And hence the primary problem with a two party system. We need to end the two party system and allow INDIVIDUALS to run for offices. I didn't realize till a few years ago how hard and expensive it is to get on the ballots in most states for federal positions anyway.

I don't think that the Democratic party "is well on its way". I think it is already there, and has been for a long while.

I think the Republican Party is beyond help.

I thought it might be possible to save the party back during the seventies and into the eighties, but the rise of the DLC and Third Way politics in the party pretty much meant that the party was a sold out corporate whore just like the Republican party. Are there some good individual Dems, yes, but they're getting purged. Is party policy better than Republican party policy, yes, but just and the gap between them is getting smaller and smaller.

looking within the constitution itself.

I can create Hughee99's political party which represents me and only me, for the sole purpose of advancing my personal interests and it is both legitimate and constitutional. I can't think of a reason in the world why anyone other than me would join it, but that doesn't make it illegal either.

I love the sentiment, but made up law is not the basis for a sound argument.

In other words, you would be illegitimate as a national Party.

The Constitution states the desires of the "people", not the desires of one individual. That would be totally irrational. You can argue whether or not it is "legal"? I would say not.

an individual, a group of people, all the people are "the people". I have the right to push my political agenda without the backing of a single other person in this country. I could inject myself into issues in all 50 states if I chose, thus making me a "national party". If a party is legitimate only if it has the backing of ALL the people, there would be (and could be) no political parties since ALL the people rarely agree on something, and when everyone does, you don't need a political party to get it done.

Sorry, I like your spirit, but this argument is a loser.

It says We, the People, and issues and elections are decided by a consensus of the majority. That is why we live in a democratic republic. Not a republic and not a pure democracy but a democratic republic.

or that political parties decide issues and elections.

as best I can tell. Only We, the People.

legal unless otherwise addressed by other laws

..and let Justice Roberts decide. It doesn't matter what the other Justices think. If he says it's a tax, then by golly it's a tax!

It's free speech, free assembly and free association.

With due regard for the minority. That's the Constitution we have.

The majority is a majority of all the people at this point. That includes rich bankers as well as the working poor and indigent. If the candidate of the richest man in America winds up having 50% + 1 vote, and the candidate is legitimate under the terms of the Constitution and the laws that implement it, that's that. The People have spoken.

As for policies and issues, there is no right for parties to decide them, or for the populace to decide them. 99.9% of the populace could be against something, and if our elected representatives vote in favor of it, they're using the power we granted them. We periodically get to withdraw and reassign that power.

This is something that the (R) have trouble understanding currently, the Tea Partiers especially. Declaring themselves to be the true people (TM) and that what others want, and what the elected reps voted for, is unimportant is both silly and isn't how the Republic runs. (Yes, it's a democracy, but not anywhere near a pure majoritarian system. A majoritarian system is one of the best ways of depriving others of rights known.)

How about you?

And, whoever forks over enough money to buy their votes.

Washington's Farewell Address 1796

I have already intimated to you the danger of parties in the State, with particular reference to the founding of them on geographical discriminations. Let me now take a more comprehensive view, and warn you in the most solemn manner against the baneful effects of the spirit of party generally.

This spirit, unfortunately, is inseparable from our nature, having its root in the strongest passions of the human mind. It exists under different shapes in all governments, more or less stifled, controlled, or repressed; but, in those of the popular form, it is seen in its greatest rankness, and is truly their worst enemy.

The alternate domination of one faction over another, sharpened by the spirit of revenge, natural to party dissension, which in different ages and countries has perpetrated the most horrid enormities, is itself a frightful despotism. But this leads at length to a more formal and permanent despotism. The disorders and miseries which result gradually incline the minds of men to seek security and repose in the absolute power of an individual; and sooner or later the chief of some prevailing faction, more able or more fortunate than his competitors, turns this disposition to the purposes of his own elevation, on the ruins of public liberty.

Without looking forward to an extremity of this kind (which nevertheless ought not to be entirely out of sight), the common and continual mischiefs of the spirit of party are sufficient to make it the interest and duty of a wise people to discourage and restrain it.

It serves always to distract the public councils and enfeeble the public administration. It agitates the community with ill-founded jealousies and false alarms, kindles the animosity of one part against another, foments occasionally riot and insurrection. It opens the door to foreign influence and corruption, which finds a facilitated access to the government itself through the channels of party passions. Thus the policy and the will of one country are subjected to the policy and will of another.

There is an opinion that parties in free countries are useful checks upon the administration of the government and serve to keep alive the spirit of liberty. This within certain limits is probably true; and in governments of a monarchical cast, patriotism may look with indulgence, if not with favor, upon the spirit of party. But in those of the popular character, in governments purely elective, it is a spirit not to be encouraged. From their natural tendency, it is certain there will always be enough of that spirit for every salutary purpose. And there being constant danger of excess, the effort ought to be by force of public opinion, to mitigate and assuage it. A fire not to be quenched, it demands a uniform vigilance to prevent its bursting into a flame, lest, instead of warming, it should consume.

Democracy, representative or otherwise, presumes that the people are the mechanism for determining the interests of the people.

If the people were to decide that rule by blood-sucking plutocrats represents "We, the people" then that is what we, the people, say and that's that.

The people are allowed to define their interests insensibly (from your perspective or mine) if they choose.

It only says, We, the People.

In hoping to decrease parties' influence by excluding them from govt, they ensured an extra-governmental 2-party, survival-of-the-richest-party system. Even worse than what they hoped to prevent.

They ignored the nature of people to band together to further their own ends. They had the purest of intentions that resulted in unintended horrific consequences for We The People.

Nothing can change it short of amending it. Never gonna happen.

No matter what the Constitution says or what the Founders meant when they wrote it.

System. There's more accountability and responsibility. But we have what we have.

Some of the people who vote for Republicans would say much same thing you say about them.

"They should be banned as a political operation in this country, not by law, but simply by the lack of participation by their naive supporters."

That would be in line with our Constitution. It happened with the Whigs and it can happen again. They lost their legitimacy.

I do not believe the Republican Party represents the people at all. They get their legitimacy by deceit and naive voters, in my opinion. By our laws and elections, they are legal and legitimate.

Yes, they would say the same thing about us. I think they are wrong. They believe they are taxed too much and that government is too big.

I don't care who or what that party represents, it is legitimate.

If a party cannot compete against another political party in the democratic marketplace of ideas, it does not represent the people and will not be in power. It is through the democratic process that we determine which political parties are representing the will of the people.

That ideal is the very foundation of the United States of America.

Right?

And I have every right to pint out he's a fuckoing bastard asshole who handed the election to George W. Bush.

The entire party is a racket to engineer unconstitutional laws to migrate wealth from the progressive, productive poor to the republican, rapacious elite bastards, as well as to destroy the planet through environmental terrorism. The party can easily be stripped of its legal ability to raise cash, effectively neutering it.

It must be desroyed SOON.

We really do need a one party state.