Open Left

The problem with the thrid party strategy...

...is that we have a winner take all system. There's a reason why third parties have historically never made much of a dent in the American system... The system is rigged against them. If the right wing had a viable third party of their own, and we had ours, maybe it could work, but then only mushy moderates would get elected anyways, 'cos they'd still win the plurality of the vote. all we'd be doing is taking ourselves out of the game completely.

According to Gallup, liberals make up about 20% of registered voters... 20% isn't going to win you many elections. Just ask Ross Perot, or the current republicans for that matter... the only way a third party might win an election is against a republican who is running unopposed... but, if that republican is running unopposed, that usually means a progressive is even less likely to win....

Let's remember that we did have a progressive party, the greens. They were relatively viable, got matching funds and everything... They certainly screwed up a lot of elections, that's for sure... However, not one green party memeber (to my knowledge) has won any election beyond the local level. Ditto to the Reform party. Perot got almost 20% of the vote, yet not one elector. And no reform party candidate won any seat beyond maybe the county level.

Teddy Roosevelt was one of the most popular presidents ever, and even HE couldn't win a third party race, and his run ended up splitting the republicans causing the democrat to get elected.

Third party strategy is not the way to go... Especially considering that the vast majority of democrats are on our side. The progressive caucus is the largest group in congress, and 38 senators wrote the letter supporting the public option months ago...

The problem is with the old time, DLC democrats who are so used to being submissive that they can't understand that they don't have to cower in front of Repbulicans anymore. They either need to be reeducated or need to go... That process will take time, unfortunately. Since only about 10% of the caucus is a problem, that strategy makes more sense, rather than smearing the entire group of democrats, most of whom are good progressives.

REID: Voting against us was never part of our arrangement!
SPECTER: I am altering the deal! Pray I don't alter it any further!
REID: This deal keeps getting worse all the time!

by: lord_mike @ Wed Jul 01, 2009 at 12:43:05 PM CDT