You're the Dog that Gets Beat: Declare Your Independence from the Two-Party Charade

In response to the liberal Democratic blogosphere's almost unanimous derision of Thomas Friedman's Sunday article suggesting a strong third party presidential candidate in 2012, Nate Silver at FiveThirtyEight today argues that the "odds against a third party bid are not as long as they seem."  He writes:

I suspect these analysts are being too dismissive of the possibility of a “serious” third-party run of some kind in 2012, and that Mr. Friedman’s prediction has a reasonable possibility of coming true.

Silver then goes on to provide no less than fifteen reasons in support of his position, and emphasizes four of them:

Voters have extremely low opinions of both major parties — much lower than in the period from 1992-1994, when electoral constituencies were being re-shuffled and when Mr. Perot lost his bid. . . . The Republicans might field a particularly polarizing presidential nominee. Sarah Palin, in particular, were she to be nominated, might have trouble achieving 50 percent of the vote, even if Barack Obama were still fairly unpopular. . . .  There is one major issue — the national debt — that neither party has much credibility on. A candidate who presented a “serious” plan to balance the budget could possibly gain traction that way. . . . The Citizens’ United decision makes it easier for a third-party candidate to raise large sums of money from corporations.

In addition to the fifteen points provided by Silver, one could add many more.  It is also worth mentioning that, though the discussion here revolves specifically around the prospects of a third party presidential candidate, many of the factors that would create a hospitable environment for a strong third party presidential candidate would do the same for third party and independent candidates at the Congressional, state and local levels.

It is no surprise that the liberal Democratic blogosphere would overreact in such a fashion to Friedman's article.  Friedman himself is despised among this contingent, often with good reason.  More importantly, however, Democrats are among the least independent thinkers and voters of any partisan or ideological bloc in the United States.  They are most likely to believe all or most of what they see or read in any news source and they are least likely to consider voting for an independent or third party candidate for any office.  Faced with the record of the current Democratic legislative majority and presidential administration (not to mention those of the past), these duopolist dead-enders still think the answer is "more and better Democrats."  They really do believe, against all the evidence, that the Democratic Party stands for something other than the consolidation of power in the hands of political and economic elites and the expansion of the global warfare and corporate welfare state.  They are like badly abused dogs, and in this they resemble nothing so much as die-hard partisans of the GOP: no matter how many times they are driven out to the middle of nowhere and left for dead, they always happily limp their way back home to the party, wagging their tails in the false expectation that, this time, they will not receive yet another beating.

Fortunately, not all folks who would lean toward the Democrats are so deluded by the ideology that sustains the two-party state.  At Counterpunch, Richard Anderson-Connolly has composed "A Voter's Manifesto" aimed specifically at "rejecting the lesser-of-two-evils trap."  The piece begins:

Our climate of anger, disgust, and helplessness has produced three quite different exhortations regarding the election in November. All are understandable yet ultimately inadequate because they fail to recognize that the current economic disaster is nothing but the logical culmination of a political sickness rooted in the two-party system itself. If the objective is to prevent corporate rule then the most reasonable strategy in November is to cast a vote for a multiparty democracy. Other approaches merely tinker with the imminent expiry of what remains of American Democracy.

He makes a strong case for voting reform and supporting third party and independent candidates, and concludes:

we must reject the trap of the lesser-of-two-evils. Democrats are moving us toward corporate rule just as surely as the Republicans. If two cars are both driving toward a collapsed bridge one should hardly be excited about getting inside the vehicle that is traveling more slowly. Democrats who refuse to see the magnitude of the oncoming crisis, or who see it but do nothing to reverse course, have no moral claim to our votes.

We can make sense of our times only be recognizing that the root of our problem is a two-party system that has been completely captured by the economic elite. The solution will not be found by picking the best choice among the available options but rather by transforming the system into a genuine multiparty democracy. Therefore a vote in November for candidates who support voting reform is the most reasonable strategy for preventing corporate rule and for renewing our democracy.

On the issue of voting reform, see also David L. Wetzell's new article, "Toward a Winner-Doesn't-Take-All Electoral System."