this post was submitted on 17 Jul 2025
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[–] Canconda@lemmy.ca 83 points 15 hours ago (4 children)
  1. Because first past the post electoral systems always result in a 2 party system due to defensive voting.

  2. Because Americans didn't listen to George Washington, when during his farewell address he strongly cautioned against "alternate domination" of a 2 party system.

  3. Because Americans are woefully uneducated, dis-interested, and preoccupied.

[–] dylanmorgan@sh.itjust.works 11 points 12 hours ago (2 children)

There’s some structural reasons (the senate, primarily) that American politics will almost inevitably devolve into two parties.

If I could do one thing to fix American politics it would be to abolish the senate, which gives low population states an insanely unbalanced level of influence over national politics.

[–] some_guy@lemmy.sdf.org 9 points 12 hours ago (1 children)

It drives me ls me crazy that Alaska gets the same amount of senate votes as California when we’re fifty times their population.

[–] dylanmorgan@sh.itjust.works 9 points 12 hours ago

Wyoming too, which has even fewer people than Alaska.

[–] Canconda@lemmy.ca 2 points 12 hours ago (1 children)

(the senate, primarily)

Fair point! In Canada our senate is appointed by the Prime Minister and the position is lifetime. They rarely reject bills from the lower house.

[–] dylanmorgan@sh.itjust.works 5 points 12 hours ago (1 children)

Wow, I didn’t realize there even was a Canadian senate, I only ever hear about parliament and figured it was all MPs.

[–] Canconda@lemmy.ca 2 points 12 hours ago

Exactly lol. All commonwealths have an upper and lower house just like the USA. I believe their senates are appointed as well, though I have not verified that.

[–] Goodmorningsunshine@lemmy.world 20 points 14 hours ago (1 children)

And because now that it's entrenched, the two parties will collude even past the death of the country to keep it that way

[–] AngryRobot@lemmy.world 15 points 13 hours ago

This comment from another post here on Lemmy says it all.

I was listening to the 5-4 podcast recently and they repeatedly stressed the point that Trump has lost ≈90% of lower court decisions and won ≈90% of Supreme Court decisions, which is an absurd swing. I’ll try to dig up a source on it though. Still it’s blatantly obvious that the SC has completely abandoned the rule of law and the constitution.

Without rule of law, we're no longer a country.

[–] Viking_Hippie@lemmy.dbzer0.com 5 points 11 hours ago

Because first past the post electoral systems always result in a 2 party system due to defensive voting.

Nope. FPTP is the norm worldwide and two party systems very much the exception. Even in the US, it's only been the last third or so of the country's history that two have managed to become so all-conquering in spite of being so unrepresentative.

George Washington, when during his farewell address he strongly cautioned against "alternate domination" of a 2 party system.

Pretty sure he was very much against the concept of political parties in general, rather than having any preference as to how many.

But yeah, the two major parties HAVE pretty much embodied all his worries and more..

Because Americans are woefully uneducated, dis-interested, and preoccupied.

That's a big part of the problem, sure, but the issues of regulatory capture and the two parties themselves being in charge of how the entire system works (including the barriers to entry for everyone else) is MUCH more critical.

[–] TachyonTele@piefed.social 3 points 14 hours ago

Didn't Jackson warn about point 2 as well? Or was it Jefferson? Someone did, and it also went unheeded (or used as a blueprint.)