What does the duopoly have to do before voters abandon it?

Despite the outrages inflicted by the two party power bloc, very few people even speak of alternative. Instead, voters seem hopelessly lock in constant defense of one or the other side of this single coin. America and its Republic are being bled to death by the avariciousness of the duopoly's power hunger. The creeping coup d'état it has effected over the recent decades should have earned it the enmity of all. Still, post people allow themselves to be cast as one or the other of two terrible, fake choices, "Republican" or "Democrat". Given the absurd lengths to which this gang has gone in offering awful candidates, fomented false issues and maintained mutual masturbation matches, what would it take for it to end?

 

The duopoly can do whatever they want, because there is no viable third option. No third party stands a chance in hell of winning the presidency. Ever.

 

If there was a third party we would then have three parties instead of two and even less chance of having one of them with good candidates across the board. We need UPPER AGE LIMITS for candidates for all Federal government jobs. We have LOWER AGE LIMITS but no upper age limits. We are ignoring the obvious that old age diminishes both the physical and mental capabilities of the majority of senior citizens. We have far too many members of the senate and congress well beyond their seventieth birthdays and both of the president elects of the last two elections beyond theirs when running for office. We appoint members of our Supreme Court FOR LIFE???? Are they somehow immune to the ravages of time??

 

There are other parties, there are other choices. There could be three, four or more important ones. There could be one party. The first Congress was more or less that way. What makes Americans so conformist, especially in comparison with other democratic republics?

 

Hell if I know I've been barking up that tree for 20 years (thanks Ralph Nader). They just get more and more flagrant in their outrage peddling profiteering, and the worse they get the more people just dig in out of fear of how crazy the other guys are it's a nice little self fulfilling loop they've got going.

 

Some of that has do do with rules made by.... the duopoly. Not exactly surprising.

 

No it doesn't, it is entirely self-imposed by the voting population. Candidates can be written in. The rules about who you can vote for only apply during the primaries and the primaries only matter for who the candidate will be from each party. Voters have always had the capability of writing in their candidate of choice.

It's like driving in your car with the windows down constantly complaining about the noise but never once putting the windows up despite that being within your power the entire time.

The duopoly is self-imposed. It exists because we allow it to exist. It will continue to exist until the voters decide not to constrain themselves with it.

 

Because there ARE only two choices. Nobody has ever made a real intelligent effort to create a third. So complaining because there are only two might be great for mental self-gratification, but doesn't get us anywhere.

And there ARE legitimate ways to start creating a third choice (if they only cared to look at how that has been done in other countries). But those who have CLAIMED they represent a "third choice" have not really made a serious effort which indicates to me that they are only doing it for personal gain. Same goes for Perot, or Stein or Nader...

Reality is reality. There are two and only two choices. If you vote third party, or if you abstain, you are actually supporting the party that WINS.

There is not way around it.

 

What other democracy is so dominated?

 

ALL presidential systems are. Parliamentary systems maybe less so. But in the former, what changes is mostly the name of the party. But nothing that is not comparable to the swing that this country went through when the Republican Party went from being a Conservative party to a fascist party (with Trump) and now struggling to slowly go back to being something akin to conservative. A shift that, though right now it's losing, I'm sure it will happen at some point in the future.

 

As long as that is the line repeated by the populace there can't be.

If you continue to vote for kick to the left nut to avoid kick to the right nut, instead of voting for cake and ice cream because a vote for cake and ice cream is just really a vote for kick to the right nut, you will continue to suffer.

 

IMO, the problem is more the lack of informed, enthused participation in the two party system we have than the need to change it.

 

Exactly. For example, in the 2016 election, something like half of all eligible voters didn't even vote.

 

I think people are tired of both parties. If a sincere, honest, charismatic leader of a middle of the road party that sought to unify the political middle were to emerge, it could do well.

 

And there is a reason for that. See my post above.

 

Something to read.

Third Parties Are Excluded from the Presidential Debates – And Punished by Campaign Finance Laws - Institute For Free Speech (ifs.org)

 

There is never a viable third party, because any attempt to bring forward parties with a real chance of attracting support and with a real message of change are utterly crushed by both Republicans and Democrats. If Epstein dies in a well guarded prison cell, what do you think happens to people who could truly topple the duopoly? The power is entrenched, like a disgusting, bloated tick. They only let in a few third choices that are so out there that very few will agree with them. They have the rest of the population fooled with bullshit like "If you vote for anybody but the candidates from the two parties, you are just throwing your vote away". It has been repeated so often that it is now just accepted. We don't live in a democracy, we live in a puppet show.

The only real solution is for everyone to refuse to ever vote for a republican or democrat again, regardless of who the third option is. We can put up with 4 years of a loony third option. Hell, look what we have put up with for the last 2 presidencies.

 

I've only voted for either R or D a handful of times in the last 25 years or so.

A person is smart; people are dumb panicky animals.

The people have the power, but politicians are smart. They keep the proles fighting over bakeries and bathrooms and yuck it up as they steal even more money and more power for themselves. The reality is that it's us versus the clowns in DC, but very few people are interested in having that conversation.

 

Long story short, both sides think the other side are idiots. And they are both right. Taking 2016 again for example, Trump wasn't a perfect candidate, but I would have voted for a bowl of Captain Crunch before I voted for that cackling buffoon Clinton. You want better results? Then put forth better candidates. And Bernie and Yang are not it...

 

Absolutely. They keep us divided with relatively inconsequential crap, keeping us so frothing at the mouth at the other party that we don't have the time or inclinations to look closely at the politicians themselves, and how they are profiting from our division. Have you ever noticed that the two parties have opposite views on literally everything? Almost nothing is bipartisan. The odds of that happening are pretty much zero, unless it was designed that way. Look at all the different parties in other countries. If you compare any two parties, there are likely many things the two parties agree on, and many they disagree on. But here, each and every issue has both parties diametrically opposed. That is only possible if it was carefully orchestrated that way. This allows the two parties to use literally anything as a reason to point at the other party and say "they are your enemy". And most of it is such inconsequential garbage. They find some little point of view that you agree with them on, and then they have you. Soon you develop that pack mentality, and adopt the point of view of the rest of your party. It all plays to our ancient tribalistic behaviors that allowed us to survive in the past, but are irrelevant in today's world at the national level, kind of like the appendix is to the human body. It's dirty psychological tricks, and the American people fall for it every time.

 

The Constitution provides clearly for a virtual political revolution every two years, when the greater part of Congress can potentially be entirely thrown out. It would not be all that difficult for a movement to get up and running between Presidential cycles.

 

That’s what needs to happen. Get rid of all of them, and only vote for someone who does not have an R or a D by their name. It is irrelevant really what they stand for. The goal is to break the power of the two parties first, and then rebuild.

 

That might be a good party name, "Not R or D".
The NotRoDs?

 

Haha, I like it.

 

When you've scraped the bottom of the barrel multiple times, one would hope you can only go up from there....