I think your right, however; I believe the party's name is already known. I believe what will happen is that this new movement will eventually co-opt one of the two major parties from within. It doesn't neccesarily have to be the Republican Party as in California, this was mostly a concequence of the incumbant being a Democrat. What will occur is other candidates running campaigns similar to Schwarzenegger's will emerge. Although at the beginning they may be X (Republican or Democrat) in name only, eventually their electoral success will lead them to gain party-wide power. It was happened atleast once before to the Republican party and atleast twice before to the Democrat party.
I think, though the change is real.

Provocative thoughts. Arnold was the right candidate for this election (fair disclosure, I was a campaign volunteer). IMHO, California has led the rest of the country in its headlong rush to become the France of North America. Maybe that makes us the canary in the coal mine, but I'm not sure. This election was the culmination of a lot of California-specific things.

Realistically I'm afraid that at the national level both parties' instincts are to better 'hone their message' while trying to buy interest group loyalty more effectively. Meanwhile government gets bigger. I don't see anything in the cards to change that in the 2004 election cycle. Bush-hating is a lousy policy platform for the Democrats, and it doesn't challenge the Republicans to do anything fundamentally different than what they're doing now.

I have slightly more hope at the state level. If the new Governor and his team make any headway at all (over the Legislature's collective dead body) we might see new faces where it really counts.

I think the circumstances of the California election were unique (and I shouldn't say I think, because they were unique). Arnold didn't have to run in a Republican primary, where his liberal social attitudes would have hurt him (but maybe not to the point that he couldn't have won), or a Democratic primary where his relatively conservative (or "fiscally responsible") economic policies would have probably doomed him (and his refusal to take the anti-tax pledge even though he indicated strong opposition to higher taxes wouldn't have helped him in a Republican primary either). Now we go back to normal elections with primaries, making Arnold's candidacy or others like him, less likely to succeed. It will be back to the usual Republicans and Democrats, and business as usual. I say that as a conservative Republican (or better self-described as a conservative anti-Democrat). For good or ill, I don't think that this election will constitute a big change in political alignment (although I could be wrong--it's happened before!)

Crazy Wahoo

Hm.

Scott is right in suggesting that one of the two main parties is likely to absorb or be absorbed by this movement. That's what political history of the US suggests very strongly.

In fact we should be careful about getting the analysis completely wrong. A couple of cautions:

(a) Is it likely to be right to explain the whole phenomenon in terms of Arnold, when this recall bandwagon hit full speed well before Arnold came on the scene?

(b) Is it likely to be right to ascribe some sort of uniqueness to this phenomenon when in reality it is to a great extent a straightforward tax revolt, almost THE characteristic American event, with multiple examples going all the way back to 1776?

As Ronald Reagan showed, a tax revolt is whatever a smart politician can make of it, which can be a lot.

Arnold's opportunity now is to achieve something which makes voters in other jurisdictions, in the US and elsewhere, think "I'd like some of that, too". If he does that then he's on the 'Reagan trail'.

The fact that Arnold didn't have to go through a primary may have allowed us a look beneath the ossified structures of politics as usual to see what's percolating down there. We didn't have to wait for the every-four-years programmed volcano to erupt. The recall exposed the tectonic forces deep underground. To carry the metaphor to ridiculous lengths, two possibilities emerge: 1) the pressure has been relieved and the next primary season will reinforce the existing order or 2) the rift in the rocky shield has loosed a demon from far within the earth that will change everything forever. I know which one I hope it is.

The indicator that "joke time is over" is the election of Arnold Schwarzenegger? You sure this one isn't just over your head?

I doesn't matter what happens at the state level. The USA is threatened from without like never before in it's history. United We Stand, dived we fall. It's just that simple, and everyone knoes it. Those that won't stand with Bush and the rest of America in our time of need will die. Good riddence. After the Arabs are put on a resveration, then we can go back to internal politics. Untill then, it's lock arms and march togther. If you can't do that you are the enemy. You will find both sides sniping at you. The Donks havn't figured that out yet, except maybe for Liberman.
I am registared as an Independent, although the Last Democrat I voted for was JFK. It scares me to see the Democratic party driving off a cliff like it is. A single Party state is the road to tyranny. Maybe some good will come out of it. With any luck the wacko democrats will join the greens and all the wackos can sit around wailing about nonsense together. Then the center can get back to business. I don't really like Bush, Rummy is a crook, Powell is a fool and Ashcroft is the second coming of Himmler. But the Democrats lead directly to an Islamic America. My America, the America of freedom, justice and Liberty for all, the last hope for humanity, does not have room for a surrender party at this point in history. That is what the Democrats have become. The First Democratic canidate that comes out and says, "we need to exterminate these fuks"! will get elected in a landslide. We should have nuked some Arabs in 2001. This whole mess would be done now if we had. While not very PC, Nuclear weapons are War winning devices.
T.

I like to think it takes two wings to fly straight, and you don't need a weatherman to tell you that.....

I think you've read way too much into this election.

All this really points out is the continued incompetence of California Republicans. The voter base has always been there, like for Reagan, and Wilson the other R governors. But the party lost over time the ability to operate effectively. I'd say the collapse began to be most notable with the Huffington campaign. From then on, the party kept nominating losers for almost every office.

Losers, not in the sense that they didn't win the vote, but losers in the sense that they couldn't inspire voters to show up. At a national level, Bob Dull, er Dole, was the same way.

But why did the republicans keep doing this? Two reasons: First, California is way too dominated by activists with off center agenda. On the left, that means ultra-socialists dominate, on the right ultra-conservatives dominate. The result is wonkish primary voters put up wonkish and boring candidates that don't inspire anyone.

The second reason is that the Republican party of California, when it has gotten power recently, has made a laughing stock of themselves. They got a majority in the lower house, yet still Willie Brown was elected speaker. Brulte and crew are pathetic. How can you get voters to bother to show up at the polls if the majority can't even elect the speaker?

This election does show the failure of the Republican party as much as the Democrats. Somehow I think the Democrats, with their ComIntern-like discipline, will learn more from this election than the Republicans will.

Don't expect miracles from Ahnuld until he delivers a couple to the people who elected him. But I agree with you that a techtonic shift in American politics is taking place, which many thought had arrived in 1992 with Ross Perot and a third American party. It didn't then, and may not this year either, given that no one on the right is challenging Bush, and none of the Democrats running say anything much different from one another. Ahnuld may be a one term governor if he fights too hard or not enough. He has very little backing from the Party he rode in on, and no real local political base in the CA legislature. Keep your fingers crossed.

GB

The last time a new party was formed was during the events leading to the Civil War. It's difficult to establish a new, third, party for lots of very practical reasons. And it's also difficult for me to see a trend in the election of Arnold, because he's pretty much a one-off. But there *could* be a seismic shift going on, because anti-Totalitarianism might be the 21st Century equivalent of anti-Slavery.

Yes, the party is over and it ended with 9/11. My grandfather was an aircraft mechanic in WWII, when the German Counter-enlightenment became the guiding force behind Totalitarianism 1.0. What was happening is probably seen more clearly in the assassination of the Archduke by a group of Anarchists, than on the fields of Flanders, but the rebellion against liberalism had begun. And it eventually took the form of Totalitarianism 2.0 in Russia and Asia, and Totalitarianism 3.0 in Europe itself. And after WWII and the Cold War had eliminated both of those, we thought we were done.

But a strain of the disease, again inspired by the Counter-enlightenment, had slipped into the Middle East spawning first the Ba'ath movement (a second-rate version that merged T 2.0 and T 3.0) and a full-fledged Totalitarianism 4.0 in the form of Radical Islamism. Because outside of the Koran, the greatest influence on the writings of Sayyid Qutb was, again, the Counter-enlightenment.

So when the guns had grown quiet after Appomattox, and chattel slavery moved from the throne of evil to the topmost in the ash heap of history it was replaced by another, somewhat subtler evil. And suicide terrorism is, and has always been, one of the favorite strategies of Totalitarian movements that are either out of power, or on the verge of losing it. (The Japanese Kamikaze and the German Werewolf campaigns were not an accident.)

So if liberalism is ready to mature, and put a final end to the enemy that our grandfathers and fathers fought, then I can see that motivating a seismic shift to a new alignment in the US... one that isn't merely dedicated to Democracy (power of the people), but to Demosophia (wisdom of the people). And yes, I know that we don't have a "pure" form of democracy, but something closer to what Robert Dahl calls "polyarchy."

So, the shift would signal more power and more wisdom as well as a recognition that we are really fighting an old enemy, an evil that has been around a long time. But do you really think we're ready, on the basis of an election of a one-off political figure? I do have a sense that something has changed, and I just hope it's a further fulfillment of John Locke and not Totalitarianism 5.0. So I'll be pretty careful before I jump onboard the "next big thing." Because I think the maturing of Liberalism isn't a sudden event. It's a gradual process that may or may not suddenly appear. But I will admit that there is a mature liberal impulse that is expressed in the blogosphere, and by people like Andrew Sullivan and Chris Hitchens and others, that doesn't fit the old "conservative" image. But that has been building for a long time, and it may well be the final matchup with Totalitarianism.

--Scott (also)

I might buy the notion that Arnold Schwarzenegger's election portends a major shift in U.S. politics if I hadn't fallen for the Ross Perot debacle in 1992. People love a celebrity outsider politician who is long on sound bite and short on substance. That's all it means; the Republicans and Democrats were not threatened by the Reform/United We Stand movement, and they're not threatened by the gropenfuhrer, who already shot his outsider cred to hell by inviting Pete Wilson back into the statehouse.

Incidentally, how many metaphors were killed in the making of your weblog entry?

This is a very intriguing piece and thank you for writing it. I do believe that you are correct in that this will shape a trend, at least for this next election cycle, of anti-incumbent movements. However, I think its a mistake to contend that this apply only to the weak, message-less, often lost in the woods Democratic Party. This will affect the Republican Party as well, and may go all the way to the top to the President.

Its not enough to only observe that a Democrat incumbent lost in this case and stretch it to an overall trend of Democrats being ousted from office, which is what you seem to imply. This happened to a Democrat in this case because he had the personality of a block of wood and couldn't use any charisma to overcome some painful mistakes.

Hmmmm.

We need to address the issue of celebrity candidates. I think that the recall is another example of the power of celebrity and "cleaning house." I think you can go back to Jesse Ventura, Ronald Regan, Sonny Bono, Clint Eastwood and maybe even Dwight Eisenhower for other such elections. Lets drop Jesse as a failure, but the others have been amiable celebrities that want to fix things and are fed up with city hall. They have all been Republican or in some sense get off my back conservatives. I can't think of a successful Democratic Hollywood type, because the left wing message is so off putting. So although Hollywood Democrats must out number Republicans 20 to 1, we've yet to see the Dems run with this combination.

Regan was the most traditional of republicans, but the others seem to tap into the frustration with inneffecient government and go at it. All of the intrusive social issues that attach to the Republican party are left on the sidelines.

So I think there is a trend here, but for us to have a seismec shift we need to see the outsider cleaning house, make government work and do it cheaper message be able to be carried by a non-celeb. The next election up is the Lousianan governers run-off. Lets see if Bobby Jindahl can win.

As a new Californian, I'm not convinced that Arnold is the forefront of a truly nationwide movement. What is happening here is important, but only inasmuch as California contains a large chunk of the US population and GDP.

What I find more intriguing is the (possibly) developing internal split within both parties on the subject of national defense and international trade. It seems to me that, in terms of ideals, the neoconservatives and neoliberals are aligned ideologically against the left-liberals and the Buchananites. If politicians acted purely on their ideals, and if partisan politics had no influence, I think there would be a vast realignment. Many politicians who are now allies would become enemies, and many who are enemies would become allies.

Not that I expect to see such a realignment, with the competition for control of each branch of government being so hot.

I agree that many voters are cynical and bored. I think their attitude is due in large measure to gerrymandering to create safe seats for pols. The effect: gerrymandering disenfranchises people. (Steven Den Beste has a recent post on this subject.)

I have read articles (sorry-no cite) stating that as many as 90% of the US House districts are noncompetitive, i.e., there is no serious opposition to the candidate of the party that currently holds the seat. Having so many safe seats engenders cynicism and apathy among the majority of voters, because many if not most of them will see that their vote makes no difference in the preordained outcome. This in turn means that only the rabid, blood-in-the-eye partisans in each party are involved in the political process, and they tend to nominate the extremists of their party. The resulting polarization means that the legislature becomes paralyzed and ineffective. This creates more cynicism and apathy among the voters and the vicious cycle continues.

Every so often something happens that breaks the cycle. In this case, it was disgust with Gray Davis plus Arnold's entry into the arena. The voters accurately observed that their votes could actually made a difference and got involved. Hight interest led to high turnout and for better or worse the people's voice was heard.

The long term cure for voter apathy and cynicism is to make sure as many elected offices as possible are actually up for grabs in every election. This will cause the parties to advance the candidates that have the best chance of being elected, as opposed to the candidates who will toe the party line when in office. Those in office will be more responsive to the people, because they will know that their job is on the line at the end of their term. When the voters percieve that their vote will actually count for something, they'll become more involved in the process, interest levels and voter turnout will increase, and the country will have better government at all levels. And Californians would not have to resort to the initiative process so often.

The Iowa redistricting law takes a step in the right direction. Would that something similar could be enacted in CA.

1. The vote was the Welfare State freeloaders refusing to pay. Arnold is going to Washington.
2. The election hung on two things: the Frisco Left counties did not turn out and the SoCal counties where Gore pulled more than a million vote majority revolted turning 500,000 for the recall.
3. LA is LEFT LEFT LEFT by at least 800,000; Frisco and environs is LEFT LEFT LEFT by at least 500,000 and this won't change.

People receiving money from the rest of us are at war with us. I don't see this election as a realignment, more of a temporary recognition that we may be a little ahead of ourselves on the road to the Welfare State. We need Wyoming and Nevada to send us money.

This is just fascinating. I agree and hope that this isn't just a one-off event. But then, I thought things would change after 9/11, too.

Everyone, please take a deep breath. All the tectonic shifting makes me dizzy. I think there is a much simpler explanation.

Gray Davis was a hideous Governor, and an even worse campaigner. That no one beat him to death last time around is a testament to sheer political incompetence.

Arnold's victory is pure Politics 101. Weak, unattractive candidates get beat by weak attractive candidates every time. That's Arnold.

Ronald Reagan would have beaten both Gray and Arnold by 30 points.

Lessons for next time around. Dems, you better dump your current crop of unlikeable creeps, including HRC. W might not be much, but he's likeable, and his campaign staff are capable. He'd murder Dean, and trounce HRC. Even the Dems hate Clark and Kerry. Surely you can come up with a candidate who doesn't make your skin crawl...like Davis.

Interesting. Maybe it's not much more complicated than the fact that a moderate well known celebrity cannot so easily be demonized and destroyed by democrats painting him or her as an 'extreme rightist'. Every scare tactic attempt in this election rolled off Arnold like water off a duck's back, precisely because the public felt they already knew the guy.

I agree that Clint Eastwood's election is a close parallel in many ways. The main difference is that whatever he achieved as mayor of Carmel was never likely to have a broader political impact. Arnold has that chance where Clint did not.

Nice analysis but, in the end, wishful thinking. I agree that, on the one hand, the two main political parties have taken media manipulation, Big-Lie telling and vicious personal attacks to new levels. As before, each panders to powerful, monied special interest groups, though now they seem to care little about how transparent this pandering has become. Yes, the average Joe sees this, understands it and feels frustrated and angry about it and, yes, especially after 9/11.

On the other hand, we get the politicians we deserve (or, more precisely, that we vote into office). Californians want free education, free healthcare, severe environmental restrictions, no-sacrifice retirement, etc., etc., etc. They became furious at Davis not because they suddenly realized their collective policy objectives were inconsistent with reality (socialist largess/low taxes/great job opportunities) but because Davis et al. failed to deliver. Note that the new governor won by positioning himself as a social liberal but fiscal conservative -- i.e., the guy who will deliver the goodies on the cheap.

Sorry, I don't see a sea-change in the essential political philosophies of my California neighbors. So, I predict the Dems will be back in force plying the exact same policies just as soon as the current crisis abates.

I covered this over at The Winds of Change on May 16th, 2003. The piece is called "The Death of Socialism". I predicted the death of the Democrats and the calving of the Republicans into two parties.

A libertarian center and a conservative right. One of the clues can be found over at Free Republic. Pay attention at how much some of the posters hate libertarians.

I call the new grouping "the Radical Center". Government out of my wallet, government out of my bedroom.

http://windsofchange.net/archives/003485.html

I wouldn't count on this being a mandate for a vast Republican resurgence in California. If the left-moderate views espoused by the new governor elect were typical of those espoused by the Republican platform, then you'd have a point. But they're not. As one who recently left the Democratic party, I know there is much to despise about them. This is mostly, for me, because of their drift away from the center. The same thing keeps me from even considering, in my wildest dreams, of ever, ever signing up to be a Republican. They're too far to the right, as fanatically as the Democrats are wedded to the far left. Schwartzenegger won because he occupied a niche left totally vacant these days: the center. Bustamante and McClintock both abandoned the center (OK, so McClintock was never there), and handed the election to Schwartzenegger. I voted for him myself for this reason.

Barring a change in strategy, which I doubt they have the spine or brains to make, the Republicans lose California in the Presidential election. The state is left-leaning. Given a Republican with some fiscal conservatism (read: good sense), and some mildly progressive social ideas, however, you could see the same abandonment of the Democratic voters by those same lefties that swung the election to Arnold.

Think Dubya has it in him to make that overture to these voters? Me neither.

Laurie K.

It has been coined "South Park Republicans" even though it really is called The Libertarian Party . Cheers!

AUTHOR: motion_view
EMAIL: gene.alexander@stanford.edu
IP: 64.169.88.116
URL:
DATE: 10/11/2003 12:38:29 PM

What happened in California is definitely part of a trend, but it did not start there. In Minnesota, a state that hasn’t voted Republican in a presidential election since 1972, voted in as Governor Republican Tim Palenty. There are many interesting parallels.
The state four years before, thumbed it’s nose at politics as usual when they voted in independent Jessie Ventura, a man with political views very much like Arnold’s. Last year Minnesota was facing a state budget deficit proportionally as large as California’s. Also there was a controversy about putting visa expiration dates on driver’s licenses which the Democrat candidate for Governor was against. The polls showed the race as neck and neck but Palenty won in a landslide. Also elected was Republican Norm Coleman to the Senate, replacing the extremely liberal Paul Wellstone.
Since then Palenty has solved the budget deficit without raising taxes and pushed through concealed carry legislation. He is also guiding some very interesting reforms in public education.
If this last year Minnesota is any guide, what Californians can expect is intense whining from Democrats and their agents in the press that the ‘cuts’ in the budget are going to make the state a bigger version of Mississippi. Hopefully Arnold will ignore them.

Don't overthink this -- there's nothing new under the CA sun or anywhere else across the fruited plain. People know they are overtaxed and know that governments are addicted to revenue. When a candidate -- of ANY stripe -- proposes tax increases, he/she gets spanked at the polls. Reagan knew it. Bush I forgot it. Clinton lied about it, and then the '94 mid-terms happened. Bush II gets it. I cannot believe there are still Demos who don't.

I agree that people are bored --- we could liven thing up a little by doing away with party primaries. Let's put all canidates in a general primary -- democrats, republicans, independents, what ever and the top two would run in a general election 30 days following the initial primary.
With this type system the party's control on who can run would be limited. In fact this is how is is done in Louisiana

Instead of a general primary, let's get the state completely out of the primary business. Every party should pick its candidate or candidates on its own dime in whatever manner it wants and anyone eligible to serve who pays a minimal fee should be put on the ballot. The state ( ie the taxpayers) should only pay for the general election.

I had to laugh at the hopeful idiot from the WSJ, who wrote: "And the single-issue litmus test (abortion, gun control, et al.), assumed to be a constant obstacle to GOP success, may also be finished. "

What race was he writing about? Arnold is pro-choice, pro-gay rights, pro-gun control, pro-environmental regulation and profane. He's more liberal than many Democrats. However, if the WSJ idiot uses Arnold's victory to encourage more GOP candidates to bare their religious fanaticism, all to the good. It's so much easier to defeat them when they don't bother pretending to be sane.

Are you folks dreaming? The Arnold promised everything to everyone. Its not even Math 101; its grade school. His math is something like 2+2=17. If the car fee gets rescinded local jusisdictions get hit in the teeth. $4 billion immediately gets added to the deficit. You think that won't come back to slam your revolution? All politics is local. California residents inititive themselves into mandated spending and revenue corners; instead of looking into a mirror, they vote for the bonehead who promises them everything. Already he is making weasel sounds. Check out the mood in two years.

New politics, zzzzz. People don't enjoyed being taxed to death. They don't like being told by the commissars and media that they know better than the lumpenprolotariat how to spend their hard earned dollars. People are tired of a disengaged political class ignoring their voices and making deals with special interest groups and pandering at their expense. You might do well to review the comments made after 1964 or after Prop 13 passed. The Dems will get new actors, new slogans and go on as before. The GOP will do the same. Its the working man that will have to pay the bill as long as both parties support the IMF, World Bank, and other quasi government agencies that are guaranteed by the US taxpayer to protect the monied classes.

If there was a shift its that it will be harder for any party to assume the mantle of virtue after its clay feet has been revealed. The media can't spin because technology has enable the public to fact check, something the media hasn't caught on to. Its amazing that the media has forgotten that a reputation for objectivity is difficult to build and easy to lose. The NY Times, LA Times CNN have been exposed for their lack of objectivity. I doubt Americans will be influenced to the extent it has in the past.

In the end elections will always depend on getting your base out to vote.

It is too soon to say if the election of Arnold is the ground breaking event that some believe it is. It may be, we just don’t know yet.

Soon, Arnold will have to govern. And that is when we will find out if something really important is going on in California. The budget gap exists because politicians, with the support of significant portions of the public, spent a lot more than then the state was taking in. How this ‘problem’ is resolved will determine the significance of Arnold. The problem can be solved. There are many potential solutions. Will Arnold solve the problem in an honest, straight forward manner? Will he make real significant cuts? Who and what will he cut? Will that be enough? And if it isn’t enough, what next?

I see inklings already of a one time special bond deal. I heard Arnold already hinting about perhaps the Feds could somehow help. This does not bode well for those who think Arnold will tackle the problems head on. Bonds, or some type of Federal participation in this local problem, is only more of the same on a larger scale. Republican fiscal conservatism has somehow morphed into “Cut taxes and spend”, the Democratic equivalent of “tax and spend”. Few care, or only give lip service, to the mountains of debt being created.

Few in the political class want to reconcile the cost of what has been promised with the states ability to pay. That, IMHO, is the key issue. Come on Arnold, don’t float more bonds, don’t borrow, don’t dance. Please don’t look to Washington for answers or help. The problem was created in Sacramento and should be solved by Californians using Californian cuts and/or resources. Bring everyone together, knock some heads, make people compromise and balance that budget. Solve the problem and take the heat. If Arnold can do the latter, he would have my support, and he would certainly be breaking new and important ground in American politics.

Mike W.

if it's true that american presidents are preferred to be intellectually challenged, 'cuz then joe sixpack feels his son could make it too, arnie will go all the way!
hit those weights!

There's a bit of truth to the notion that Democrats are suicidal. I thought it would be a good Idea to have consensus between the executive, legislative, and judiciary just to see what they would do with it.
Democrats suck basicly. Look here if you want confirmation. Drivers Licence for Illegal aliens wouldn't have gone over with the general public in regular times, but now we have 1 billion plus religious fanatics who want to blow up any American target of opportunity. Davis never batted an eyelash as he signed it. His fate was sealed before it got to his desk. Davis signed that bill to skewer the Democratic traitors in the legislature. Perhaps the one decent patriotic thing he did.
I thought the recall election was a crackerjack way of doing it. Everybody get in a line and "WE THE PEOPLE" pick who we like. Much better then having two elections, one to pick the most GOPish candidate, then the second to find out how much he lost by to the democrat.
I like having the field as a whole in it down to the wire, and McClintock actually got some substantive issues into the election. This is the way it is supposed to be. You hear what they really stand for.

And if you were really quick you could even catch what Arianna Huffington stood for at certain brief moments.

Social Democrats, USA
815 15th Street, NW Suite 511
Washington, DC 2005
Copyright: 1996, SD, USA

Splitting the Republican Coalition

Irving Kristol is a leading spokesman among neoconservatives. He co-edits the Public Interest, a journal that is often an excellent source on political and economic matters. Kristol did a piece for the Wall Street Journal in June called "Times of Transformation." In it he delivers a seminal analysis of the current political scene. The article, although not so intended, suggests a winning strategy for Democrats.

Kristol points out that the conservative revolution in the Republican Party occurred in 1964 when Rockefeller lost the presidential nomination. He argues that the liberal revolution captured the Democratic Party in 1972 with the nomination of George McGovern.

Kristol described the current Republican coalition as consisting primarily of two main strains: economic and social conservatives. The economic conservatives are anti-state and the social conservatives are anti-liberal who view liberalism "as corroding and subverting the virtues that they believe must be the bedrock of decent society." He believes that the differences between the economic conservatives and the social conservatives produce "tensions" between the two groups. Kristol's long range view is that the social conservatives represent "an authentic mass movement that gathers strength with every passing year."

more...
http://www.socialdemocrats.org/miller.html

Dear Digest:

I think reports of the coming demise of the two-party system are greatly exagerrated.

The winner-take-all basis of the American political system weighs against the viability of third- and fourth-parties. In our system, the victorious party needs a clear majority, because without a clear majority they have no mandate and without a mandate they can't govern.

Not to mention the Constitutional amendments that would be required to implement a hybrid Parliamentary system. Or the fact that in multi-party systems you get undesirable outcomes like Maurice le Pen on the Ballot in France or ultra-Orthodox parties controlling the Education and Immigration ministries in Israel.

So, I guess, yes the parties are corrupt and sclerotic, except when compared to their counterparts elsewhere.

furious