Tulsi Gabbard: I’m leaving the Democratic Party

[Dill]

(11-05-2022, 05:13 AM)hollodero Wrote: I find this chart to be misleading, in that it pictures the conservative position unaltered throughout the years. I couldn't possibly compare the McCain party with the current Trump party. If any, the stick man on the right also should be pictured running straight towards crazytown.

Of course, as always the two-party system is to blame in the end. How people on all aisles don't band together and relentlessly attack this toxic system, the one common ground almost all Americans seem to find when asked about, is pretty weird.

Still don't really get this. So three points.

1. I see the positives in a multiparty system. The political spectrum and the range of choice is clearer. No one would be calling Centrist Obama a "socialist" with real leftists two parties left of him. 

2. But to say the two-party system is to blame for the current divisions? I ask myself, would Italy have gone fascist had they a two-party system in 1920, or Germany in 1930? I have some doubts. Authoritarians have seized power from (small "d") democrats in many places because they were in a system which enabled governance with pluralities/superminorities.

3. The current divisions have much more to do with 1) economic conditions--decades of flat wages amidst dramatically rising worker productivity, and workers aren't pocketing all that extra value they are creating (neoliberalism), 2) shrinking union membership, and the political socialization that went with such membership, 3) an economic elite with a long tradition of ruling through fear (of working masses, a black underclass, immigration, socialists from Europe, and Muslims straining to impose Sharia on us all), and 4) new communication technology which advantages 3 over traditional political debate/discussion subject to civil norms and standards of evidence. So that 3 elite is able to control the "narrative" about why the U.S. is going in the wrong direction--though their success also undermines their control, as millions believe the uncontrollable MJT and DJT speak their pain.