This… at least from what I remember of my few history/politics classes in college (I was a math major) is that historically 3rd parties when they gather enough support have either bent the leaning of one of the major parties enough they essentially merge or when that doesn’t happen they go the way of the Whigs.
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Yeah, the 1850s saw a major reorganization of political parties, with the whigs going under and the Republicans emerging out of the ashes (with a weird coalition of abolitionists and those not wanting slavery to spread because they saw slave labor as competition for free, white labor in the territories). The populists in the 1890s made some serious headway among southern/western share croppers (in some cases of both races, but racism was also a huge stumbling block for some - remember this was just prior to the fully deployment of Jim Crow laws) and working class people up north. They had a major influence on the development of the democratic party from there.
The progressives that eventually joined the party under Teddy Roosevelt (which is probably the closest we came to a 3rd party president) eventually drifted into the democratic party as the republicans became more pro-capitalist in orientation.
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Around here we use ANSI terminology.
names are one things, policies are quite another,
In the US, those sorts of arguments are often advanced, disingenuously, to advance the political prospects of outright fascists.
Now, I suppose you are arguing against the Liberal Party, which is best remembered for
a) recently changing it’s political platform to be more right wing
b) ensuring that conservatives had enough enough power to gut your interests.
I despise the way in which people have been using “neo liberalism”-- a right wing effort to destroy public institutions in favor of well monied private interests, to savage the reputations of liberal Democrats who support things like the EPA, higher education, social welfare. The distinction is a critical one.
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Re: Braustelle: wilco.
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I looked it up for my state, Ohio, and there’s lots of “third parties”:
- America First Party of Ohio
- Communist Party of Ohio
- Constitution Party of Ohio
- Green Party of Ohio
- Libertarian Party of Ohio
- Natural Law Party of Ohio
- Ohio Labor Party
- Ohio Patriot Party
- Socialist Labor Party of Ohio
- Unity Party of Ohio
I don’t recall hearing about many of these, but I’m sure their platforms would be rather interesting to look at.
Here goes the rest of my evening.
https://votesmart.org/political-parties/
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The only third party that matters:
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This made me smirk, then cringe.
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Bahahahahaha. If only the Hens would see that the Foxes weren’t so bad! Ahahahaha.
On one side of the gulf you have evil assholes who would burn the planet than see a poor (or really, anybody but themselves) get a fair shake. And on the other side of the gulf there are those of us politely insisting that our inalienable rights be recognized.
This bothsideism view I see reflected is infantile. It is the view of an uneducated person who isn’t personally effected (read: cis het white middle class) and thus cannot empathize with others.
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Don’t even try to look at their platform page. I can’t decide is it was deliberately designed to be unreadable, or if only “true patriots” would read a page done in red, white. and blue, with extra fonts and extra italics and extra underlines and extra punctuation.
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So… you decided to perfectly illustrate my point that the PEOPLE who make up an opposing political party are often seen as “foxes” and “evil assholes” who one couldn’t possibly find common ground through each others’ lack of empathy and stereotyping? Where is that slow clap gif…
And if you think one of the major political parties in the US isn’t mostly concerned with “cis het white middle class” and the upper class, and I have some bad news for you…
Or wait - was this about Trekkies? Because, yes, those vermin need to be put in their place.
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No clicks from me, rest assured.
Excuse me?
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LOL I haven’t seen that gif before. That’s great.
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I’m already using the metric system. The temp is now 24 degrees. I’m not kidding.
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Well, that’s just unAmerican! 
Isn’t that one great! It’s a classic!
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