ABOLISH ALL POLITICAL PARTIES

[HeinBallz]

No no no...   Let me clarify - I'm not speaking clearly enough to make my point.  Romney has a monopoly on republicans and Obama has a monopoly on democrats.   In this current system, why are we ending up with nominees that don't fit into the ideals of what their political platform entail?  Do you really know any democrats that would support a president that has a foreign policy that allows for innocent people to be killed and justify it as - well... They lived close to terrorist so it was necessary.  That is a very republican line of thinking.  Or any republicans that would support a president who flip flops on abortion, has a record of strict gun control, & enacted a form of socialized medicine when he was a governor - all very democrat lines of thinking.  It's not so much the final two candidates in the november election as it is the selection process the year leading up to it.  A removal of all political parties would solve this problem. Just incumbent vs. replacement contender.  Why would anyone oppose that?

[8manpick]

A removal of all political parties would solve this problem. Just incumbent vs. replacement contender.  Why would anyone oppose that?

What would you call the group of people organizing their campaigns and stuff?  The Mitt Romney party?  Wouldn't they just figure out that it is way easier to campaign if you have a shitload of people with somewhat aligned views organizing together to support a candidate? Kind of like a political party?

[Kat Kid]

No no no...   Let me clarify - I'm not speaking clearly enough to make my point.  Romney has a monopoly on republicans and Obama has a monopoly on democrats.   In this current system, why are we ending up with nominees that don't fit into the ideals of what their political platform entail?  Do you really know any democrats that would support a president that has a foreign policy that allows for innocent people to be killed and justify it as - well... They lived close to terrorist so it was necessary.  That is a very republican line of thinking.  Or any republicans that would support a president who flip flops on abortion, has a record of strict gun control, & enacted a form of socialized medicine when he was a governor - all very democrat lines of thinking.  It's not so much the final two candidates in the november election as it is the selection process the year leading up to it.  A removal of all political parties would solve this problem. Just incumbent vs. replacement contender.  Why would anyone oppose that?

Well I can immediately think of lots of people who would oppose it, namely the vast majority of the country's registered voters that are registered as either a democrat or republican.

[HeinBallz]

Are they afraid they wouldn't know who to vote for without an (R) or (D) next a candidates name?


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[MixBerryCrunch]

The problem isn't political parties per say, it's the American public. 75% of the public is uneducated (stupid) and uninformed and yet will still vote. These people vote in two ways: they blindly cast a vote for whichever party they have aligned themselves with, or they go with the "cool" vote.  Unfortunately, the cool vote nowadays is whichever candidate gives more handouts in the name of social equity.  Like it or not, Romney was right when he said we have become a society of entitlement.

[HeinBallz]

A removal of all political parties would solve this problem. Just incumbent vs. replacement contender.  Why would anyone oppose that?

What would you call the group of people organizing their campaigns and stuff?  The Mitt Romney party?  Wouldn't they just figure out that it is way easier to campaign if you have a shitload of people with somewhat aligned views organizing together to support a candidate? Kind of like a political party?

Sure, call it the mitt Romney campaign.  But then they would be forced to get sponsorship from people that are actually intellectually aligned with Mitt Romney - not closely aligned with a political party that Romney may or may not be closely aligned with. Everyone who has ever complained about RINO's or DINO's would know exactly what I'm talking about.


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[HeinBallz]

The problem isn't political parties per say, it's the American public. 75% of the public is uneducated (stupid) and uninformed and yet will still vote. These people vote in two ways: they blindly cast a vote for whichever party they have aligned themselves with, or they go with the "cool" vote.  Unfortunately, the cool vote nowadays is whichever candidate gives more handouts in the name of social equity.  Like it or not, Romney was right when he said we have become a society of entitlement.

I can agree with that, but I wouldn't call them stupid.  Every media outlet is extremely biased and it takes a lot of time and effort to cut through the bullshit.  But I think you get it - removing the cheat sheet of having an R/D next to a candidates name will either force people to not participate or pay closer attention.   


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[HeinBallz]

I would also say 75% is grossly inaccurate - maybe 25% of the voting public which is only roughly 60% of the population.


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[Kat Kid]

Are they afraid they wouldn't know who to vote for without an (R) or (D) next a candidates name?


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I don't know.  I was just responding to your ridiculous claim.

[HeinBallz]

Are they afraid they wouldn't know who to vote for without an (R) or (D) next a candidates name?


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I don't know.  I was just responding to your ridiculous claim.

My argument implying people are lazy and guilty of party line voting seems to be exemplified when stating these same people would not want political parties broken up.  Having said that, you could have taken my question of "who would not want that?" as a rhetorical question; the only logical response is - which you correctly pointed out - are the people affiliated with the party. As I am stating it, those people are part of the problem.   

I'm curious though - would anyone here argue with me if you didn't already dislike me as a Paulite?  Have I argued with so many of you that I will immediately be labeled (C) for "Crazy" because you're all so used to disagreeing with me?  (much like a (D) next to a democrat or (R) for republican)  Can anyone not see how society does this every day and every where?  Even here, people take some posters thoughts and ideas as gospel - SD, Trim, Rusty, Sys, Even you KK...   What if you or one of these guys goes off the deep end?  Seems kind of powertardish to label someone or some organization as god like and infallible and drink the Kool-aid so to speak.  Isn't independence and free thinking one of the things this board was founded on?  I'm not going to go as far as calling any of you incapable of critical thinking, but damn... having thoughts shot down with nothing more than "crazy" warranted as a response really gives the impression that that's the case.

I mean, categorizing something as "crazy" "Conspiracy theorist" or "stupid" without providing any substantial, logical, and/or well thought out response may rouse high fives from buddies - but it makes people appear childish & irrational to everyone else.

[steve dave]

You can't force people to not join up under a party name. Why do the people who bitch the most about freedoms want them taken away when people decide to do things they don't agree with? It goes both ways.

[p1k3]

people will vote for who they're told to vote for. It has nothing to do with popularity. For instance, most conservatives were indifferent to mitt romney at one point or another. But TPTB told them all that hes the "most electable" and the sheep followed the leader. As long as this is the case nothing will change in America

[steve dave]

You can't take away their freedom to do that Pike, this is America.

[p1k3]

You can't take away their freedom to do that Pike, this is America.

i unfortunately agree. I realize theres nothing we can do to end political parties. People will have to change it, and that is a long way off from happening.

[0.42]

The current legal structure makes it so that an outside party must spend an extraordinary amount of time and money to get on every state's ballot or in a presidential debate or anything having to do with any political race that is better than on the local scale. Who made the current legal structure? Democrats and Republicans. They made it so that it's legally next to impossible for any third party to mount a legitimate effort towards changing the two-party structure. That's not an issue of freedom, that's an issue of rigging the system so that the populace is made to feel that they don't have any legitimate alternatives with the resources to win an election.

At the very least I'd like to see things become more equitable for other parties so there's a more level playing field. If it turned out that in a vacuum the American public still wants two parties and only two parties, great. At least other organizations got a fair shot. But I'm not sure you'd see just two parties in a vacuum given how fractious our current political setup is and how much dissension there is between the centrists/pragmatists and true believers in both parties.

[steve dave]

Here's the thing, you can't have a ballot with one million names on it. Which is what you would have. Anyone with enough support to mount a successful campaign will have no problem overcoming the obstacles to get on the ballot. Anyone who can't, has no shot to ever be voted into office. It's an excellent gateway.

[0.42]

Anyone with enough support to mount a successful campaign will have no problem overcoming the obstacles to get on the ballot.

That's the thing. You can't get "enough support to mount a successful campaign" without registering with one of the two parties who made the current set of election rules. Ron Paul attached his name to the Republican Party for a reason. Ross Perot was an extraordinary case because he had enough money to run for president outside of traditional party structures, and he wouldn't even have a chance today in today's climate with Super PACs dumping an ungodly amount of money into presidiential and congressional races.

You can have the most qualified candidate for a position get completely buried in an election because they either refuse to be part of one of the two major parties or they aren't friends with enough billionaires. What you're doing is employing the classic Republican argument that I believe--correct me if I'm wrong--you criticize fairly regularly: "Pull yourself up by your bootstraps!" In the case of elections outside of somewhere like Vermont, that's completely unreasonable for third party candidates in most cases.

Also:

Here's the thing, you can't have a ballot with one million names on it. Which is what you would have.

Lots of European democracies tend to make these sorts of things happen without "one million names" on their ballots, and they have higher voter turnouts than us. There obviously would be limits that would need to be in place, but the current structure we have is utterly prohibitive to political innovation and new ideas.

[steve dave]

You can't force people not to pool their money for a candidate of their choice. This is America.

[0.42]

You can't force people not to pool their money for a candidate of their choice. This is America.

Why not make it easier for people to have more choices on where to pool their money? Let the free market decide instead of the government. This is America.

[steve dave]

There are unlimited choices, your problem is the choices people are making.

[HeinBallz]

SD is just fishing now.


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[steve dave]

Nope

[Trim]

Are they afraid they wouldn't know who to vote for without an (R) or (D) next a candidates name?


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I don't know.  I was just responding to your ridiculous claim.

My argument implying people are lazy and guilty of party line voting seems to be exemplified when stating these same people would not want political parties broken up.  Having said that, you could have taken my question of "who would not want that?" as a rhetorical question; the only logical response is - which you correctly pointed out - are the people affiliated with the party. As I am stating it, those people are part of the problem.   

I'm curious though - would anyone here argue with me if you didn't already dislike me as a Paulite?  Have I argued with so many of you that I will immediately be labeled (C) for "Crazy" because you're all so used to disagreeing with me?  (much like a (D) next to a democrat or (R) for republican)  Can anyone not see how society does this every day and every where?  Even here, people take some posters thoughts and ideas as gospel - SD, Trim, Rusty, Sys, Even you KK...   What if you or one of these guys goes off the deep end?  Seems kind of powertardish to label someone or some organization as god like and infallible and drink the Kool-aid so to speak.  Isn't independence and free thinking one of the things this board was founded on?  I'm not going to go as far as calling any of you incapable of critical thinking, but damn... having thoughts shot down with nothing more than "crazy" warranted as a response really gives the impression that that's the case.

I mean, categorizing something as "crazy" "Conspiracy theorist" or "stupid" without providing any substantial, logical, and/or well thought out response may rouse high fives from buddies - but it makes people appear childish & irrational to everyone else.

[0.42]

There are unlimited choices, your problem is the choices people are making.

Their choices are forced in many cases due to legal coercion. Many companies would likely rather support a fiscal conservative party and not deal with the religious folks that come with the Republicans.  In many cases, the religious folks can be bad for profits due to "morality" concerns, so why force them to get in bed with those folks? The only reason they currently support the status quo is because the two parties have, in their own self-interest, made it prohibitively difficult to change the system from the outside.



"You mean my company can now support a party that won't try and outlaw stem cell research because they don't have any religious nutballs to tell them they won't vote for them if they don't? Sign me up, like, today."

-Big Shot Science Company CEO

[steve dave]

Nobody's forcing anyone to do anything