> You mean since about 1790? There have always been two parties in congress (minus the era of good feelings) and they have always had opposing ideology, and hav

> You mean since about 1790? There have always been two parties in congress (minus the era of good feelings) and they have always had opposing ideology, and have almost always blocked one another's proposals. That's by design, actually. The goal was never to create a government that can efficiently create a million laws and regulations. The point of having multiple parties is that each of them will block each other and only the laws and regulations that everybody can agree on will actually get through. Unfortunately, politicians have been learning to game the system for ~200 years now, and it's not working exactly as designed. Another big difference lately seems to be that everybody's an extremist because nobody can change their mind or compromise without getting called out in the media for back pedaling or giving up or "working with the enemy" or whatever.