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It's more nuanced than that. America has the issue where there's 2 big tent parties, but there's a million little fiefdoms that are easily captured by radicals.
by xxpor 5y ago
It's more nuanced than that. America has the issue where there's 2 big tent parties, but there's a million little fiefdoms that are easily captured by radicals. Things like local school boards, where people just don't have the time and energy to pay attention to every detail. Last November, my ballot up here in Seattle had 25+ things to vote on. In California it's probably even worse.
I get why the 2 party system evolved at the federal level, but there's no reason why we couldn't have more parties at the local level. That's exactly what happens in Canada, for example.
- jamie_ca 5y agoCanadian - I haven't seen any evidence of party affiliation by candidates for City Council/School Board level, in either BC or Ontario.
- xxpor 5y agoThe current mayor of Vancouver is officially independent (although he was NDP while an MP), but the previous mayor was Vision Vancouver. Here's a list of the city counselors and their parties: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vancouver_City_Council#2018%E2%80%93present https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vancouver_City_Council#2018%E2...
- civilized 5y agoI appreciate that, but massive, rich cities like San Francisco are crown jewels and bastions of Democratic power. Are we to believe that what happens in these cities is just the equivalent of some school board declaring pi = 3 in Podunk Nowhere? I think it's pretty representative of what the vanguard of the party wants. And it will continue to be unless the rank and file demand better.
- xxpor 5y agoEhhhhhhh I don't really agree with that. It represents what the people who care about that particular issue want. Saying it's the vanguard of the party, or that US parties can even have vanguards, is kind of silly. They're just too large and have a diversity of opinions.
- civilized 5y ago"It's not what the party wants, it's what the people who care about this issue within the party want" seems like a distinction without a difference.
- xxpor 5y agoIt means that how things become salient is very different. For example, all of this school board nonsense. It appears they've started to cross the line, and people have begun to notice. And now there's pressure to move more toward the average position of the party. It's quite different from these more centralized states with party platforms that actually mean something.
- civilized 5y agoI hope you're right. In the meantime voters are going Republican in VA and NJ.