Current Events > The two-party system is fucking stupid.

(+) Yeah! (+)

So is strictly voting along party lines. Motherfuckers treating political lines like it's a sexual identity.

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It also fucks up the 3 branch checks and balances when all 3 branches are on the same side....

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Y'all should have listened to old George
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What? The two-party system is a huge advantage... to the two parties within that system.

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and until the first past the post voting system is changed to a tiered system, its stupid to vote third party for anything beyond state level. you might as well just burn the ballot.

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always has been m8

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monkmith posted...

and until the first past the post voting system is changed to a tiered system, its stupid to vote third party for anything beyond state level. you might as well just burn the ballot.

And the first past the post voting will never be changed, because the only ones with the power to do so are the parties that benefit from it.

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ZeldaMutant posted...

And the first past the post voting will never be changed, because the only ones with the power to do so are the parties that benefit from it.

vote in halfway decent politicians and that can change. i was surprised that the democrats in my state, who finally wrestled the gerrymandered district map out of republican control, went and passed a law to start an independent commision to redraw the future maps instead of relying on whoever is the sitting governor and legislature.

this isn't something that'll be fixed over night or with one election. its incremental, refusing to participate because its not perfectly fixed NOW is asinine.

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teepan95 posted...

Y'all should have listened to old George

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We need more choice. I was talking with someone yesterday about this very thing, and made the analogy saying what if we wanted a quick burger, but we were constrained to either McDonalds or Burger King? No wendys, no carls jr, no in n out, no shake shack. That's the political world we've been imprisoned in for decades.

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teepan95 posted...

Y'all should have listened to old George

this. I don't know why people ignored his advice. he was built up like a godlike hero for our early nation. and he says "don't make political" parties. and what do we do? we made political parties. I sometimes wonder what our country would be like had we listened to him

Zikten posted...

this. I don't know why people ignored his advice. he was built up like a godlike hero for our early nation. and he says "don't make political" parties. and what do we do? we made political parties. I sometimes wonder what our country would be like had we listened to him

whats up with this founding father worship?

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I'm not worshiping him. I said others did. but his advice about political parties was spot on

What's really disturbing, is that now, I'm seeing a lot of backlash from partisan idiots, taking shit about of people for being politically moderate lol. Like, right here on CE you see plenty of braindead comments like "durr hurr both-siders mirite" as if it's suddenly a bad thing to point out problems with both Democrats and Republicans.

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JBaLLEN66 posted...

whats up with this founding father worship?

Taking good advice is worshipping?

Washington's advice was completely insane and ran counter to how politics and humans work. Not every utterance from a Founding Father is some profound, sage-like wisdom.
The problem is that the system they designed completely breaks down in the presence of negative partisanship, because they designed the system to move slowly because they liked the way things were when they designed it.

Zikten posted...

he says "don't make political" parties. and what do we do? we made political parties.

Those next two guys essentially created the two-party system. All that's changed since, is occasionally one of those parties implodes.

Questionmarktarius posted...

Zikten posted...

he says "don't make political" parties. and what do we do? we made political parties.

Those next two guys essentially created the two-party system. All that's changed since, is occasionally one of those parties implodes.

If only he had said "don't make lots of little parties" instead...
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monkmith posted...

and until the first past the post voting system is changed to a tiered system, its stupid to vote third party for anything beyond state level. you might as well just burn the ballot.

Burning might be the only way we get the change to actually happen.

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yeah man i wish we had a parliamentary system where no one gets a majority so they end up forming two left and right-wing coalitions anyway

that would for sure solve our issues

teepan95 posted...

If only he had said "don't make lots of little parties" instead...

Franklin was already dead (or close) when Jefferson and Adams were fighting.

onedarksoul posted...

We need more choice. I was talking with someone yesterday about this very thing, and made the analogy saying what if we wanted a quick burger, but we were constrained to either McDonalds or Burger King? No wendys, no carls jr, no in n out, no shake shack. That's the political world we've been imprisoned in for decades.

Yeah, despite people on this board being fully able to recognize why only having two competitors in an industry is a bad thing, they actively discourage anybody supporting 3rd party candidates in favor of this "lesser of two evils" nonsense.

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Broseph_Stalin posted...

yeah man i wish we had a parliamentary system where no one gets a majority so they end up forming two left and right-wing coalitions anyway

that would for sure solve our issues

So you admit that the system has issues and that the country has issues. And you think we should just sit on our asses and deal with it

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LostForest posted...

What's really disturbing, is that now, I'm seeing a lot of backlash from partisan idiots, taking shit about of people for being politically moderate lol. Like, right here on CE you see plenty of braindead comments like "durr hurr both-siders mirite" as if it's suddenly a bad thing to point out problems with both Democrats and Republicans.

Don't you know that if you don't blindly follow and worship one party you must be an extremist for the other party?

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hockeybub89 posted...

So you admit that the system has issues and that the country has issues.

...no? I'm saying people mistakenly blame the two party system for our issues.

It sucks but what can you do. If you want third party candidates to have more power it would require both the Dems and GOP to agree to give up power which is never gonna happen.

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RchHomieQuanChi posted...

they actively discourage anybody supporting 3rd party candidates in favor of this "lesser of two evils" nonsense.

Two evil parties and a dozen insane fringe parties, isn't really an ideal situation, no.

Broseph_Stalin posted...

...no? I'm saying people mistakenly blame the two party system for our issues.

Oh we have tons of issues beyond that. The two-party system is just one of them.

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2 party system is dumb.

Party line voting is not.

There is no reason for me to ever vote Republican. The fundamental philosophies of the party are bad.
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Questionmarktarius posted...

Two evil parties and a dozen insane fringe parties, isn't really an ideal situation, no.

So the solution is to make sure there's zero competition and keep doing what we're doing now?

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hockeybub89 posted...

The two-party system is just one of them.

It's not really a problem. Unless you want the House to elect the President.

RchHomieQuanChi posted...

So the solution is to make sure there's zero competition and keep doing what we're doing now?

Leave the (R), (D), or (?) off of the ballots. Get rid of primaries.

Questionmarktarius posted...

Leave the (R), (D), or (?) off of the ballots. Get rid of primaries.

I can get behind this. Primaries are a male problem right now too.

For that matter, eliminate the dumpster that is the CPD and allow an impartial organization to run debates. Allow major third party candidates to participate and suddenly you won't have people saying "Oh what a shitshow, America is doomed."


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"Winner Take All" is the WORST thing to happen to any 'Representative Constitutional Democracy'.

Artificial limits like 1x representative per party or 1x representative per seat is fundamentally STUPID.

It doesn't accurately represent the constituency and only aims to snowball power to one side for each seat.

Proportional Representation per seat with multiple representatives per seat is the only ACCURATE way of representation IMO without encumbering the citizenry with the unnecessary burden of each and every decision in boring direct democracy.

Proportional Representation is fair, it's accurate, and gives multiple candidates a chance to represent their constituents.

No vote is ever wasted, it goes to empower your chosen representative.

Within one seat in either Upper or Lower houses, a seat can and should be occupied by multiple represenatives.

Each region that goes up for election should have all candidates get voting power proportional to how much voting power each citizen assigns to each candidate.

Ergo the combined maximum voting power of 1x seat will always end up being 1.0

But each representative will only have 1.0 voting power based on how much voting power each citizen assigns each representative.

Each citizen can have 100 points split into integer / whole number values amongst any candidate they like and assign points to any candidates in arbitrary fashion as long as it's split into whole number values.

Any votes not cast is just voting power disasppearing into the ether and nobody gets to have it. Ergo voting is critical and has real meaning.

This allows far more Points of View and makes it FAR harder to corrupt people since there will be far more people representing each seat / area and far more de-centralization of power.

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Alucard188 posted...

So is strictly voting along party lines. Motherfuckers treating political lines like it's a sexual identity.

To be fair, if you are of a certain sexual or gender identity beyond the traditional cisgendered heterosexual ones, it kind of is as one option is tolerant to supportive and the other option thinks they're going to hell.

I just wish more conservatives were like me and didn't give a fuck about social issues.

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Lebronwon posted...

It sucks but what can you do. If you want third party candidates to have more power it would require both the Dems and GOP to agree to give up power which is never gonna happen.

It would at least require third parties to make legitimate grassroots efforts to grow nationwide. Third parties could do very well in House and state government elections at the very least, but they make almost no effort to.

Look up the Vermont Progressive Party. Third parties can be successful in America, they just don't make any legitimate attempt to do so.

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Damn_Underscore posted...

Look up the Vermont Progressive Party. Third parties can be successful in America, they just don't make any legitimate attempt to do so.

And my system of "Proportional Representation" per seat would allow all 3rd parties to have some voice at the table and be able to cast their proportionally assigned by the constituency voting power in all decisions.

Every representative sent, that received voting power, would have some voice.

You want diversity of thought and representation, imagine every seat in Congress having 10+ people representing each seat.

Then you have to hear every argument for / against each law along with modifications to each bill on a line by line basis.

Every representative can make a case for their position.

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The masses need to realize this for it to ever change. They wont though.

People want to root for Our team!!1!

Talking politics is like talking sports teams to the average Joe.

KamenRiderBlade posted...

You want diversity of thought and representation, imagine every seat in Congress having 10+ people representing each seat.

Or just, you know, pay attention to article 1, and get as close to one representative per 30000 people as possible.

The number of Representatives shall not exceed one for every thirty thousand, but each state shall have at least one Representative

The house should have about 11000 representatives by now, not be locked at 435.

America's voting system is not why America has a two-party system. It does prevent third party presidents, although ironically those are the only elections American third parties make an effort in.

Most of the British Commonwealth nations (including the UK itself) use a first-past the-post voting system, yet the party representation in their parliaments is still diverse.

America's two party system literally only exists because third parties don't actually try to win elections and grow nationally.

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I have always said this.

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ElatedVenusaur posted...

Washington's advice was completely insane and ran counter to how politics and humans work. Not every utterance from a Founding Father is some profound, sage-like wisdom.
The problem is that the system they designed completely breaks down in the presence of negative partisanship, because they designed the system to move slowly because they liked the way things were when they designed it.

Yep, our government was designed by our forefathers this way specifically to make change hard on purpose because they really hated a monarchy in every conceivable way.

And back then we did have more than 2 parties running for President, but it always boils down to two parties winning all the time because they were the polar opposites. People are drawn to the extremes. Why do you think IMDB user ratings are predominately 1's or 10's? Youtube star rating was predominately either 1's or 5's stars... the reason is because to most people you make a bigger impact voting in the extreme (little do these people know the algorithm makes it where there vote won't even matter by constantly voting in 1's and 10's). Same concept applies here. A third party representative that has a closer ties to one of the 2 parties will just be taking votes away from one of the parties. One of the best solutions to this problem is a tier list style of voting... the only problem is that kind of voting requires much more man power and is definately more "complicated" than what we have now.

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the elephant in the room is Americans aren't intellectually curious enough to care enough about politics to actually pursue third party politics, are proudly anti intellectual and frankly are fine with their largely mediocre living situations as long as they don't don't have to do too much work, can live on credit lines to keep up with the joneses, and can continue to do drugs and stuff their face with the benefits of cheap food, booze and drugs and sex (often brought to them by the Globalization that few understand but won't stop them from screaming about it because they saw it on Facebook)
you can be offended all you want but you know I'm right on much of the American populace stop blaming the sky for being and blame much of your goofy ass neighbors and family, this is what much of y'all desire a medicore country because you don't feel like doing any heavy lifting.

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that said most nation states that are actually functioning democracies often divvy their parties into "alliances" that frequently end up being the same as the duopoly so at least America is somewhat more efficient in just dividing their subbranches into two political parties lol.

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coolboy11 posted...

"alliances"

Republican party is already a bizarre alliance of Ayn Rand and Jesus.

Questionmarktarius posted...

Or just, you know, pay attention to article 1, and get as close to one representative per 30000 people as possible.

But one person can't possibly represent all the view points of 30,000 people.

Let's say 49% of the 30,000 people voted for the other representative.

it makes more sense to send in representatives with 51% & 49% of the voting power for that seat into Congress then to give one person all that power.

If there are more than 2 candidates, then send them all in as along as they have > 0% voting power.

You want real representation without one side saying they "Rigged" the system or "First Past the Post, Winner Take All" screwed you?

Then Proportional Representation per seat with the citizenry being able to divy up and assign their voting powers to ANY and ALL candidates in any way shape or form they like out of 100 points in integer / whole number increments makes things very fluid / accurate.

No one person would be likely to get all the voting power.

Questionmarktarius posted...

The house should have about 11000 representatives by now, not be locked at 435.

That's still not enough representation or accurate enough IMO.

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coolboy11 posted...

that said most nation states that are actually functioning democracies often divvy their parties into "alliances" that frequently end up being the same as the duopoly so at least America is somewhat more efficient in just dividing their subbranches into two political parties lol.

The fact that there are "Alliances" is despicable.

Two Party System also sucks.

Each subject should be tackled independently and not voted based on Party lines / Alliances in Tit-for-tat trades of votes.

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The sports team bullshit aspect of American politics has gotten really bad, yes.

Biden supporters are basically blue chuds. Acting just like Trump supporters but over Biden instead of Trump. Some are even trying to claim Biden was the "alpha male" in last night's debate even though he let Trump bully him out of a third of his speaking time. This shit is insane. Neither Biden or Trump or fit for office.

And lo and behold, we have some of them bashing George Washington for being right in this very topic. Why don't ya bring up his wooden teeth while you're at it?

Twelf posted...

2 party system is dumb.

Party line voting is not.

There is no reason for me to ever vote Republican. The fundamental philosophies of the party are bad.

This.

Democrats are shit. But Republicans are pure fucking evil fascists.

Granted, I'm not voting for Biden who is blind to this.

https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/biden-sharing-power-with-republicans-is-a-good-thing-923669/

https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2019/12/joe-biden-america-needs-the-republican-party.html

Yeah, no. Fuck that Republican with a D next to his name.
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We should switch to a dictatorship then so there will only be one party.

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