makes sense. but at the same time, the 2 party system does seem to prevent a crazy minority party from winning. i mean, let's talk about country x. let's say country x has 3 liberal parties (a, b, and c) and one ultraconservative reactionary party (d). the majority of the country might find party d to be insane bullshit, but if the liberal vote is spread out between a, b, and c, d might somehow win. i really don't know the specifics on what's happening in iran, but i kinda wondered if that's what happened there.
Crazy minority wins do not happen in Western democracies, or if they do, they don't last for long. But you can go ahead and support a two-tiered state if you think that's better than something more democratic. I hear this all the time from Americans.
i'm such an asshole american. lol like i probably didnt say this time, i didnt put any research into it. but, since you seem to think 2 party system=bad. i'm wondering...why?
Because what if I don't drink Pepsi or Coca-Cola? I should have the right to drink water, or to make lemonade if I want as well. Two-party states are extremely limited in flavouring, or they become extreme. They pit two very distinct groups of people against each other in a socio-political climate, when government has to run on stabilized majority consorted power. It breeds "Us vs. Them" mentality, it maintains a deflated, stagnant, lethargic and moderate status quo in a modern environment that calls for change, and it doesn't respond well to the public at all. I mean, government is supposed to be accountable and responsive to people. It is supposed to react to what the public wants. But in a two-party state, the power of the people is highly limited - because half of them are being ignored constantly on a complex issue that say, the parties decide they want to pass something as policy. That is to say, the great big party machines are continually requiring the public to be indirectly involved in a process that leaves them with a choice between Coke or Pepsi. It's like making that consumer choice on re-feed.
i dunno. i see what you're saying, but doesn't it at least risk allowing a crazy minority to win? what if there was like a vote for or vote against option? or something like a sports tournament voting process where the national leaders needed to be voted on a couple times, for the main vote to come down to two parties. or even a 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and 4th choice option.
If you are afraid of a crazy minority winning then you should be fully endorsing either Coke or Pepsi wholeheartedly. There is a risk of crazy Coke winning even if you voted Pepsi. You take the same risk with your vote as you would if you had more flavours to vote for. I don't agree with a showdown voting system, because that would defeat the purpose of allowing someone's vote to count and represent them as a constituency. I mean, I could be voting for a party candidate in 4 rounds of voting and not even have my vote count to represent my choice for a national leader. It's indirectly manipulating democratic choice into two distinct categories at distinctive opportunities. What good is it to be apart of a party if you get defeated in the third round of the political tournament in elections? Selecting a leader of the party should be left exclusively up to the parties. I mean, it's their group of people that should know who they would like to work with as their leader.
yeah, there's always a chance that coke or pepsi will be crazy...but as long as they're both fairly moderate, you reduce that risk. and if your candidate gets knocked out the first round, tough shit. choose the lesser of the rest of the evils. the showdown system does, however, run the risk of knocking out the #2 most popular option right quick. i wasn't talking about selecting the leaders of the party like that. rather, the primary candidates for let's say...how i assume the canadian system works. you've got 4 main parties. the two most liberal run against one another, at the same time as the two most conservative. then the winner of each "bracket" goes for the national seat. i just don't like to see there be even a remote possibility that some psycho reactionary or radical due to the majority's 4th option winning over the majority's 2nd option. but you said that doesn't happen in the western world. why doesn't it? is it our relative economic stability compared to the rest of the world? what if that changed and we ended up with a 1984 or v for vendetta scenario?
Well, surprise, surprise, surprise!!! Took the test and found out I am a left leaning libertarian... Duh.
yay, me too. right there with ghandi, nelson mandela, and the dalai lama Economic Left/Right: -3.00 Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -4.05
Economic Left/Right: 4.25 Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -7.28 I've taken that quiz a few times. Overall, I'd say it's pretty accurate. It has a few loaded question which I will discuss in a moment, but it also has a lot of thought provoking ones. They are presented in simple terms which I fear may cause many people to consider the choice 'obvious' when it really is not. This puts those who oppose control of either in a tight spot. The use of 'responsibility' makes this a weird question because it implies obligation. Delivering a profit to the shareholders is a matter of self-interest, not societal responsibility. Public should be in that sentence before school. A privately owned school can use any method it wants. I wonder how this question affected the scale. I'm not ridiculing it, it just seems like something that wouldn't correlate with political views. This is a question that I fear some people on the 'right' might have agreed to, even though no one in their right mind could agree to such a preposterous statement. Damn that 'always.' Price gouging is good for the corporations, bad for us.
Because radical parties like the Marijuana Party, the Green Party, the Christian Alliance, or the Rhinoceros Party have no real power in Canada. There is no radical fringe power in the Western World that has any real or lengthy power in politics because of the efficiencies that come with elections and democratic balances. No one is scared of these fringe parties at all. They have no real power because they are crazy minority parties.
but couldn't these fringe parties throw the balance off a bit? like people that would have voted liberal, voted green or marijuana. then let's say the only people left are the conservative christians who vote christian this time around seeing their opportunity to make a vote for that party count? i dunno, maybe i'm just being paranoid, but it seems to me that a two party system completely prevents something like this from happening, rather than making it just unlikely.
No, they don't. Name one fringe party in the Western world that has greatly shifted the balance of power?
eh. you might be right. it would be nice to be able to vote for a more liberal party than the democrats. i've always kinda wanted to live in canadia.
Hipstatic Quote: The problem is that most of those that have come here claiming to be ‘libertarians’ have turned out to be right wing. NO, they seem to be right wing from what they say. * Quote: As I’ve said above they seem to think that somehow believing in such things as legalisation of drugs or not being interested one way or the other about gay marriage makes them left wing. As I’ve pointed out it is only considered left wing by them. To me and many others on both left and right they don’t seem exclusively championed by the left. * Quote: But that is rubbish; it just means they are not a traditionally minded conservative (small c). Which is what? The problem I’ve found is that most libertarians don’t seem willing or able to debate their ideas, because whenever they do their right wing bias becomes patently obvious. Many like you here just claim to be not really right wing and saying ‘others’ know what it means. But that doesn’t seem to stop the stance of right wing libertarians being of the right. * Quote: The thing is that I know people that have left wing views and consider themselves left wing who are opposed to the legalisation of drugs for instance. The point is that many right wing libertarians seem to use such things to claim they are not of the right, that is rubbish, they are of the right. * Quote: What makes such libertarians, right wing, is their stance on such things as economic policy, welfare, healthcare, etc – which all seem to favour the interests of wealth over the interests of those in the rest of society. But as I’ve pointed out what they say is right wing – what they claim to say that is not right wing actually isn’t – so they really are just right wingers trying to pretend they’re not. To me it’s a bit dishonest. * If you wish to put down the reasons why this brand of libertarianism isn’t of the right please start a thread on it.
No, it isn't only considered left ' by them'. To most people here, it is considered left. In your mind anyone who deviates from socialist orthodoxy in any way is right wing. I think that's 'the problem'. It is something I often come across with the old school left wing in the UK. Well others here do seem to know what it means, you are the one struggling with it. That is circular logic. No, you are just saying that Lord Balbus has declared that it doesn't count. But that's just your opinion. You seem to think that when you 'point something out' then the debate is over, Balbus has spoken. It isn't. If you insist that libertarian stances on social issues are not "left wing" then fine, but that's not how I see it and neither do many other people here. You seem to have a very simple viewpoint that left is good and right is bad, so if we can just label someone as being right then you can declare yourself the winner and move on to a discussion about how we can build socialism. No. You seem to be the only one struggling with the concept, I don't see why we need to devote an entire thread to that.
Hipstatic Originally Posted by Balbus As I’ve pointed out it is only considered left wing by them. To me and many others on both left and right they don’t seem exclusively championed by the left. I’ve given my reasons for thinking they’re not and used an example – can you give me an actual argument beyond ‘no’? You see ‘considered’ of the left and being of the left isn’t the same. Something my be considered a left wing idea (like drug policy reform) but be based on a completely different mindset. If an idea is based within a right wing philosophical mindset it isn’t of the left. * Quote: Originally Posted by Balbus The problem I’ve found is that most libertarians don’t seem willing or able to debate their ideas, because whenever they do their right wing bias becomes patently obvious. But is supporting Keynesianism a part of socialist orthodoxy? Not according to my Marxist friends. To them it is a capitalist theory. It seems to me you only see a supposed mote in another’s eye while completely ignoring the plank that is in fact sticking out of your own. But the thing is that I’m happy to discuss debate and defend my ideas in an open and honest way, happy to present them up for scrutiny. You on the other hand often seem unwilling to debate you views and when you do and they get criticised you don’t seem able to defend them. I speak my mind and explain what I see. You, like you have here, seem to prefer sneers or snide asides to actual discussion. * Now if we are going to discuss libertarianism please begin another thread.
If something is flat, it's flat. But what if EVERYONE understood "straight" to mean "flat?. Does that make it any less flat? Then what does "straight" mean? If I say "straight" and everyone but you understands that I'm talking about "flat", your misunderstanding of what I say doesn't change what I mean.... Wow, wasn't that enlightening? The stuttering fish has spoken.
