

What we get down to here is a fundamental difference in philosophy. The United States is and always has been highly decentralized by the standards of Britian's other daughter countries. If your hypothetical 15% (VERY hypothetical, since we're assuming that the members of this hypothetical minority that's so at odds with the mainstream they haven't been co-opted by one of the majors yet is so evently distributed there isn't a clump of them large enough to elect a single Congressman anywhere) is scattered too widely to elect representatives, then their views ARE irrevelant because they don't represent the majority in any state or district, which is more important than their numbers nationwide.

So you would cheerfully ignore 15% of your population? as I said earlier, how can you call your representaion legitimate in such a case?..

Basically, yes. They're citizens of their districts and their states before they're citizens of the United States. If not one single congressional district in the entire country wants a third party candidate, then it would not be democratic to give the third party representation--though if there WAS 15% of the electorate that felt it wasn't being represented, it wouldn't be very long before one or both of the majors started nominating candidates that saw things the same way they did--see, for example, the Republican Liberty Caucus (libertarian) or the Congressional Progressive Caucus (Social democrats).

Well for one thing you do have third parties, but I would also seem that you have a very depolitisied public. Givent the overwhealming attitude of your two main parties I would think that the US public would have woken up to not having alternative vews represented and implemented. Maybe this is a good thing..you have Falwell and other like him

Take a look at the list of third parties at Politics 1 (I posted the link in the Political Resources thread) if you haven't already. Most of them are tiny, fragmented, and they make the Libertarians and the Greens look like moderates. Frankly, if our system keeps those loonies out of power, so much the better.

[LadyTevar]

First, just so you know.. I VOTE. Every election.

What ticks me off, however, is that when I vote in the Presidiental election, no matter how close the race is in my state, whomever gathered the majority of votes gets *All Five* electorial votes, because my state votes As A Block.

That is the main thing I'd change about our Electorial System: No Block Voting! The winner of the majority votes should get 2/3 of the Electorial, and the loser 1/3 (or 3/4-1/4).

Of course, that will take years of lobbying my state gov.

[Stormbringer]

First, just so you know.. I VOTE. Every election.

What ticks me off, however, is that when I vote in the Presidiental election, no matter how close the race is in my state, whomever gathered the majority of votes gets *All Five* electorial votes, because my state votes As A Block.

That is the main thing I'd change about our Electorial System: No Block Voting! The winner of the majority votes should get 2/3 of the Electorial, and the loser 1/3 (or 3/4-1/4).

Of course, that will take years of lobbying my state gov.

That's a stupid system because it assumes that you'll only ever have a two party system. Likely but ill-fucking-legal.

A truly fair system would be to go to direct popular votes or a proportional electorale system.

[Ignorant twit]

Or how about going back to the old system?

The winner of a state gets the senatorial electors and you win congressional electors district by district.

[The Dark]

First, just so you know.. I VOTE. Every election.

What ticks me off, however, is that when I vote in the Presidiental election, no matter how close the race is in my state, whomever gathered the majority of votes gets *All Five* electorial votes, because my state votes As A Block.

That is the main thing I'd change about our Electorial System: No Block Voting! The winner of the majority votes should get 2/3 of the Electorial, and the loser 1/3 (or 3/4-1/4).

Of course, that will take years of lobbying my state gov.

I wouldn't even say that. Make the voting district by district, rather than through the whole state. If one candidate wins 7 districts and the other one wins 6 in a state worth 13, then they get 7 and 6 electorals respectively. As far as I'm concerned, that's the only way an electoral system can claim to be legitimate, if it divides the vote as small as is practically possible.