Chapter 3 Fractured Political Parties

Fractured Political Parties

Traditionally, it didn’t matter that issues were not discussed in the election campaigns. Party and group politics governed. If the candidate was a Republican you knew basically where he or she stood running as a Republican on all of the issues. Likewise you knew where the Democratic candidates stood simply based on their party affiliation. If you belonged to a union, or were a blue collar worker, or an educator you knew you were to support the Democrats. Likewise if you were a business owner or a farmer you were for the Republicans. Life was simple and uncomplicated!

Party platforms were hammered out at least every four years during the conventions that selected the standard bearers of both parties. Interest groups then lobbied both parties for their points of view to be adopted by the respective parities with the promise of delivering a “block” of votes to the party that championed the particular groups’ issues. For the most part winning candidates actually tried to, and were surprisingly successful at implementing the planks of their party’s platform. Nowadays however, things have been altered. The parties do go through the motions of debating policy stances and building a platform but it is mostly smoke and mirrors designed for media consumption. The key these days seems to be “don’t rock the boat” for fear that the media will cover your differences and in the process alienate some voter or group. The result is both parties tend to have such watered-down platforms that they often are indistinguishable from one another. And that often leads to third party candidates running for office and muddying the waters further.

A further complication to the old style party platform is the fact that with all the early primaries and caucuses, the party standard bearer is known well ahead of the party’s national convention. With the leader of the party already chosen, delegates merely develop a platform that the eventual presidential candidate dictates. In the old days generally there were several viable candidates for the party’s nomination for president still alive at the time of the party convention and the result was there was a real debate between the various blocks of delegates over platform issues. It was only after the platform was hammered out and adopted that the delegates actually chose their standard bearer. Even this was often done after many votes and compromises. Not so today!

Interest groups often “hedge their bets”: They will support candidates of both parties in the hopes of being able to exercise influence no matter which candidate ends up with the most votes on Election Day. Gone are the days of honest knock down drag out debates in front of the television cameras. Too much is at stake to allow even the appearance of division or diversity in either the Republican or Democratic party. The net result is that the Republicans have driven the moderates out of the party infrastructure and the Democrats have adopted a centrist position trying not to alienate any voter. The result is voters no longer really know where candidates stand, regardless of party. Is the Republican candidate really a moderate or is he/she among the conservatives without a conscience? Is the Democrat committed to the traditional values of the Democratic Party or is he/she just trying to get elected in the most expedient way possible? Is it any wonder that the apathetic voter is reduced to voting on personality or good looks of the candidates – assuming they are energized enough to vote at all? Looking at voter turnout over the post World War II period we struggle to get 50% of the eligible population to the polls on Election Day, and in off-year elections it is even less! So in reality about 25% of the eligible population decides who will be our leaders, year-in and year-out.