Yeah, I'm not excited about the two-party system. I also find the idea of a prime minister vs. popularity contest president appealing.
Both parties are actively working together to keep third parties from challenging their dominance. A "major party" status in some states means that Democrats and Republicans only have to achieve 5,000 signatures to get a candidate on a ballot, while a third party candidate has to spend tons of cash to get 25,000 signatures to get on the same ballot. That's one example of thousands how the two major parties conspire to maintain their grip on power. The electoral college is another example of how the system is rigged. Further many of the more obscure parts of McCain-Feingold (more appropriately name the Incumbent Protection Act) exist to make well-funded third party candidates less likely and prevent such threats to their power. I'll add more later. But yes, I agree the two major parties need to be forced into a position where they HAVE to deal with smaller, organized groups in order to govern I'm just not exactly sure how we pull that off. __________________________________________________________________ James Landrith [EMAIL PROTECTED] cell: 703-593-2065 * fax: 760-875-8547 AIM: jlnales * ICQ: 148600159 MSN and Yahoo! Messenger: jlandrith http://www.linkedin.com/in/jlandrith http://www.jameslandrith.com http://www.multiracial.com http://www.multiracial.com/abolitionist/ __________________________________________________________________ > Great summary, thanks for educating me on an area where I wasn't all that > well informed. > Reading your thoughts below, i see yet another example of how the two main > parties leech off and absorb so many ideas that smaller groups have. How > do you feel about the concept of a multi-party system in America? Think it > could help by making larger parties have to form coalitions with small but > strong groups? Is America even capable of supporting such a system? > > The older I get, the more it just seems wrong that everyone in this > country is pretty much forced to always choose between two sides. >
