Forum: Is It Time For A Third Party?

Every week on Monday morning , the Council and our invited guests weigh in at the Watcher's Forum, short takes on a major issue of the day, the culture, or daily living. This week's question: Is It Time For A Third Party?


Fausta's Blog : Hell, no!


Bookworm Room : It's time to take over the GOP, but not to divide it so that the Democrats can conquer.

The Glittering Eye :No. Duverger's Law is the rule-of-thumb in political science that says that two party systems ultimately emerge in plurality rule systems with single member districts while proportional representation systems tend to be multi-party.

In other words the conditions for a third party can't be favorable without electoral reform.

I think we're either nearing a Constitutional Convention or an actual rebellion.


The Razor : Only if it replaces the Republican Party.


JoshuaPundit : I see the majority of the American people as being between a rock and a hard place.

On the one hand, the Democrats have truly become what Barack Obama and George Soros wanted to create - an ultra Left, corrupt socialist party utterly opposed to most of the Constitution with suicidal views on  national security and illegal migration. And for good measure, a nice side order of fiscal irresponsibility, ultra high taxation, and exacerbated racial unrest.

It is exactly the kind of party a corrupt snake like Mrs. Clinton was born to lead. And the fact that someone with her record and moral character has at least a 50% chance of polluting the Oval Office with her presence is a grim testimony to the state of our politics and our Fourth Estate.

On the other hand, we have the Republican Party, whose leadership long ago ceased to represent anyone except itself, let alone the people whom dutifully voted for it and gave it majorities in congress that were marketed to them as what was needed to stop the dangerous decline of the country. Here, we have a whole infrastructure of politicians and elites who essentially regard the people they supposedly represent as a damned nuisance who should shut up and simply get behind whatever they've decided this year's product with an 'R' on it is going to be.

The whole situation resembles nothing so much as a famous Simpson's cartoon where two space aliens, Kang and Kodos seek to conquer and enslave America by posing as the two presidential candidates:



As far as the GOP goes, it's gotten so toxic that the Republican establishment is signalling openly that if the peasants are so uppity as to pick Ted Cruz, Donald Trump or anyone else who's unwilling to go along with their agenda, they'll try and sandbag them by having a brokered convention to pick one of their own chosen ones. And if that doesn't work, they're actually prepared to do whatever they can to throw the election to the Democrats and try and use the old tired formula again in 2020.

So, a third party? Lots of pros and cons.

The way the system is set up, it's very tough to get on the ballot in all fifty states let alone set up the infrastructure to compete nationally. The obvious historical precedent is that of the Whigs, who imploded over the slavery issue and gave birth to the Republicans. The fledgling Republican Party lost their first election badly,in 1854. They won the next one, in 1860, but it's not usually remembered that there were five parties competing that year and the GOP squeaked by on a minority vote.

Another con is the obvious one...that splitting the Republican Party almost guarantees that Hillary Clinton will be the next president, with all that entails.

The pros? How about the possibility of no choice? Without an open, vociferous revolt, I don't see the Republican party being taken away from those whom now hold it. Either Trump or Ted Cruz would have to have such an overwhelming amount of delegates as to make a brokered convention impossible, and there's no way of forcing people whom despise them and their supporters to work to get a Cruz or a Trump elected. At best, many of them may sit on their hands and do little or nothing and at worse they will simply vote for Mrs. Clinton as more than one of them have suggested.

Is it possible to win the White House without their support? It all depends on how many of them dial out, how fed up the American people are, how successful outright voter fraud is and how the campaign itself goes. These things can hinge on small events. The way I see it, at this point in time Mrs. Clinton has a probable 237 electoral votes going in, including the entire West Coast, Hawaii, New Mexico, Minnesota, Illinois, DC, Maryland, Delaware, New Jersey, New York and all of New England except perhaps New Hampshire. And that assumes that the Democrats don't also take Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan, Wisconsin,Colorado, Nevada, Florida, Virginia or North Carolina. Pennsylvania and either Michigan, North Carolina or Virginia alone give her the winning number of 270. It isn't an impossible map in 2016, but it's no picnic. And there's a distinct possibility it may be our last real election as a Republic.

I'm not trying to be discouraging here. The map can get better depending on events, the GOP elephant might pull together and rouse itself for one more charge with the first real conservative candidate since Ronaldus Maximus (perhaps with a more 'moderate' VP as a sop to the Establishment, which is usually how these things get done). And we maybe able to start rebuilding the country again.

But if the GOP implodes because the establishment tries to sabotage a conservative candidate, or because they succeed one way or the other in giving us a Kang or Kodos choice, a third party isn't a choice. It's a necessity.

Greg Aydt, Rhymes With Right : I'm starting to think yes -- and I say this as someone who has spent the last 35 years as an active Republican and the last 15 as an elected member of my county Republican Executive Committee.

Let's look at things. The Democrats have moved so far left that they have become Euro-socialists even as the Euro-socialists move to the right because their experiment has been failing for some time. The Republicans are on the verge of being taken over by latter-day Know-Nothings seeking to close the borders, impose religious tests for office and (in some cases) proposing secession -- an existential threat that rivals Watwrgatw. So tell me -- where is there room for those of us who occupy the center-right that was exemplified by Ronald Reagan? I'm beginning to wonder if there needs to be some new vehicle for the sane center of the United States.

The problem, of course, consists in two realities.

First, the two parties have rigged our nation's election laws to keep third parties marginalized by limiting ballot access. The major parties have automatic access to the ballot, while everyone else faces onerous signature or financial requirements to do so.

Second, in our system it is virtually impossible for more than two parties to thrive in the long term. In the last 25 presidential elections there have been four major efforts at running a major third party candidate for president. Each of those parties has not only failed to win, but has failed to even field a significant candidate four years later as one or the other major parties shifted enough to absorb most of the insurgent party's voters.

What I guess I'm saying is that there is little chance of such a party making a go of it in the long term. The best that could be hoped for is that one or the other party might be dragged away from the ideological precipice on which they stand.


GrEaT sAtAn"S gIrLfRiEnD : No and no. The third part meme sounds great perhaps from a purely partisan view (naturally), yet it's a path to defeat and the inauguration of HRC as the 45th President of the United States.


Laura Rambeau Lee,Right Reason : Unfortunately the time has run out for a third party to be an effective option for the 2016 presidential race. What we have today are essentially two progressive big government parties. The Democrat Party exists to advance the socialist/communist agenda. The Republican Party is not much better and has lost all direction by trying to bring in non-conservatives they believe they need to win a majority. The party may be the friend of big business but they refuse to take a stand for the social issues and traditions of American culture which have made this country great.

After delivering a Republican House majority in 2010 and Senate majority in 2014 one would think the Republicans would acknowledge the hard work and commitment of the conservatives within the party and try to incorporate more of their values and address their issues. Instead we have been taken for granted and used to advance the power of the GOP. In 2012 they ran Mitt Romney against the wishes of most conservatives and failed to defeat President Obama, which should have been easy considering the actions and scandals piling up during his first term. They continue to treat conservatives as a small inconsequential group within the party even though we have been their staunchest supporters.

Since I do not believe a third party is a viable option at this time, we conservatives have to demand the Republican Party accept the candidate we choose; a candidate who can communicate with all Americans and show them where we as a country have gone off course and how he or she will effect true change by restoring American pride, traditions, and culture. Obama promised hope and change but people are realizing the change he promised was not what they envisioned, and many have lost hope. We need someone who can help restore to Americans their spirit of ingenuity, self-determination, freedom, and independence. We need someone who will return government to its rightful place in America; a government that serves the people.

  Well, there you have it.

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