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Enough Blind Allegence to the Parties

I couldn't agree more!

This relates to (or is identical to) some of the ideas I developed and connected to other thoughts on elections in Go Get Grandma's Recipe, but maybe I am used to writing longer articles and blogs should be shotrer than my first blog here? I don't want to be a... bloghog? New Term for describing me?
Sinclair

The two party system is a hard-to-grasp-concept for us Belgians. We can vote for the federal government. If we want to vote for a "big" party we can choose between "christian democrats" (30%) or "socialists" (20%)or "liberals" (20%) or "nationalists" (20%) or "green" (5%). If we want to give our vote to a small (and thereby unimportant parties, we have a choice of about seven others. In this system the voters are not very loyal to one party but tend to "shop around".
This way governments are by definition coalitions between two or more parties, and unstable. (any party who thinks it can gain votes by forcing early elections will do everything to let the goverment fall)Does this system appeal to you?

That kind of system sounds great.  As much as the U.S. preaches about Democracy around the world, it is actually not a true democracy but a Republic.  A party could recieve a descent percentage of the votes in every district around the country, and yet recieve no representation in the federal government.  The two party system is somewhat of a hegemony.  And in truth, there is more similarities between the two parties than what they portray.  Unfortunately, when the Green Party candidate Ralph Nadar made a big push in 2000, it diluted the base of the democratic party.  This helped give the victory to the ideological opposites of the greens... the republicans.  I believe that if a third party were to become established in the states, they would have to come up the middle between the democrats and the republican, driving a wedge between them and capturing the moderate vote.  

Just south of the border there are three main parties PAN (current president Calderon) PRI (all previous presidents before fox were PRI) and PRD.  The most interesting part of this system is that the presidential election last year was between the PRD (the newest political party) Manuel Lopez and the PAN Calderon.  The PRI was the third and unlikely candidate.  There were a lot of people that thought the PRD won the election stirring up conflicts and protests all over the country.  I think a big part of the problem in the U.S. is that people are to loyal to certain parties instead of "shopping around."  However in order for all this party loyalty to be broken up here is the kicker.  People like Ralph Nader should never have run for President.  His part didn't have enough backing to make a significant push.  He should have started with a run at governor and forming ties with other states.  The PRD in Mexico before Manuel Lopez ran for President had governors in states such as Tabasco and I think Mexico City. Perhaps the biggest problem is the political strategy.  I know that some states are moving towards more liberal nominees.  I just feel that perhaps what the United States needs isn't a more "liberal" party but a party that begins to attack states and make some important changes.  From there people will gain faith and hopefully (similar to Mexico) we here in the States can have at least a prominent third party.  I am not super educated in politics (not that this is my disclaimer). Perhaps in states such as Washington this is already happening. What needs to happen however is places like Los Angeles, Chicago, New York, Miami, Phoenix, Los Vegas need a mayor that is neither Republican or Democrat. From there a few Governors that aren't Republican or Democrat need to start turning heads.  After reviewing a list of all the political parties for governors they are all either Republican or democrat.

check the link
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_current_United_States_Governors

Some victories for third parties can also be found here but in my opinion this effort needs to be stronger and in a sense supported in part by the two current parties.  I thought country was was all about promoting democracy! (maybe for each million dollars the Republicans and Democrats raise they should have to either donate 25% to charity or an anonymous third Party fund? Maybe I'm just crazy!)

Check the link:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libertarian_Party_%28United_States%29#Number_of_candidates

SnowLeopard, that's exactly what I'm talking about.

You'll see in the post I just made on VoteSizing from your request that the people are no longer in control of the government.

No one asks us what we want. They just do what they're told by the people who actually run the government: the people and corporations with millions and millions of dollars.

I'm not saying our government is corrupt (although they probably are...okay...they are) but the point is that we desperately need to band together as citizens and start looking at our options for changing the way our government works.