Well, so are party platforms like those of the Greens and the Libertarian Party, which implicitly demand allegiance to various cockamamie idealistic projects and condemn those who object to any point in the platform that's drawn up on the basis of the Ideal Template.
In my opinion, one of the (many, vitally important) benefits of Ranked-Choice Voting is that if outsider parties- particularly those that have endured for a series of election cycles, like the Greens and the Libertarians- find that they've actually been allowed a path to compete with the Big Two, they might see clear to modifying some of their more extravagant proposals in the direction of emphasizing practical achievements rather than ideological posturing. Because we need alternatives very badly; this democracy is in peril of degenerating into the sort of two-party system found in the history of Colombia, as described in the book More Terrible Than Death: two major parties, each pledging nominal allegiance to a given ideological slant, relatively speaking, while in actuality being almost entirely about regional/local partisanship and party patronage. Two party politics that gets freighted with cynicism and decadence declines to the level of rote tribal loyalty and the use of political power for punitive retaliation. The goal of dialogue between constituencies or a dialectic of compromise on policy is forgotten.
In Colombia, the degeneration into hostile factions eventually led to the era of La Violencia, in the 1940s- a ten-year civil war. Sane human beings do not seek to invite a future like that for the United States. The question is whether there are enough of us to keep the lunatic fringes from bootstrapping their extremism by hogging the narrative. Because it's definitely possible for societies to get carried away. En masse.
I've been noticing troubling indications of that slide into cynicism and zero-sum politics ever since unscrupulous political advisers like Newt Gingrich and David Horowitz began demonizing the Democratic Party in the 1990s and speaking in terms of the politics of annihilating the opposition; over time, this has led to the same narrative among many Democrats. The politics of annihilating the opposition is implicit in Wokism- a movement that poses rhetorically with extravagant Left radicalism, but which ultimately boils down to a campaign of polarization to herd voters- the favored constituencies, of course- into the camp of the Democrats (Along with the most outspoken leaders making sure to get well-paid, of course.)
There are several problems with the Democratic Party embrace of zero-sum radicalism: the first is that it's a grave error to turn into your adversary like that. The other problem is that the Republicans do demagoguery better, and polarizing politics work to their advantage. The Democrats need to step away from that ledge, and get a better grasp on their verbal faculties, their rhetoric. A matter as different from success at achieving the policy goals of campaign promises as symbolism is from substance.
>In my opinion, one of the (many, vitally important) benefits of Ranked-Choice Voting is that if outsider parties- particularly those that have endured for a series of election cycles, like the Greens and the Libertarians- find that they've actually been allowed a path to compete with the Big Two, they might see clear to modifying some of their more extravagant proposals in the direction of emphasizing practical achievements rather than ideological posturing.
I've never understood why those looking to break the two-party duopoly aren't the most fanatical popularists of all.
Well, so are party platforms like those of the Greens and the Libertarian Party, which implicitly demand allegiance to various cockamamie idealistic projects and condemn those who object to any point in the platform that's drawn up on the basis of the Ideal Template.
In my opinion, one of the (many, vitally important) benefits of Ranked-Choice Voting is that if outsider parties- particularly those that have endured for a series of election cycles, like the Greens and the Libertarians- find that they've actually been allowed a path to compete with the Big Two, they might see clear to modifying some of their more extravagant proposals in the direction of emphasizing practical achievements rather than ideological posturing. Because we need alternatives very badly; this democracy is in peril of degenerating into the sort of two-party system found in the history of Colombia, as described in the book More Terrible Than Death: two major parties, each pledging nominal allegiance to a given ideological slant, relatively speaking, while in actuality being almost entirely about regional/local partisanship and party patronage. Two party politics that gets freighted with cynicism and decadence declines to the level of rote tribal loyalty and the use of political power for punitive retaliation. The goal of dialogue between constituencies or a dialectic of compromise on policy is forgotten.
In Colombia, the degeneration into hostile factions eventually led to the era of La Violencia, in the 1940s- a ten-year civil war. Sane human beings do not seek to invite a future like that for the United States. The question is whether there are enough of us to keep the lunatic fringes from bootstrapping their extremism by hogging the narrative. Because it's definitely possible for societies to get carried away. En masse.
I've been noticing troubling indications of that slide into cynicism and zero-sum politics ever since unscrupulous political advisers like Newt Gingrich and David Horowitz began demonizing the Democratic Party in the 1990s and speaking in terms of the politics of annihilating the opposition; over time, this has led to the same narrative among many Democrats. The politics of annihilating the opposition is implicit in Wokism- a movement that poses rhetorically with extravagant Left radicalism, but which ultimately boils down to a campaign of polarization to herd voters- the favored constituencies, of course- into the camp of the Democrats (Along with the most outspoken leaders making sure to get well-paid, of course.)
There are several problems with the Democratic Party embrace of zero-sum radicalism: the first is that it's a grave error to turn into your adversary like that. The other problem is that the Republicans do demagoguery better, and polarizing politics work to their advantage. The Democrats need to step away from that ledge, and get a better grasp on their verbal faculties, their rhetoric. A matter as different from success at achieving the policy goals of campaign promises as symbolism is from substance.
>In my opinion, one of the (many, vitally important) benefits of Ranked-Choice Voting is that if outsider parties- particularly those that have endured for a series of election cycles, like the Greens and the Libertarians- find that they've actually been allowed a path to compete with the Big Two, they might see clear to modifying some of their more extravagant proposals in the direction of emphasizing practical achievements rather than ideological posturing.
I've never understood why those looking to break the two-party duopoly aren't the most fanatical popularists of all.