Divided party?

[Twoller]

Who says we need political parties at all? There is nothing in our system of government that requires political parties. We simply have the right to form associations based on political orientation. It is a freedom, not necessity.

The most important thing we need to do now to confront the "two party system", and make no mistake about it, there are people who insist this is a real system, is to get rid of the primaries.

The primary elections like we see cominig up this June are run for the benefit of the political parties, paid for by the public. We don't need political parties and we should be under no obligation to run their elections. It isn't even necessary that political parties have elections at all. Political parties are free to nominate who they want for an office any way they want to. Political parties are private organizations, not subject to the rules of government provided by the constitution.

One of the ways we can get rid of the primaries is to declare it unconstitutional to ask somebody registering to vote what their political party is. It is none of any of any part of government in the US's business to ask what your political party is. The only justification there is for asking is to provide information for running the primaries. That's it. Remove party registration with voter registration and the primary elections have nothing to work with. They could no longer know at the polls, like they do now, what your political party is.

[PochoPatriot]

Originally Posted by Twoller

One of the ways we can get rid of the primaries is to declare it unconstitutional to ask somebody registering to vote what their political party is.

Is there a specific clause in the Constitution that prohibits this? If there is one, please point it out to me, because I have missed it. Otherwise you seem to be willing to die on the wrong hill.

[RadioActiveRich]

This is another one of those things that everybody goes apesh1t for when it is said, but never really made sense to me.

But, if you ever want rousing applause during a speech just talk about how you hate partisan politics and how there should be term limits. People go nuts.

The truth is though, that the problem isn't political parties. It is that you cannot tell the parties apart anymore. What is the real difference between the GOP and the Dems? Both want amnesty, both want healtcare reform (just different versions), both spend money like drunken monkeys and then blame everyone else. No difference.

Partisan politics is good. There is nothing wrong with it. We just need to get the American people to do their part and call BS when they are supposed to.

As for term limits, there is no law that says you even have to nominate the incumbent again. There is your term limit. Primaries and elections are term limits. Anything else is a cop out by the voters. You want the person out? Vote them out!

[ilbegone]

Originally Posted by RadioActiveRich

This is another one of those things that everybody goes apesh1t for when it is said, but never really made sense to me.

But, if you ever want rousing applause during a speech just talk about how you hate partisan politics and how there should be term limits. People go nuts.

The truth is though, that the problem isn't political parties. It is that you cannot tell the parties apart anymore. What is the real difference between the GOP and the Dems? Both want amnesty, both want healtcare reform (just different versions), both spend money like drunken monkeys and then blame everyone else. No difference.

Partisan politics is good. There is nothing wrong with it. We just need to get the American people to do their part and call BS when they are supposed to.

As for term limits, there is no law that says you even have to nominate the incumbent again. There is your term limit. Primaries and elections are term limits. Anything else is a cop out by the voters. You want the person out? Vote them out!

I dislike both the Republican and Democrat parties: The agendas may be different, but in the end it is the same result for regular people.

And there is no solace in the hope of a third party. Most are nuts, crackpots and something like the cure being much worse than the disease.

Yet the two main parties give us little in the way of candidates which may be palatable to centrist America - it's as though the extremists in both parties have a lock on the nomination of candidates. We have a choice on who scares us the least, and that's called "representative government"?

Something needs to change in the way candidates are chosen and presented to the public. Otherwise the two parties will continue to sodomize us.