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b_b  ·  3838 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: Why the recovery isn't helping Democrats in the midterm polls

You're looking at it incorrectly. The two party system has little or nothing to do with party affiliation, loyalty, or team spirit. It has only to do with the way elections are decided. In our case, we have district voting in which the candidate with the most votes wins (which doesn't always even mean a simple plurality). In this situation, a two party system is a mathematical inevitability. People can't be blamed for it; elections are the simplest game theory we all play.

On an unrelated topic, I'm not sure a multiparty platform is any better, because in the end a coalition had to be formed in a parliamentary system, so even though there can be many parties, there still is a ruling group and an opposition. Any democracy becomes a de facto two party rule, even if the alliances are more fluid. The result, however, is similar. It's not as if Europe has avoided our economic woes.