The only way out of this mess is a third party that refuses corporate funding in any form

[Phoebe Loosinhouse]

and makes that part of their ongoing qualifiers to retain party support once someone is elected.

We need a renewed idealism that the government exists to serve the PEOPLE and not the corporations and that there are smart, committed people out there who would be willing to renounce the entrenched system of bribery we have in place at the moment in order to run as candidates of the New Party.

Then we need people to come behind this party and put their money where their mouth is and support generously so that eventually we can clean house and reclaim the government. Maybe term limits as part of this party structure as well. The Founders always had in mind the citizen legislator who would serve honorably and then return to the farm, the factory, or whatever their previous vocation.

Our major problem is the structural integrity of the system overall so that's where I think we need to address our energies.

Until something like this happens, the minority of Representatives that ARE working on the people's behalf will just continue to be overrun and out muscled by the bought and paid for.

[cali]

1. our system really doesn't support that. wish it did.

[LiberalEsto]

2. We tried that with the Citizens Party

Back in the 1970s-80s the Citizens Party had a few successes in state and local elections but got nowhere with its presidential candidates, Barry Commoner, Jesse Jackson and Sonia Johnson. (I can't recall if they ran other candidates.)
The Citizens Party aimed to limit the power of corporations. Unfortunately the public didn't seem to feel the need for it.
With all the corporate abuses that have taken place in recent decades, I would think more people recognize that unbridled corporatism is a major problem. However there is still fear that a third party campaign would cost the Democrats votes and hand the government back to the Republicans for more of the misery we endured with Bush I and II.

[Phoebe Loosinhouse]

4. Ahead of their time. More people are enlightened to the issue now.

As to your other point,you would expect that this theoretical Party would align itself the majority of the time with Democrats. It would make us a little more Parliamentarian and not just 2 monoliths that trade power back and forth.

[saltpoint]

15. Commoner was a very impressive voice in that election. Your analysis is

right on in saying that there was no public ear for what he had to say. I heard several of his addresses, including the nomination acceptance address in Cleveland that year.

John Anderson did make some inroads but even he could not crack what -- 7% or so? -- of the electorate.

[LiberalEsto]

20. Thanks

I was a member of the Citizens Party in NJ for several years. We were all fired up and really thought we could make a difference. Then the grim reality of Reaganism sank in.

[saltpoint]

28. The Reagan landslide depressed a hell of a lot of us. What a dreary

election outcome.

The mainstrea media of course censored Barry Commoner's comment that the censorship of third party voices in this country was "bullshit." That's too strong a term for the nightly news.

But it was accurate just the same.

[fasttense]

3. You're wrong. There is another way.

We can march on Washington and stay there until we get what we need.

One day of protest ain't going to cut it. We need to live in DC for a month. A rotating group of 50,000 people for a month might finally get some news coverage and make our government listen to us. Just like Cindy Sheehan did outside the Crawford Texas.

So, how do we organize it?????

[Stevenmarc]

5. Politicians that don't take corporate funding, we can call it The Unicorn Party

[deutsey]

19. LOL

It's a bitter "LOL", but a good laugh nonetheless.

[sea four]

The problem with that is

that the party which spends the most money usually wins the elections, because they have more money to run better campaigns. Leftists are at a big disadvantage because of this. There aren't too many progressive or socialist billionaires, but there are plenty who are right wing.

[Le Taz Hot]

6. I've been saying this for years.

We can "sit-in" in DC forever and a day and nothing's going to change because the major political parties are only cogs in the wheel of the entire power/money grab. These legislators know that the party faithful will come to their rescue every time with their, "He/She's better than the other guy/gal" meme.

[Echo In Light]

16. +1

[Skink]

7. Public financing of elections.

[sea four]

8. Yeah but

how do you get this group of legislators to pass public financing, when they are benefiting from the way the system is set up now? We need a non-corrupt congress to pass a public financing bill. But we don't have that, and it's hard to get a non-corrupt congress without publicly financed elections. It's like a vicious circle.

This is a really hard problem to solve, this control of our political system by corporate interests. The American people need to wake up. That's what needs to happen first, I think. Perhaps we could wake them up somehow...

[Phoebe Loosinhouse]

9. Which is exactly my point. Those benefiting from the current system

of payoffs and bribes will be in no hurry to reform the system. So rather than expecting the completely impossible, I think it is more likely than a drive for reform coming from the outside has more chance for success and it would take a fair amount of time.

A third party would be ignored by the media and treated as though it did not exist. Their candidate could WIN a primary and all the ink and TV time would be about the also-rans. They would not be invited to any debates. Their candidates will be ridiculed as "fringe""radical" "socialist".

But what if people just accepted all the above and just ran the most subversive, committed campaign EVER that completely bypassed all the standard models? If a candidate did not get on the ballot, WRITE IN!! Let the campaign be powered by the Internet. The power is available, the level of disillusionment is at critical mass. It would be wild to upend the status quo entrenched interests!

[Nicholas D Wolfwood]

12. I don't think a lot of them would think of themselves as "benefitting" from this system.

Constant fundraising is not really something any of them want to do. Why do you think they accept corporate funds in the first place? It's simply easier/more feasible than trying to drum up $50 a head to fund a multi-million dollar campaign every couple of years.

I think your biggest problems are A) fear of the unknown for what that system would actually produce; B) fear of loopholes that would have the potential of breaking more than 200 years of peaceful transfer of power (don't underestimate this one); C) conservatives who don't like public funding for anything; and D) a Supreme Court challenge.

[dysfunctional press]

10. but how is that going to resolve the polanski issue..?

:shrug:

[Nicholas D Wolfwood]

11. Lemme guess - your Green Party is the answer, no? (nt)

[Phoebe Loosinhouse]

17. I am not a member of the Green Party and I have never voted Green Party

so not sure why you're calling it "my" Green Party.

BUT the inability of the Democratic Party to unite and work together on behalf of the American public when thousands are literally dying each and every day due to lack of coverage, makes me far, far more receptive to any reasonable third Party effort in the future. If Howard Dean started one, I would join tomorrow.

[kctim]

13. Pipe dream

There is no way such a party could have enough clout to win anything when the population is pretty much split on what they define as "working on the people's behalf." Do you really think anybody, left or right, is going to vote against someone they agree with because others think they are bought and paid for? No chance. And the current re-election rate of incumbents proves that.

[saltpoint]

14. Respectfully disagree. The apparatus and cultural context are not in

place for a successful third party movement in the United States at this time.

The most successful third party efforts in our history have all failed.

It's true to say some fared better than others but more true to say that the balance of power at the lever-level did not change, even when the third party nominee was an attractive, or vigorous, or interesting, or influential candidate.

The U.S., IMO, is too anti-intellectual to support a climate in which third parties might join public discourse as equal entities.

[dionysus]

18. not possible in a de facto two party system. tilting at windmills doesnt work.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

21. It won't happen until progressives stop buying the "not as bad" meme.

And start voting for candidates that actually represent them.

"I never submitted the whole system of my opinions to the creed of any party of men whatever, in religion, in philosophy, in politics, or in anything else, where I was capable of thinking for myself. Such an addiction is the last degradation of a free and moral agent. If I could not go to heaven but with a party, I would not go there at all." --Thomas Jefferson to Francis Hopkinson, 1789.

"Were parties here divided merely by a greediness for office,...to take a part with either would be unworthy of a reasonable or moral man." --Thomas Jefferson to William Branch Giles, 1795.

“Always vote for principle, though you may vote alone, you may cherish the sweetest reflection that your vote is never lost." --John Quincy Adams

[treestar]

22. Obama did the direct internet funding

Over time, IMO this will take care of itself.

People are always going to think of their own jobs first, though. Corporations employ a lot of people. That's why you can't drum up this generalized "corporations are the demon" argument, might as well go somewhere else and be more effective.

[Romulox]

23. Right, but he's not governing as someone who owes anything to the "netroots"

I think you've missed the point entirely. We're not talking about how to gin up more money for the established parties. :hi:

[Phoebe Loosinhouse]

24. "Corporations employ a lot of people" So what? Does that give them the right

to purchase our government? The pervasive and corrupting influence of some specific industries and corporations is well known. I am glad that corporations employ people. But I think they should be subject to strict oversight and regulation since they have proved themselves incapable of the "self-regulation" that Republicans like to promote.

[treestar]

25. The people who work there

in the little jobs - they don't want to purchase the government (that's another question - why do voters vote for candidates who spend the most money? - that's a weakness we have to deal with in ourselves) - but they want to keep their jobs.

I know this once having a job that was supposedly threatened by legislation - we were naturally against that legislation and our employer reminded us daily that our doors would close and we'd be out of a job.

If you worked for a big company, you'd naturally be averse to anything that you thought might cause you to lose your job. That's just the way people are.

[jotsy]

26. I have contended since the early 90's that the two party system is not in our best interests

But a single third party isn't likely to work on a long term basis.

I've heard Thom Hartmann speak to how the founders warned against any kind of political alliances that might serve to create division among the governed. Case in point, a successful third party with just a 35% majority could decide things for the other two thirds.

Both current schools of political thought have pimped us out, because we're getting screwed, and they make big bucks letting the corporations have their monetary way with us. Can't you see them making their podium rants donning one of those legendary feltish, feathered fedoras?

The two party stronghold is like a road with high walls on both sides, what I think we need to do is poke holes in them with a variety of "off" party candidates or designated independents. Come November 2010, if we make it to that when in tact, target any HOR (now isn't that ironic!) member whose been there say since before...2005, except of course, for Dennis Kucinich, who I believe to be a true champion of the people. The senate should also be purged of longstanding sell outs.

The internet has proven a great tool of communication and should be promoted as a means to limit the need for the gross amount of money being poured into a public process by private interests.

[WCGreen]

27. When you have winner take all elections set up in defined districts,

it is hard to see where a third party could really be effective.

It would eventually, if successful, attract people from the other two parties and then we would fall back into a two party system.