The name of the book is “Breaking the Two Party Doom Loop” and comes our way by the author Lee Drutman, a political scientist and a senior fellow in the Political Reform Program at New America. Before the 1990’s the two parties equaled four in their bifurcation with liberals and conservatives on the Democrat side and conservatives and moderates within the Republicans. (To a high degree this is still the makeup of the Montana House, which contributes to two productive session in 2017 and 2019.) The two parties at the national level have culled their ranks resulting in a true two party democracy with zero-sum partisanship. The result have left the American people pessimistic of national politics accented by 68% of respondents favoring a multi-party (3rd party) solution.
Drutman presents a comparison of the electoral process in peer western nations. He goes into depth in such an alternative (Australia and Maine and many places in-between), of ranked choice voting where the second and third choices on a ballot with a list of candidates are used to reach a final candidate that garners a plurality. He also creates additional parties to more accurately reflect the political preferences of Americans; from Christian traditionalist to progressives and those stops in-between. Lacking the previous divisions in the parties, Drutman suggests that two parties cannot adequately be inclusive to take on social and economic policy differences composing political preferences in our nation.
Drutman who admits to being a Democrat is passionate about the need for rationale change in election process. How will change occur? Drutman posits that change of such significance may only be possible as a result of hyper- extreme acrimony and violence . Let’s hope not though we have plenty of the former. Watch the hearings if you dare). There is a bill in congress slowly building that calls for a rank choice for congressional races. Let’s add the use of Big Blue, the chess playing IBM to implement redistricting at a 50 state level and the removal of a party labels from Secretary of States who direct elections as self-identified partisans.
This bill offers a template for change to restore trust, and participation in the election process. It is expertly researched and written for the layperson interested in best-practice election systems.