Stark Contrast

When forced to defend the two-party system against reasonable opposition, bipartisans of the duopoly parties parrot the same talking points: a third party would take too long to build, it might only end up a spoiler, and such efforts have not been successful in the past. Considering the three together, it becomes apparent that duopoly ideology favors impatience, opportunism, and fatalism. It is a schizophrenic mentality, paradoxically mingling aspects of futurism, antiquarianism and alarmism.

This stands in stark contrast to their opposition. In a talk for the Long Island Progressive Coalition, Kimberly Wilder provides ten reasons to support third parties, and, by extension, independent candidacies, on the basis of constitutional principles, critical reflection and independent action. A number of points from the presentation could be brought to bear in the response to the above bipartisan charade, some of which I've touched on before: 1) just because there is a two-party system, that does not mean that those two parties have to be the Republican and Democratic Parties (Duverger's Law); 3) if it is a virtue of the two-party system that each party works as a check and balance against the other, then a third party would provide a check and balance against their combination or collusion; 9) ballot access laws are biased and discriminatory; 10) national third parties have had great effects upon the history and development of the United States, for example the Anti-Slavery Party, the Women's Right to Vote Party, the Republican Party, the Prohibition Party etc..