"They just don't seem to win elections though....'
No new political Parties have been able to gain much ground for a century or so... though, in the nineteenth century, we had new Parties (& new political ideas) springing up all the time.
What is different?
Well, IMO, the two dominant Parties have 'conspired' to erect a 'ring fence' around the political turf that they occupy, and make it very difficult for any competition to emerge and gain traction... potentially to threaten their positions.
(And, when I say 'conspire', I mean both Parties only doing what comes naturally to them... while Reps and Dems continue to oppose each other election after election, the only time they can be *counted on* to present a united front is when their turf is threatened by 'outsiders'.)
Things such as enacting, State-by-State, high barriers to ballot access for new Parties, and banning things such as "cross-over voting" which ONCE was the norm across the land, and allowed new Parties to grow and gain political strength gradually --- but only survives today in one out of the 50 States.
No, it really isn't surprising that our political system has been rigged to entrench an oligopoly of two --- an awful lot of time, expense, and work has gone into creating just those conditions. |
