Forward Party

[BobTheCoward]

It would also rely on the opinions of the population being more homogeneous than they are. If you adopt the most popular opinions on Issue A, Issue B, and Issue C, you'll run into various permutations of "I like their views on Issue A, but I hate their views on Issue B and Issue C, so I'm not going to vote for them." 75% of the population may support each issue, but it's not necessarily the same 75% for each of them.

It is just a matter of more complicated math and many more variables. I wonder what that middle compromise looks like and how big it actually is.

 

[Brainster]

A centrist party sounds great, but unfortunately there are few passionate moderates.

 

[Suddenly]

It's funny how all of these supposed third parties are still trying to work within the A or B political system we have.

I also like how they are going straight to a national election and convention instead of doing the leg work of getting candidates elected in local elections. Ya, they should totally be taken seriously.

That's the way to do it, really. Find a Ross Perot just less crazy and quitty and go from there. Know going in that you aren't trying to be a third option. The idea is to become the new A and let the old A and B fight over being B.

This party just seems like taking everything that makes people uninterested in politics and distilling it into one bottle.

 

[dudalb]

"Centrist" party. A bunch of wannabe celebrities trying to make corporate shilling look cool.

Hardlinr ideologue hates moderates. What a surpriae.

ANybody who does not demand government seizure of all businesses is probably a corporate shill in your book.

I am skeptical about this party..it does smell a little of a Yang ego trip...but the disdain that the hardliners in both parties have toward moderates is not a good thing for Democracy.

 

[dudalb]

That website is so vague and esoteric you’d think it was a William Gibson novel.

I have to agree, and I am strongly in favor of a viable centrist party.
Yang involvment makes me skeptical.
But I note the hatred for centrist in general I am seeing in this forum.
Sort of a Bizzaro version of the Trumpers yelling about RINOs.

 

[kookbreaker]

I wonder how they differentiate themselves from the Alliance party, besides being ultra-vague that is.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alliance_Party_(United_States)

 

[Suddenly]

I have to agree, and I am strongly in favor of a viable centrist party.
Yang involvment makes me skeptical.
But I note the hatred for centrist in general I am seeing in this forum.
Sort of a Bizzaro version of the Trumpers yelling about RINOs.

People like Yang and Whitman think that their idea of a centrist party is viable because those are the people they see at cocktail parties.

There is a viable centrist party. A party of feckless compromise and slavish devotion to the status quo. It already has majority support but suffers from the anti-democratic features of US politics but does very little to address that.

Biden was already making deals to put anti-abortion judges on the federal bench. If these so called moderate GOPers that would support a 3rd party would just make the leap to the Democratic Party already they'd have exactly the party they want.

 

[dudalb]

People like Yang and Whitman think that their idea of a centrist party is viable because those are the people they see at cocktail parties.

There is a viable centrist party. A party of feckless compromise and slavish devotion to the status quo. It already has majority support but suffers from the anti-democratic features of US politics but does very little to address that.

Biden was already making deals to put anti-abortion judges on the federal bench. If these so called moderate GOPers that would support a 3rd party would just make the leap to the Democratic Party already they'd have exactly the party they want.

You seem to have trouble dealing with the fact that most Americans are not as far to the left as you are.

 

[dudalb]

That's the way to do it, really. Find a Ross Perot just less crazy and quitty and go from there. Know going in that you aren't trying to be a third option. The idea is to become the new A and let the old A and B fight over being B.

This party just seems like taking everything that makes people uninterested in politics and distilling it into one bottle.

And a Hard Left line is what people want to hear....

 

[Venom]

Yawn. Until these knuckleheads acknowledge how far the Radical Right has gone at least once, don't wanna hear that both sides ********.

 

[dudalb]

Yawn. Until these knuckleheads acknowledge how far the Radical Right has gone at least once, don't wanna hear that both sides ********.

I am a "Centrist" who freely admits the GOP has gone stark raving mad.
I just don't think that to go bonkers in the opposite direction is a answer.

 

[Delvo]

I am a "Centrist" who freely admits the GOP has gone stark raving mad.
I just don't think that to go bonkers in the opposite direction is a answer.

What's the "bonkers" that anybody's going to the left? What are these "bonkers" extremist positions that people supposedly believe and are damaging the country by so viciously fighting for?

Yang & Gang couldn't find any real examples that are actually things anybody anywhere actually thinks, so they had to go with lies (which just happen to be Republican talking points by some amazing coincidence). If they're so "centrist" and "moderate", why did they only need to lie about one side (and copy those lies from the other side)?

 

[Cain]

In most of Europe, Hillary Clinton would have been a center-right candidate. I saw a recent headline that said Joe Rogan self-identifies as a "bleeding heart liberal." Why? Because he supports same-sex marriage, universal health-care, and marijuana legalization? Trump was the least conservative candidate in 2016. He was a Republican who said Social Security and Medicare would be unmolested. Wasn't he the only candidate who refused to sign Norquist's Tax Pledge? He held up a rainbow flag, declared NATO obsolete, and vowed not to get into more wars. He staked out a traditionally conservative, anti-corporate position on immigration and the southern border. By 2020, he was Mr. Conservative (who proudly wanted his signature on stimulus checks).

The structure of the system dictates two parties, so this is certain to fail. It's all the more certain to fail if it's framed as centrist. When third parties are effective, they are the "bee sting of American politics": they attack and then die. Andrew Yang is a social entrepreneur seemingly motivated by ego and vanity (which is true for most, but more so for him).

 

[Venom]

I am a "Centrist" who freely admits the GOP has gone stark raving mad.
I just don't think that to go bonkers in the opposite direction is a answer.

I'd be glad to see these pretend moderates admit just once that the GOP has gone stark raving mad. But they don't. They seem terrified of criticizing the right, because they know they have to reel them in a little in order to play their "both sides" card.

 

[Delvo]

In most of Europe, Hillary Clinton would have been a center-right candidate.

Not just Europe and not just them + other similarly advanced countries either; practically all American politicians are even substantially to the right of the American people.

 

[ZiprHead]

Duverger's law^WP

In political science, Duverger's law holds that single-ballot plurality-rule elections (such as first past the post) structured within single-member districts tend to favor a two-party system. The discovery of this tendency is attributed to Maurice Duverger, a French sociologist who observed the effect and recorded it in several papers published in the 1950s and 1960s.[1] In the course of further research, other political scientists began calling the effect a "law" or principle.

As a corollary to the law, Duverger also asserted that proportional representation favors multi-partism, as does the plurality system with runoff elections.[2]

Duverger's law draws from a model of causality from the electoral system to a party system. A proportional representation (PR) system creates electoral conditions that foster the development of many parties, whereas a plurality system marginalizes smaller political parties, generally resulting in a two-party system.

Most countries with plurality voting have representation in their legislatures by more than two parties. While the United States is very much a two-party system, the United Kingdom, Canada and India have consistently had multiparty parliaments.[3][4] However, only the two dominant parties of their times have formed governments in the United Kingdom and Canada.[dubious – discuss][citation needed] Eric Dickson and Kenneth Scheve argue that there is a counter force to Duverger's law, that on the national level a plurality system encourages two parties, but in the individual constituencies supermajorities will lead to the vote fracturing.[5] Steven R. Reed has shown Duverger's law to work in Japan[6] and Italy.[7]

 

[Roger Ramjets]

Trump was the least conservative candidate in 2016. He was a Republican who said Social Security and Medicare would be unmolested. Wasn't he the only candidate who refused to sign Norquist's Tax Pledge? He held up a rainbow flag, declared NATO obsolete, and vowed not to get into more wars. He staked out a traditionally conservative, anti-corporate position on immigration and the southern border. By 2020, he was Mr. Conservative (who proudly wanted his signature on stimulus checks).

This says plenty about what Trump was willing to do to stay in power, but not much about his true political leanings - which are and always have been conservative.

Why do I say that? The fundamental difference between conservative and liberal thought is empathy. Conservatives don't have it. They only care about themselves. Nothing that Trump did showed any shred of empathy. Where he espoused a liberal stance it was only because it might benefit him personally. Why did he even want to become president? To make America a better place - or to spite Obama, bask in the popularity, and monetize it?

Trump appealed to the Deplorables because his selfishness resonated with them. This explains his (and their) position better than any 'right' or 'left' label put on an issue.

 

[BobTheCoward]

This argument that somehow politicians are more conservative
...are you sure you are not just measuring age?

 

[Trakar]

Andrew Yang = Attention Whore

The more politically oriented, poverty stricken, third cousin of lord Elon.

 

[psionl0]

A third party can't thrive under a FPTP voting system.

A Democrat voter is more likely to vote Democrat than Forward for fear that if enough votes bleed away from the Democrat candidate then the Republican candidate will get the plurality and win by default.

Ditto for a Republican voter.