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The UK and the USA are both based on the UK establishment's greatest invention: first past the post. This forces two parties. One party is "pro establishment".

The UK and the USA are both based on the UK establishment's greatest invention: first past the post. This forces two parties. One party is "pro establishment". Then you only have one party who is supposedly "anti-establishment". At this point you only have one party head to keep an eye on. If the mood turns ugly (and it won't often because the establishment own all the press/media), you have to fix the head of the one "anti" party now and again. UK: use the media to circulate a smear campaign against Corbyn after he nearly got in power and surprised them USA: use the media to ignore/denigrate/belittle Sanders as some kind of insane communist. Trudeau campaigned on removing FPTP and as soon as he got in someone, somewhere told him to drop it like a hot potato. Legalizing weed was fine, even though this was apparently hotly contested before, because it's not a real issue and is there to be sacrificed when real power issues come up.

chrisseaton 6y ago
FPTP clearly does not force two parties, given as there are three substantial parties in the UK parliament, and seven more minor parties with seats!
- amiga_500 6y ago
  Lib dems are always an insignificant bit-part. They got 7.4% of the votes at the last election and 1.9% of the seats. Smaller parties like the green party do even worse. By design.
  - chrisseaton 6y ago
    > Lib dems are always an insignificant bit-part ... Smaller parties like the green party do even worse. Smaller parties... like the SNP? 7% of the seats from 4% of the vote. Seems to fly in the face of what everyone says about what is possible under FPTP. And what's more they've been effective in influencing what happens in parliament!
    - amiga_500 6y ago
      Most of the time it converges on two parties. Here's the "law": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duverger%27s_law https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duverger%27s_law So you might think it's possible. But it's a case of in theory, in theory and in practice are the same, in practice, they ain't. And that is what FPTP is designed for. To over-reward those at the top of the leaderboard. It's designed to not be representative.
    - xnyan 6y ago
      >And what's more they've been effective in influencing what happens in parliament! It's actually not that different in practice There are a large range on views in both parties, but you put on the Democratic or Republican label in order to build a majority coalition. This is sort of like how the Westminster parliamentary system works: labor forms a government with the greens. Labor has more seats by far is and is mostly in charge, but the greens get some government positions and a little influence on the agenda of state. As a recent example of this here Bernie Sanders was not at all a Democratic party member but "joined" with them to try and get enough support.

chrisseaton 6y ago

FPTP clearly does not force two parties, given as there are three substantial parties in the UK parliament, and seven more minor parties with seats!

amiga_500 6y ago
Lib dems are always an insignificant bit-part. They got 7.4% of the votes at the last election and 1.9% of the seats. Smaller parties like the green party do even worse. By design.
- chrisseaton 6y ago
  > Lib dems are always an insignificant bit-part ... Smaller parties like the green party do even worse. Smaller parties... like the SNP? 7% of the seats from 4% of the vote. Seems to fly in the face of what everyone says about what is possible under FPTP. And what's more they've been effective in influencing what happens in parliament!
  - amiga_500 6y ago
    Most of the time it converges on two parties. Here's the "law": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duverger%27s_law https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duverger%27s_law So you might think it's possible. But it's a case of in theory, in theory and in practice are the same, in practice, they ain't. And that is what FPTP is designed for. To over-reward those at the top of the leaderboard. It's designed to not be representative.
  - xnyan 6y ago
    >And what's more they've been effective in influencing what happens in parliament! It's actually not that different in practice There are a large range on views in both parties, but you put on the Democratic or Republican label in order to build a majority coalition. This is sort of like how the Westminster parliamentary system works: labor forms a government with the greens. Labor has more seats by far is and is mostly in charge, but the greens get some government positions and a little influence on the agenda of state. As a recent example of this here Bernie Sanders was not at all a Democratic party member but "joined" with them to try and get enough support.