emazur
11-03-2009, 05:29 PM
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/02/opinion/02douthatsub.html?_r=3&hp
But there’s more that such parties could accomplish. They could provide a counterweight to the corruption associated with one-party rule, whether in solidly red states or deep-blue cities. They could get unorthodox candidates elected, and win hearings for unorthodox ideas. And they could help fulfill the promise of federalism, by organizing themselves around local particularities, rather than the national political divide.
Imagine if Bloomberg, instead of using New York’s Republican Party as a flag of convenience, had spent his mayoralty building up a permanent third force in city politics — a good-government party, modeled after the 19th-century Mugwumps, that could provide a civic-minded counterweight to the Democratic machine.
Or imagine if California’s famously polarized legislature included several smaller parties — Libertarians, Socialists, Social Conservatives — capable of forming coalitions with either the left or the right, so that every budgetary debate didn’t pit a bloated Democratic majority against an intransigent Republican rump.
But there’s more that such parties could accomplish. They could provide a counterweight to the corruption associated with one-party rule, whether in solidly red states or deep-blue cities. They could get unorthodox candidates elected, and win hearings for unorthodox ideas. And they could help fulfill the promise of federalism, by organizing themselves around local particularities, rather than the national political divide.
Imagine if Bloomberg, instead of using New York’s Republican Party as a flag of convenience, had spent his mayoralty building up a permanent third force in city politics — a good-government party, modeled after the 19th-century Mugwumps, that could provide a civic-minded counterweight to the Democratic machine.
Or imagine if California’s famously polarized legislature included several smaller parties — Libertarians, Socialists, Social Conservatives — capable of forming coalitions with either the left or the right, so that every budgetary debate didn’t pit a bloated Democratic majority against an intransigent Republican rump.