- Things are sort of fucked up in the US right now.
- A lot of the power to fix things lies in Congress.
- Representatives are increasingly not representative (thanks to the fixed size of the House, each Representative has roughly 700,000 constituents and counting, nevermind the Senators).
- It costs ridiculous amounts of money and time to campaign to such a large consituency. The little representing that our elected officials do therefore caters to wealthy corporations and organizations.
- Our winner-takes-all voting system ensures that there are no partial victories, no point in trying if you don’t think you can carry a majority.
- This helps maximize strategic campaigning and voting while encouraging appealing to the lowest common denominator.
- This broadening of scope discourages participation in and understanding of the election process. Campaigns become a machine to entertain, not to inform.
- Forcing voters to put their eggs in one winner-takes-all basket means there will be fewer baskets. See, for example, our current two-party system.
- Voters become disinterested as the feeling of disenfranchisement increases. This cycle feeds itself.
- Things won’t change until we stop throwing away the votes of 49% of the populace.
- We need to back parties that want voting reform (all third parties
) and legislation that calls for it. I know at least FairVote helps push such legislation. The Greens and Libertarians both would love some voting reform.
Tags: Politics
There’s some interesting stuff going on in this regard at the state level. Back in 2004, New York instituted a policy wherein minor parties had the option of running their own candidate for state office, or officially endorsing a candidate from another party. So, you can vote, say, Green, but it counts towards a democratic candidate. This actually goes a long way towards building up the support base of third parties. The Working Families party has done a pretty good job of using this system, and they talk more about this voting system here.
Apparently, there’s an effort to get this kind of system put in place in Massachusetts. I ended up signing some petition to that effect, so maybe it will come up as a ballot initiative this or next year.
Interesting. Seems like a compromise between our current system (in that it perpetuates the two dominant parties) and a more ideal system (in that it encourages “safe” third party voting). I’m not sure if I think it’s a good idea or not. On the one hand, anything is better than what we have now. On the other hand, it might be a temporary fix with which enough people are satisfied that a more ideal system is never put into place.
I like the idea. It lets third parties ramp up. They can consistently put themselves out there without necessarily looking like losers, raise awareness, and build a base.
But where does that leave the Libertarians?
I can’t imagine them endorsing either a Republican or a Democrat.
Well, fair enough. But it’s not like they are hurt by this either.
Things are definitely getting even LESS competitive. We’ve just released a couple of reports. This one might interest you:
http://www.fairvote.org/blog/?p=8