Political Parties

Does anyone else think political parties should be obsolete? Personally, I think people get too wrapped up in democrat vs. republican and then when it comes time for the presidential general election, the independent party gets no love. I'm just curious how everyone else feels on this topic.

JRForThePeople said:

Does anyone else think political parties should be obsolete? Personally, I think people get too wrapped up in democrat vs. republican and then when it comes time for the presidential general election, the independent party gets no love. I'm just curious how everyone else feels on this topic.

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Absolutely.
There was a study done that showed people would agree or disagree with the same policy, depending on which party supported it.

I'll see if I can find it, no promises.

Anywho, the results were pretty clear that people use party's as a filter to an moronic degree.
Suspending critical thinking and objective reasoning is not a positive.

JRForThePeople said:

Does anyone else think political parties should be obsolete? Personally, I think people get too wrapped up in democrat vs. republican and then when it comes time for the presidential general election, the independent party gets no love. I'm just curious how everyone else feels on this topic.

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No, political parties are important because they offer a larger communication & debate medium. Parties are powerful platforms to discuss & present political ideas.

However I do think the dual system (R vs D) is quite silly. Here in Switzerland, we have many parties : UDC, PLR, PBD, PDC, PS, Green etc. I think having more than two parties would prevent the constant rival feeling that democrats have for republicans (and vice versa).

Cisero said:

No, political parties are important because they offer a larger communication & debate medium. Parties are powerful platforms to discuss & present political ideas.

However I do think the dual system (R vs D) is quite silly. Here in Switzerland, we have many parties : UDC, PLR, PBD, PDC, PS, Green etc. I think having more than two parties would prevent the constant rival feeling that democrats have for republicans (and vice versa).

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I just think that people should support a candidate they believe in and not support him/her simply because of a (D) or (R) next to their name. We should just have the candidates present their opinions and allow the American people to choose based on their views.

JRForThePeople said:

I just think that people should support a candidate they believe in and not support him/her simply because of a (D) or (R) next to their name. We should just have the candidates present their opinions and allow the American people to choose based on their views.

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The problem isn't the party. The problem is the people who take ill-informed decisions & place too much trust in the letter next to the candidates name.
But this is not always the case. For example, plenty of democrats will not vote for Hillary because they have moral red lines. I don't think the solution is to abolish political parties, but to promote unbiased media outlets & critial thinking. Easier said then done.

Cisero said:

The problem isn't the party. The problem is the people who take ill-informed decisions & place too much trust in the letter next to the candidates name.
But this is not always the case. For example, plenty of democrats will not vote for Hillary because they have moral red lines. I don't think the solution is to abolish political parties, but to promote unbiased media outlets & critial thinking. Easier said then done.

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If the objective in bold, can't be currently met, then what do you do?

Cisero said:

No, political parties are important because they offer a larger communication & debate medium. Parties are powerful platforms to discuss & present political ideas.

However I do think the dual system (R vs D) is quite silly. Here in Switzerland, we have many parties : UDC, PLR, PBD, PDC, PS, Green etc. I think having more than two parties would prevent the constant rival feeling that democrats have for republicans (and vice versa).

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The differences in the United States and Switzerland political systems are the reason for the differing amounts of political parties. In the United States, the party that manages to obtain a plurality of support for its candidate and for its policies is able to push a specific agenda. This provides an incentive to establish a broad enough coalition as you can to approach, and hopefully secure, a majority of the vote (also known as guaranteeing a plurality). Additionally, third parties are weakened because of a combination of stringent historic controls. These controls take shape in the form of state and federal laws, informal media prohibitions, and winner-take-all elections, and include ballot access issues and exclusive debate rules.

The direct democracy system seen in Switzerland permits every citizen to effectively join in the legislative process by allowing them to challenge a law so long as they manage to obtain 50,000 signatures. This, in turn, can incentivize the creation of a large number of parties because of the low barrier to entry into the democratic process.

MrT said:

The differences in the United States and Switzerland political systems are the reason for the differing amounts of political parties. In the United States, the party that manages to obtain a plurality of support for its candidate and for its policies is able to push a specific agenda. This provides an incentive to establish a broad enough coalition as you can to approach, and hopefully secure, a majority of the vote (also known as guaranteeing a plurality). Additionally, third parties are weakened because of a combination of stringent historic controls. These controls take shape in the form of state and federal laws, informal media prohibitions, and winner-take-all elections, and include ballot access issues and exclusive debate rules.

The direct democracy system seen in Switzerland permits every citizen to effectively join in the legislative process by allowing them to challenge a law so long as they manage to obtain 50,000 signatures. This, in turn, can incentivize the creation of a large number of parties because of the low barrier to entry into the democratic process.

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@JRForThePeople, what MrT said above. ^^^

We don't have political parties in the USA because we like political parties. We have two parties because we have winner-take-all elections. For example, the presidency. If a person gets a plurality of the vote he/she wins the White House. Same happens with Senate, House, Gubernatorial, etc., etc. Thus the incentive is for politicians to build coalitions that will yield a majority of the vote. Over time that has resulted in coalitions that are almost 50% vs. 50% of the public. It just so happens that one coalition is called Republicans and the other Democrats.

It doesn't change because whenever you then have someone who splinters off from one of those 50% vs 50% coalitions to form another coalition, EG, the environmentalists decide to split off from the Democrats, it immediately guarantees that Democrats will lose their 50% coalition, which swings the winner of the election to the anti-environmentalists in the Republican party. Same in reverse. If evangelical Christians split off from the Republicans, it guarantees that Republicans will then lose their 50% coalition, which will then swing the winner of the election to the anti-fundamentalists. So by splitting off from a coalition, it guarantees the splitting group that they'll screw themselves.

Thus everyone bands together for their own interest and ends up maintaining a 50%/50% coalition split which guarantees a two party system.

JRForThePeople said:

Does anyone else think political parties should be obsolete? Personally, I think people get too wrapped up in democrat vs. republican and then when it comes time for the presidential general election, the independent party gets no love. I'm just curious how everyone else feels on this topic.

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Yes, get rid of parties. Just have the general election with instant run-off if nobody gets more than 50% of the vote.