Okay, America. This is crazy. Both parties
are fracturing before our eyes. How did we
get here? We have always disagreed about the
size and scope of the government. This goes
back to our beginnings, before the Constitution:
Federalists versus Anti-Federalists, Democratic
Republicans against the Whig Party, the splintering
of the Democratic Republicans into two parties,
and still the debate rages on.
The thing is, nobody has got it all right
or wrong. No one has all the answers. And
the oversimplification of our two-party system
just isn’t cutting it.
This is what the current political season
should teach us. The first wake up call to
both parties should have come when the Tea
Party swept into Congress in 2010. Establishment
candidates being blasted out in the primaries
by non-politicians running as Washington outsiders.
Last October, I thought Ted Cruz was too radical
to get the nomination and the same was true
with Bernie Sanders. Both fall outside of
their parties to the extreme right and left
respectively. That’s why a year ago Jeb
and Hillary were the presumptive nominees,
they toed the party line. But now being an
establishment candidate is repellant to a
large portion of the electorate.
This toxic political climate is a symptom
of a disease that’s been there for a long
time. Two parties cannot effectively represent
the multitude of political views and needs
in our country. The party system has been
broken for a long time. Here’s how we can
fix it.
Pass the 28th Amendment abolishing the Electoral
College. The Electoral College has allowed
only 2 parties to compete for power without
impunity for more than 220 years. Here’s
how it works: It’s like there are 51 (including
DC) different presidential elections happening
in November. Each state gets the number of
representatives they have in Congress, plus
the District of Columbia gets 3 votes. In
all but 2 of these races, whichever candidate
gets the most popular votes, wins all that state’s
Electoral College votes. There are a total
of 538 and you need half plus one to win,
so 270 gets you to the White House.
What will getting rid of the Electoral College
do? It will release the stranglehold the 2
parties in power have; give other parties
a real seat at the table; and give citizens
candidates and parties who better match their
values. This new government would function
by building coalitions across party lines;
compromise no longer a dirty word, but a function
of a diverse society.
And lastly, America: we need to be for each
other’s right to disagree passionately and
respectfully, without forgetting the person
across the aisle is indeed another human.
