Re: Democracy in America Re: Villain of the Week

[Joshua Bell]

"Yanni Cooper" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> Bull honkey. There may be 3rd parties, but there are only ever 2
> candidates, and I don't see that changing anytime soon.

I've pointed out before that candidates would be foolish not to attempt to
appeal to exactly 50% of the population, thus inevitably setting up a two
party/two candidate system. Is that the fault of the American political
system, or human psychology?

(To reiterate: If a candidate has >50% of public support on an issue, his
opponents disagreeing on that issue obviously have <50% support - they'd be
foolish to broadcast this support as they would be alienating the majority
of voters. This will tend to cause candidates to select issues with an exact
50-50 polarization of public opinion, and other issues will simply be
ignored. This only leaves room for two candidates to argue an issue.)

Eliminating the role of president - that is, someone selected by the entire
populace - is probably the only way to do this, but that role appears to be
highly effective in balancing against the regional interests supposedly
espoused in congress and being a more direct representation of current
public opinion.

There may be nothing better for humans than mostly-effective pragmatism.

Joshua