The cry for a third party, to me, is a healthy sign, as a third party would offer another option for Americans, strengthening democracy. One thing that is not so healthy, however, is something I read from the guardian article that we read on the shutdown. The Guardian wrote...
"Another Chinese tourist, on the National Mall with his fiancée, said he had not followed the politics of the fiscal crisis closely. "But this is what happens when you have two parties," he quipped. "One party is better.”"This is a scary idea to me. A one party system may get things done much faster because there is no opposition, however, it is practically a dictatorship. The system of checks and balances may stop the government from operating at its full potential, but that is the way of a democracy. I find this very interesting, as I am learning about different political and government structures, as well as, democracy versus dictatorships in my world politics class.
One thing I have heard through most media outlets, including ESPN last night, is that it is the Republicans fault for shutting down the government because they failed to compromise. I can empathize with that view of the situation because it could certainly seem like that, (I also know that I may be a little biased, since I do consider myself a conservative at the end of the day) but I do not think that the Republicans were the ones refusing to compromise. Democrats, including the president, got everything they wanted out of the shutdown. Also, every bill written up by Republicans in the house was put down by Democrats in the senate. In addition to this, it was said many times that the president did not want to negotiate with Republicans. So Republicans were not the ones who were unwilling to negotiate, and ended up getting little to nothing (except for blame) out of the bill that finally ended the government shutdown and extended the debt ceiling.
As for the debt ceiling, it should not have been raised. The U.S. national debt is currently over $17,000,000,000,000. That is more than our current GDP. The current debt per citizen is nearly $54,000 and the current debt per taxpayer is nearly $149,000. The national debt is growing as we speak and it must be paid off eventually. It is time our government takes responsibility and only spends what they bring in. They must be held accountable now because the future is going to be rough with this debt hanging over for generations-to-come.
I agree that a third party or more parties would help American politics. Although, if the new third party is the Tea Party or the Libertarians, I don't think that would do a lot of good, especially the Tea Party. I think the Tea Party would only exacerbate the polarization problem. Several more parties, or a break up of the current two parties would be best, and perhaps help depolarize. This may allow some of the more moderate parties to work together and prevent some of these gridlock situations and bring some original proposals to the table.
ReplyDeleteI do agree the "debt ceiling" as fake as it is, should not have been raised. The discussion shouldn't be what new fake debt limit should be set for ourselves, I think it should be what spending are we going to cut to live within our means. Some sort of bipartisan agreement needs to be made that cuts spending across the board as much as possible.
I don't know whose "fault" it was the government shutdown happened, although the consensus does seem to be that the republicans lost that standoff. Again, who has the "fault" is a far less important issue than the eminent bankruptcy, default, and destruction of the USD that is coming if change in budget management doesn't happen.
I do agree with the "Debt Ceiling" topic you mentioned. It's not right to just raise the ceiling everytime we get close and the government needs to take a stand. Also the debt per citizen and taxpayer is extraordinary high. I cant believe that the government has payed over 50,000 dollars per person in the U.S. The spending needs to be stopped and the house and senate need to come together.
ReplyDeleteTanner, good point. I agree that it would be good for the political system to be broken up to individual sections of each party. That would definitely mix things up. I was just trying to offer some type of alternative. As what we have right now seems to be much of the same from both parties in the political establishment. They each increase debt like crazy when in office, as well as increase the scope of government in one way or another. Something different would be more productive, I believe.
ReplyDeleteJeff, I too picked up on that one frightening line from the tourist. It's refreshing to remember that his comment is not just reprehensible but just factually wrong. This does not happen because of a two party system. Such things happen in the American version of democracy, one that allows for divided government. In Parliamentary systems, by definition and at all times control of parliament is united with the control of the government, so there is no crisis (which in all systems, including our own, rests on the failure by the legislature to fund the government. Parliamentary systems, derived from the so-called "Westminster" British system, specifically evolved to avoid this thing from happening).
ReplyDeleteParliamentary systems are also a bit more amenable to third parties, as they can participate in forming governments (the current UK government is a coalition of two parties, for example). But without proportional representation (you vote for a party list of candidates, and the amount from each is dependent on a portion of the vote) conventional wisdom says a third party will never really work out. It just takes away votes from an established part, in which case people learn simply to vote for the closest establishment party that represents them.
Divided government, as you note, is indeed quite messy. The Senate did indeed mostly vote down the House's bills. However, for divided government to be a possibility at all, a system needs strong norms about compromise. Republicans claimed that Obama would not compromise, but he and his allies would counter that the historic norm is that budget fights should be about budget fights. Without a norm that we don't refuse to fund everything if we don't get one particular thing, the whole system quickly collapses. On the other side of the equation, though, Obama may end up suspending the individual mandate anyway in effect because of the problems with the website, so the demands of the Republicans may not seem so irrational in the end (it's just that they had them in mind before these problems emerged).