Sunday Discussion Group

50% of the country doesn’t want a D or an R majority in Congress, but what do they want? That’s the thing. Moderates of both parties might have some success in creating an alternative to extreme left/right politics. And I would venture to say that the majority of moderates are Independents-left leaning or right leaning.

But the real problem is the dearth of talented politicians. One would need the political skills, charisma, and inspiration of Bill Clinton or JFK to form a party from Independent voters. And how many of those are living and running for office in every state in the Union? Off the top of my head I can only think of two-both Democrats-Brian Schweitzer of Montana and Marc Warner of Virgina ( and maybe Janet Napolitano of Arizona.)

The two-party system has, over literally decades, become so intertwined with the mechanics of elections and governing that the rise of a third party is almost impossible. From things as large as federal campaign finance and federal and state ballot access laws, to things as small as “party balance” requirements for state boards and commissions that only contemplate Ds and Rs (and thereby both marginalize third parties and deny potential third-party candidates a good training ground), the system and the two major parties have become symbiotic.

On the other hand, poll after poll shows a majority of Americans is socially to the center-left and fiscally to the center-right, and feels that the Ds are too far left and the Rs are too far right. One would think a new centrist party would be an easy sell.

The problem, of course, is that political “activists” tend to be non-centrists and centrists tend to be inactive. There are few “militant moderates,” giving rise to the political cliche that the only things in the middle of the road are roadkill. The larger efforts at forming third party or non-party options have either been at the far edges of parties already largely perceived as too non-centrist by the majority (think the Green Party on the left and the Constitutional Party on the right), or have become prominant only through a Faustian bargain with a nutjob just known, funded, and charsimatic enough to raise the party’s profile, but with so much baggage that he is equally limiting to the movement (think Perot, Ventura).

All that considered, I think a third party would be viable at present under two conditions: big names would have to have the courage to leave the comfort of their parties to found and front it, and there would have to be a bipartisan critical mass so that the general public could imagine it really happening.

Imagine a new centrist party, based in large part on civility and process reform, staying out of our personal lives, and balancing the government’s checkbook “just like average Americans have to do,” and promising better, less “political” days ahead. Now imagine it is founded by Colin Powell, William Weld, Michael Bloomberg, Lowell Weicker, Susan Collins, Ed Rendell, Ben Nelson (Senator from Nebraska), Tim Penny — and others with name recognition, credentials, and in the case of much of this list, seed money.

I think it would catch fire and create enough momemntum to first overcome and then change many of the structures that perpetuate a D-R system. I also think the chances of it really happeningare virtually zero.

Third parties are a weak response to politics as usual. The stronger response to the current situation would be for progressives to wrest control of the Democratic party away from the DLC and the tired, corporate-owned liberals who have ruined our party.

“Viability” and “having an impact” are two very different things. The Reform Party was never viable, but it clearly had an impact on the ’92 and ’96 election numbers. Clinton would’ve beaten Dole in ’96 no matter what, I’d guess, but I’m not at all sure the same is true of Bush I in ’92. Though the numbers are smaller, Nader’s Green candidacy peeled off voters from Al Gore, too.

So, I’d say there’s almost no chance of a third party arising that can get its candidates elected to federal office. I think there’s a better chance of a third party arising that can screw over one of the Big Two.

If we’re hoping for an alternative, what we want is a third party that peels the populist wing away from the plutocratic wing of the GOP–not one that tries to find the Middle Way.

What “we” want may be a more progressive alternative than either of the “mainstream” parties (although the Rs get less mainstream by the day). But I have seen poll after poll over the past 2 decades that suggests the majority of Americans want a middle way. They want an end to squabbling. They want pragmatism and civility and focus on day-to-day issues, not the wedges and Supreme Court issues that activists (including me) most care about.

My point being simply that if a third party is to happen, it will not happen in a way anymore meaningful than a spoiler if it happens anywhere but the middle. The general public perceives a growing polarization, and for most busy Americans, it turns them off of politics altogether. The opportunity for a viable third party exists solely in the middle, filling in that perceived polarization.

Call it the desire for a “purple” party. I (and I suspect many others here) may still prefer what would be left of the Democratic party (likely the Wellstone end of it); Sen. Brownback would likely still prefer what would be left of the Rethugs (likely the Mullahs Falwell & Robertson end of it), but I think that done correctly the Middle Way could be a viable third party right now.

What Zeitgeist said, with a couple modifiers.

It would take some fairly large number of establishment politicians and other figures, backed by mammoth financial investment, coming forward in a compelling way to create a viable third party. The politics are easy enough to figure out: strong-but-smart on defense and foreign policy; inclined toward privacy rights, personal freedoms, and non-interference with markets domestically; and with investment priorities in infrastructure and education. And the names Zeitgeist (great band, by the way–I mean the folks who later had to rechristen themselves The Reivers) throws out–Rendell, Collins, Bloomberg, Weicker et al–are the likely suspects. A few other mainstream officials, people like Lindsay Graham and Joe Biden, could come aboard as well. They’d have to be backed by people with business credibility like Bloomberg, Warren Buffett and Lee Iacoca, and perhaps by some with larger social appeal–Oprah Winfrey, for example, or Lance Armstrong.

I think this would be very good for the country, as it would rip politics free of the interest-group barnacles that currently limit what’s possible on both the right and the left, and probably would de-escalate the current extreme level of partisan conflict. The problem is that every ambitious public figure has come to prominence within the two-party system; they’ve invested in partisan politics, and the parties have invested in them. Surprisingly few public figures have made a go of it trying to operate above politics; Perot flamed out, as did Ventura, and Bloomberg’s success–for all that I’m a big fan–was the result of unique circumstances and his own huge resources.

My own sense is that it will take a major crisis, or a series of them–another terror attack followed by economic collapse, say–to really discredit the “old politics” and create space for a consensus party of “national greatness,” to use a term sometimes employed by McCainites and others. Even then, it might require the opposition–right now, the Democrats–to fail after that and discredit themselves to open the field. IMO, though, the terrible and comprehensive failures of the ruling Jihad wing of the Republican Party make this gloomy sequence of events all too likely…

There is only one instance in US history of a third party becoming viable and taking power, and that is the Republican Party, which was organized out of the Abolitionist movement, due to the failure of both the Democrats and the Whigs to adequately address these issues. The Whigs were in the process of fracturing – as many people here have pointed out, this is a pre-requisite. Additionally, while the cause of Abolition was not a universal issue outside the South, the issue of “free soil” was, as small farmers and workingmen throughout the country did not want to compete with slave labor as the slave system was expanded into the western territories, as the Democrats favored and the Whigs dilly-dallied on.

Thus there was an issue of major national importance not being faced by either dominant party, and one of the major dominant parties was falling apart over sectional and economic issues.

The situation has not been seen in the country since. There have been points – like the Great Depression – where if one of the major parties had not grabbed the issue and dealt with it, that a third party might have come into being with a real chance of taking power anywhere.

As to having an “independent” candidate for President, none of the bozos who promote this ever mention the problem that would exist were the candidate to win: how would he govern, with the Senate and House united against him by the overwhelming power of both Democrats and Republicans who hated him?

The “third parties” that exist in America are nice little chowder and marching societies for the half-baked idiots who inhabit them.

Regarding funding for a 3rd party, what about what Dean did with internet fundraising? Maybe it wasn’t as revolutionary as all the hype, but wouldn’t 3rd parties be able to build on it? Especially if they were running on anti-corruption platforms.

Sorry.

That third party stuff is a hot air…

Why?

One word: Apathy.

We’ve barely got the interest to support two parties.
Most Americans don’t know even who Karl Rove is.

In other words… when you hear an American say:
“Where’s the party man?”
Trust me: He is not referring to planks and politicians.

I’m all for a 3rd party to the right of the Republican party, a biblical party or whatever as long it helps bring the Republican back where they deserve to be, firmly in the minority.

It feels like we’ve got a third party in place now. Many conservatives won’t claim them and the left certainly doesn’t. Maybe the third party comes into being by wearing the cloak of a mainstream party and uses that party’s machinery to replicate and entrench. Like a virus. Maybe that’s why they’ve gotten so far. We keep trying to call them something they’re not.

All that a third party would have to do would be to push one single narrow idea that appealed to at least 30% of the people. But they would have to push it forthrightly and exclusively, and in a manner that absolutely ruled out any compromise or broadening. They would also have to adopt a rhetoric more explicitly violent than any previously heard. Above all, they must promise to use power to relegate their opponents to second-class citizenship: that is the only political promise that matters. Nothing else except that will get people to stand in line and vote.

If they do these things, it will not matter what the idea is: as long as it appeals to >= 30%. If you can turn out 30%, power is yours, in perpetuity.

What drags the “major” parties down is that they try to start with their base and then build upon it. The moment you do that, you are lying to somebody, and you have to start with the verbal backflips and the parallel rhetoric (what is said in public vs. what is said behind closed doors). This is what kills the parties. Everyone is demotivated. No one votes unless their propaganda machine has ratcheted up their paranoia to the point where they feel that it is an issue of immediate survival.

This comment was excessively long, so I decided to only write the first two paragraphs and turn the rest into a blog post at my site. Click here to read the rest of it.

I think this issue misses the point. We don’t have two parties; not by the normal meaning. We have two permanent coalition parties, both of which are comprised of many smaller parties, or factions. That’s why a Democrat in a rural area is likely to be more conservative than a Republican in an urban area. And a Congressman from rural Alabama will be different than a Congressman in rural Vermont, irrespective of party. And how Texas switched from Democrat to Republican, without changing ideologies. Sometimes the coalitions will divide themselves, as Clinton saw when he had trouble with his Dem-majority Congress, and sometimes they stay together, as Bush has had during most of his reign; including picking up many rightish Dems onto his side. But they really are coalitions of smaller groups.

And that is how other countries do it, except that everything is much more explicit elsewhere. But in the end, Bush has to work to keep his political coalition together, just like Blair does. And because things are going poorly for him, Bush is now having trouble keeping any of his coalitions together.

The rest of my post goes on to explain why our coalition system must exclude third parties. But the short version is simply that our “third” parties are merely disgruntled factions of the larger coalitions, and thus cannot attract large enough numbers to compete; for much the same reason why they dropped out of the larger coalition. And if they could compete with the two big coalitions, then they’d be powerful enough to take control of whichever one they wanted; rather than starting from scratch. But I think the larger post makes this point more clear. It’s still not long enough to explain everything, but they never are.