The Sunday New York Times for December 15 has this dialogue in the Sunday Review, on whether the U.S. would be better off with a multi-party system.
The Sunday New York Times for December 15 has this dialogue in the Sunday Review, on whether the U.S. would be better off with a multi-party system.
And…no mention of campaign finance reform? Without which third parties have precisely ZERO chance of making any progress in this bought and paid for democracy. The wealthy have no need for a third party.
Reminds me of the old Steve Martin gag…
“YOU can be a millionaire. Yes that’s right…YOU can be a millionaire.”
“First…get a million dollars.”
I would have liked for them to run more of the responses, at least online.
I agree with Mr. Perry. I submitted a short letter as well. Some of what I said overlapped with statements in Pete Lavenia’s letter. Lavenia’s position as a NYS Green Party officer probably gave his letter extra weight, which is fine.
The mainstream press is vested in the two-party system. Makes their job easier, as all they have to do is talk to two sides. All of their contacts are in place. Harder to cover multiple sides from the ground up. Shortsighted, but a big problem in my estimation.
Reminder of what the USA has NOW —
i.e. EVIL and Vicious ANTI-Democracy minority rule gerrymander regimes of left/right super-extremists —
1/2 votes x 1/2 Pack/Crack gerrymander areas = 1/4 Control.
ACTUAL real control is about 5 or less monarchs/oligarchs in each legislative body — with many top executive officer party hack monarchs added to the EVIL mess.
Some results – USA national bankruptcy, UN-declared WARS, rotted older cities and now suburbs, etc. etc.
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P.R. and nonpartisan App.V.
Interesting facet of this discussion, BTW – does the US *need* a multiparty system? IF radical campaign finance reform were to take place, the question would be answered in due course.
But letters do raise what is a far more direct barrier for third parties: proportional representation. Germany, where the author of the lead letter taught, is a good example. In its half of seats elected by PR, third parties do well. In its half of seat elected by one-seat districts, they are largely shut out.
When focused on reform, third party activists would do well to keep focused on proportional representation and U.S.-style fair representation voting forms of it, as detailed at FairVote.org