political independents

[eirias]

Andrew Sullivan linked to a New York Times blurb showing that lots of people (esp. in the southwest) are uncomfortable with party labels these days, and that in a recent nationwide poll, a majority of respondants said they would prefer elections sans party labels. At first blush, this is interesting and maybe important -- but then I think about it and I realize I'm pretty sure that parties, labeled or no, are an emergent property of political landscapes. I have a strong suspicion that the two-party system is so entrenched here that even if we scrapped the current one, even if we abolished labels, an effectively two-party system would emerge as the new stable state within a few election cycles. I think that all that this might be signalling is disillusionment with the two current parties. What do you all think? (Bonus points for answers deeper than "Of course they're disillusioned; [party of choice] sucks!")

Comments

[rms10.livejournal.com]

I would think that now the time would be ripe for a third party to develop -- one that's fiscally conservative and socially moderate-to-liberal -- but maybe right now what's happening is that the Democratic party is slowly changing to fulfill that need.

Certainly the Republicans have abandoned all pretenses at fiscal conservatism and states' rights, because they've slowly changed to respond to the neocons and evangelicals.

[feuervogel]

So, then, a new Progressive party needs to spring out of the no-longer-progressive Democratic party. Of course, that'll never happen, because "liberal" is a curse word.

[eirias.livejournal.com]

Since when is "progressive" a synonym for fiscal conservatism? My impression is that "progressivism" has more to do with things like unions, populism, more rather than less spending... in combination with certain social causes (education? women's lib? prohibition?). Someone who has a better handle on the history spanning that 19th-20th c. boundary should feel free to correct me :).

By contrast I think what rms10 is describing is closer to Libertarianism (though not whole-hog; see "social moderate") or old-school laissez-faire Liberalism.

The usage is hopelessly confused in America these days, where "liberal" and "leftist" are synonyms (they haven't always been, and in some elsewheres they still aren't). But these are my understanding of the terms.

[eirias.livejournal.com]

Oh oh OH, maybe I misread you and you're saying that as the Democrats change to accomodate the fiscal conservatives, the "other branch" should break off and form its own party. Which would be entirely sensible :).

[feuervogel]

Erm, yes, that's what I meant. "Democrats become conservatve, so progressives make our own party." Because the Leadership doesn't want us, either.

[kirin]

So, I was about to say: "Wait, wait... I was following your mis-reading up until 'prohibition'. Huh? Where'd that one come from?"

And then I went and googled some history and oh look, "Progressive" used to be applied to the "moral fabric" movement that gave us Prohibition. Huh.

You're right, I give up; political labels are completely useless.

(But yeah, as you figured out, *today's* meaning of the label Progressive tends towards the socially liberal and plenty of social programs sector. Not likely to be prohibiting much of anything.)

[ukelele.livejournal.com]

Progressive makes lots of sense in conjunction with prohibition! The temperance-movement types were generally women -- politically disenfranchised (I mean, literally, at first) with a burning desire to induce social change and betterment. Don't look at an axis of permissiveness vs. repression here; look at the underlying utopian themes in both temperance and modern progressivism. Both are strongly about imposing a particular moral vision on society in service to utopian ends -- ie in order to progress toward some imagined better future state -- even if the specifics of the moral vision differ.

[eirias.livejournal.com]

I think that from your point, we can extrapolate some political advice: never assume that the axis you care about is the axis on which a particular party is operating.

(Gosh, I wonder what politics would look like if people followed this advice. Would it change anything?)

[ukelele.livejournal.com]

I am used to not making that assumption ;), but then again, I am a cranky third-party type. This is why I understand when people say "the major parties aren't really distinguishable" and get grumpy at people who yell at them for saying that ;).