Americans, by a 2 to 1 margin, think that the Democrats do not have a plan to win in Iraq. What will they think in 2008? I don't think that the "2" will have to change their mind, but the "1" may learn something.
Well duh--do you "have a plan to win in Iraq"? You of all people ought to know that no one has a plan to actually win in Iraq. The question is, will American voters simply forgive Republicans for leading us into this unwinnable war, or will they hold Democrats equally accountable, since so many of them voted "for the war" in 2002, as Republicans will be fond of saying in '08, generously sharing a responsibility that they would not have made as clear had the war turned out differently.
The American people blame Bush for the war more than the Republican party. With Bush gone, voters will return to voting Republican.
Carl, polls have consistently shown that more people are on the side of Democrats on issue after issue--except for terrorism. And that may change if the Democrats actually get an intelligent and market savvy consultant to ram into public consciousness the idea which you yourself agree with that the Bush foreign policy has been a complete disaster and has NOT made us or the world in general safer, but far more dangerous.
The best way to make a 2-party democracy corrupt is for one party to keep winning elections for more than a decade.
I agree 100% with you there. Take a look at Machiavelli's Discourses, book 3, chapter 1, where he explicitly says the same thing (even the 10 year time frame--"10 years or so", I think he says). And recommends a hanging of some public figure every ten years ago as a way of keeping the "powerful" and the ambitious in check.
Power corrupts. Having a two party system reduces that corruption. In a world peopled by humans who are inherently inclined towards corruption, the two party democracy is as good as it gets.
Actually, I think a 5 party system would be better, with 2 large and 3 smaller parties. And with the parties having some distinctive characteristics to set them off from one another, ideologically or economically or both. That would force coalitions, genuine deliberations between opposing points of view, and more sensible compromises. Would also rid any party of the delusion that they might build a "permanent" majority. That should be impossible, and it is essential that no one believe that it might be possible.
But more on that some other time, I gotta go. BTW, I finally got around to reading Chernow's biography of Hamilton. Liked it a lot. Our past disagreement was over whether he was a Democrat or a Republican--I still think he was more of a Democrat than a Republican, but that too will have to wait. (Unless you don't mean the party but the generic political system--in that case, we can agree). |
