| Long story short, it's because of abuse of tribalism by the two parties. I'll give you a good example: the 92 presidential debate. Ross Perot, a third party candidate got almost 19 percent of the vote! So what did the two parties do? They worked together to takeover the debates so they could keep third parties from ever getting that close again! Then couple that with carefully crafted lies, usually based on identity politics, that encourage and foment tribalism and division, add in the corrupt primary system, among other spices like blackmail and three letter surveillance of Congress, and you get what we have. This is why it angers me so much every time someone says "both parties are just as corrupt" and is met with a thousand "ways $theotherone is actually the bad one but $ourparty is the only one looking out for the people" and derision for even stating it out loud. After years of pondering this issue I have come to the conclusion we need to, over multiple election cycles, focus on getting third parties and independents who are fully transparent about funding into office, and enough to take away the majority from both parties, hopefully under a coalition of some sort, which would force both parties to come to the table in a more adult like manner. Make no mistake, all three branches of government have suffered similar corruption, but the legislative is supposed to be the closest to the people, so I think it is the place to start (well really the state congresses are) So many of the unconstitutional things which our gov does that goes unchecked is due to both sides of Congress violating their oaths. If we had a congress worth a damn we could use them to self correct... |