Kathianne
07-26-2016, 10:09 PM
http://theweek.com/articles/638661/gop-convention-bad-democratic-convention-already-worse
I disagree with his conclusion on blame, I'd put that on an ill-informed electorate and the two parties' elites. Change is going to come, but it won't be from Cruz or Sanders, but those pushed out of the two parties change in ideologies. Neither provides for those that really want government to work.
The GOP convention was bad. The Democratic convention is already worse. Edward Morrissey (http://theweek.com/authors/edward-morrissey)
To paraphrase Mark Twain's observation on weather, everyone complains about the two-party system — but nobody does anything about it. That has long seemed true of routine complaints about the binary nature of America's national politics, which have been stable for more than 150 years. In 2016, however, the appeal of factional politics appears to have caught up with the Republican and Democratic parties — and at just the precise moment when both seemingly have lost the competence needed to stage a simple, scripted convention.
Tensions between grassroots voters and the party leadership nearly produced a disaster in last week's Republican convention. Despite their defeat in the primaries, so-called #NeverTrump delegates attempted to pass a series of reforms in the Rules Committee, including a rule that would allow delegates at future conventions to "vote their consciences" — in other words, ignore direct democracy. That only attracted a handful of votes in the committee meeting leading up to the convention, but the desire to make a statement about the rules during the main event didn't die with those proposals.
...
The Democrats delighted in gloating about the GOP chaos.
Oops.
This week has already arguably been worse for the Democrats than last week was for the GOP. And it's only Tuesday.
DNC chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz has been tossed out of her own convention and forced to step down as DNC chair. Top Democrats got booed at warm-up events across the spectrum — and even at the convention itself.
...
The lesson from both the Republican convention and the disastrous start of the Democratic convention may well be that the much-predicted end of the two-party system has all but arrived. Both parties have traditionally acted as so-called big tents, where factions have always contended for primacy. In the end, though, party regulars — the agents of representative democracy — understood that unity after a primary boosted everyone's access to influence and power, and held populist passions in check to ensure the best possible broad front for general elections, both for the White House and for Congress.
Now, however, the populists — agents for direct democracy — in both parties may be ready to break those ties and remain independent factions rather than yoke together for a common goal. If so, few have more responsibility for that than Bernie Sanders, who offered a chagrined response to the boos that naturally flowed from his populist "revolution," and Ted Cruz, who made ideology not just superior to unity but made cohesion itself evidence of betrayal. They may well have made themselves obsolete along with the two-party system they long decried. And if one of these parties can figure out how to come together for one last hurrah, they may take it all in 2016.
I disagree with his conclusion on blame, I'd put that on an ill-informed electorate and the two parties' elites. Change is going to come, but it won't be from Cruz or Sanders, but those pushed out of the two parties change in ideologies. Neither provides for those that really want government to work.
The GOP convention was bad. The Democratic convention is already worse. Edward Morrissey (http://theweek.com/authors/edward-morrissey)
To paraphrase Mark Twain's observation on weather, everyone complains about the two-party system — but nobody does anything about it. That has long seemed true of routine complaints about the binary nature of America's national politics, which have been stable for more than 150 years. In 2016, however, the appeal of factional politics appears to have caught up with the Republican and Democratic parties — and at just the precise moment when both seemingly have lost the competence needed to stage a simple, scripted convention.
Tensions between grassroots voters and the party leadership nearly produced a disaster in last week's Republican convention. Despite their defeat in the primaries, so-called #NeverTrump delegates attempted to pass a series of reforms in the Rules Committee, including a rule that would allow delegates at future conventions to "vote their consciences" — in other words, ignore direct democracy. That only attracted a handful of votes in the committee meeting leading up to the convention, but the desire to make a statement about the rules during the main event didn't die with those proposals.
...
The Democrats delighted in gloating about the GOP chaos.
Oops.
This week has already arguably been worse for the Democrats than last week was for the GOP. And it's only Tuesday.
DNC chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz has been tossed out of her own convention and forced to step down as DNC chair. Top Democrats got booed at warm-up events across the spectrum — and even at the convention itself.
...
The lesson from both the Republican convention and the disastrous start of the Democratic convention may well be that the much-predicted end of the two-party system has all but arrived. Both parties have traditionally acted as so-called big tents, where factions have always contended for primacy. In the end, though, party regulars — the agents of representative democracy — understood that unity after a primary boosted everyone's access to influence and power, and held populist passions in check to ensure the best possible broad front for general elections, both for the White House and for Congress.
Now, however, the populists — agents for direct democracy — in both parties may be ready to break those ties and remain independent factions rather than yoke together for a common goal. If so, few have more responsibility for that than Bernie Sanders, who offered a chagrined response to the boos that naturally flowed from his populist "revolution," and Ted Cruz, who made ideology not just superior to unity but made cohesion itself evidence of betrayal. They may well have made themselves obsolete along with the two-party system they long decried. And if one of these parties can figure out how to come together for one last hurrah, they may take it all in 2016.