I think there is a good case to be made that the third-party impulse surging through town halls and protests can be absorbed into the existing Democratic Party. This is because the working people of this country have figured out neither party is actually listening to their woes nor doing anything to address their issues.
So, a third party could arise to represent the pragmatic, problem-solving middle of the demographic or one of the existing parties could be co-opted to represent these people. I believe that at this time it is much more likely the Democrats will be co-opted. I am seeing an energy at the grassroots that is pointed in the FDR New Deal direction. Bernie is trying to make this happen.
Things are happening in Texas too. Yes, Texas. Take a look at one of Kendall Scudder, the new Chair of Texas Democrats' barn-burning working man stump speeches. A good example is at the Oligarchs' tour recent stop in Ft. Worth. Kendall is the second speaker. People from both parties respond to what is basically a channeling of FDR's stump speeches. Other prominent Texas Democrats, like James Talarico, are signaling they are not on board with DC Democrats.
I see the parallels to the Whigs. I agree Democrats are in the process of breaking up with each other. But, I see a real possibility that all those red states that DC Democrats have been ignoring will rise up and take hold of the Democratic Party.
A person may or may not belong to a political party, but pretty much everyone can be pegged by something along the political spectrum, I suppose full Democratic Socialist to the left and full MAGA to the right. The problem is that neither of these extremes is officially a political party. The Democratic party could try harder to be Americans' center. Amplify that the Republican party is now the far-right MAGA. Own up with DSA (Democratic Socialists of America) that it should stand up as its own political party and is far-left. It is much easier to talk with disaffected Republicans if the Democratic party left side is "progressives". Americans for the most part do not want to associate with either the far left or the far right. They do want to feel welcomed and nurtured for once, though.
The Democratic Party is certainly a coalition, but I don’t think you’re describing it accurately. For one, it has Black voters from progressive to conservative and urban to rural.
Even before Trump & MAGA, the parties had stopped competing in vast swaths of the country. Republicans don’t try to compete in urban areas and Democrats have conceded rural areas. This makes it very hard to defeat unpopular or corrupt incumbents because it must be done in primaries that are almost designed to protect incumbents.
Unfortunately, it’s hard to image what might link what connects rural and urban voters upset with the status quo other than being upset with the status quo.
Great analysis, I am on the same page. I've written a bit about how the realignment has left the parties with a lot of internal inconsistencies that must be resolved over time, which could easily mean current factions split off and/or form new parties.
I do think that a third party is one of those "slowly, then suddenly" things. It won't work until it does. Once there's a niche, something will fill it. So maybe Ross Perot didn't come around at the right time, but lay out the conditions and the party will suddenly materialize. There are always attempts at a third way (e.g. Andrew Yang). Trump himself could be considered a third party, but instead he just coopted the existing Republican infrastructure.
Thinking about a third party in terms of winning or even challenging a presidential election is the wrong metric. A third party should be focused on winning a small handful of House seats to force a coalition government.
We're only about 30 months removed from a time where Democrats had control of both Houses of Congress and the Presidency. We're only about six months removed from the Trump inauguration.
It's much more likely change will come from shifts within the parties than from the rise of a third party.
Both parties have shifted positions *substantially* over the last 10 years and they are capable of shifting back.
To make a falsifiable prediction: I think we will not see meaningful third parties *at least* though the next three Congressional elections (26, 28, 30).
Actually, analysis of 92 shows that Perot took equal amounts of votes away from both Clinton and Bush. Nate Silver did a whole video about this a few years back.
I think there is a good case to be made that the third-party impulse surging through town halls and protests can be absorbed into the existing Democratic Party. This is because the working people of this country have figured out neither party is actually listening to their woes nor doing anything to address their issues.
So, a third party could arise to represent the pragmatic, problem-solving middle of the demographic or one of the existing parties could be co-opted to represent these people. I believe that at this time it is much more likely the Democrats will be co-opted. I am seeing an energy at the grassroots that is pointed in the FDR New Deal direction. Bernie is trying to make this happen.
Things are happening in Texas too. Yes, Texas. Take a look at one of Kendall Scudder, the new Chair of Texas Democrats' barn-burning working man stump speeches. A good example is at the Oligarchs' tour recent stop in Ft. Worth. Kendall is the second speaker. People from both parties respond to what is basically a channeling of FDR's stump speeches. Other prominent Texas Democrats, like James Talarico, are signaling they are not on board with DC Democrats.
I see the parallels to the Whigs. I agree Democrats are in the process of breaking up with each other. But, I see a real possibility that all those red states that DC Democrats have been ignoring will rise up and take hold of the Democratic Party.
We'll see.
Nice piece, even if it pains me to see Perot's third party runs labeled as "obscure" when those still feel like relatively recent elections to me.
I did notice a small error - you refer to MAGA's "endemic anti-nativism" but obviously "anti" isn't correct there.
Thanks. And thanks for the heads up-- yes, that was a boo-boo I missed in my 30 second glance of editing. It has now been fixed.
A person may or may not belong to a political party, but pretty much everyone can be pegged by something along the political spectrum, I suppose full Democratic Socialist to the left and full MAGA to the right. The problem is that neither of these extremes is officially a political party. The Democratic party could try harder to be Americans' center. Amplify that the Republican party is now the far-right MAGA. Own up with DSA (Democratic Socialists of America) that it should stand up as its own political party and is far-left. It is much easier to talk with disaffected Republicans if the Democratic party left side is "progressives". Americans for the most part do not want to associate with either the far left or the far right. They do want to feel welcomed and nurtured for once, though.
The Democratic Party is certainly a coalition, but I don’t think you’re describing it accurately. For one, it has Black voters from progressive to conservative and urban to rural.
Even before Trump & MAGA, the parties had stopped competing in vast swaths of the country. Republicans don’t try to compete in urban areas and Democrats have conceded rural areas. This makes it very hard to defeat unpopular or corrupt incumbents because it must be done in primaries that are almost designed to protect incumbents.
Unfortunately, it’s hard to image what might link what connects rural and urban voters upset with the status quo other than being upset with the status quo.
Great analysis, I am on the same page. I've written a bit about how the realignment has left the parties with a lot of internal inconsistencies that must be resolved over time, which could easily mean current factions split off and/or form new parties.
I do think that a third party is one of those "slowly, then suddenly" things. It won't work until it does. Once there's a niche, something will fill it. So maybe Ross Perot didn't come around at the right time, but lay out the conditions and the party will suddenly materialize. There are always attempts at a third way (e.g. Andrew Yang). Trump himself could be considered a third party, but instead he just coopted the existing Republican infrastructure.
Agree 100%
Thinking about a third party in terms of winning or even challenging a presidential election is the wrong metric. A third party should be focused on winning a small handful of House seats to force a coalition government.
This seems pretty clearly wrong to me.
We're only about 30 months removed from a time where Democrats had control of both Houses of Congress and the Presidency. We're only about six months removed from the Trump inauguration.
It's much more likely change will come from shifts within the parties than from the rise of a third party.
Both parties have shifted positions *substantially* over the last 10 years and they are capable of shifting back.
To make a falsifiable prediction: I think we will not see meaningful third parties *at least* though the next three Congressional elections (26, 28, 30).
Actually, analysis of 92 shows that Perot took equal amounts of votes away from both Clinton and Bush. Nate Silver did a whole video about this a few years back.