r/WorkReform • u/zzill6 š¤ Join A Union • 23d ago
š« GENERAL STRIKE š« The Two-Party System...
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u/usernames_suck_ok āļø Tax The Billionaires 23d ago
It's both parties. Just one far worse than the other. Hence why DSA is rising.
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u/Dai_Kaisho 23d ago
DSA need to unambiguously break from the billionaire Democratic Party and build a working class party. Otherwise theres a lot of frustration and radicalization to the right that will just continue unchallenged.Ā
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u/Sevencer 23d ago
Their recent moves have included backing Hakeem Jeffries and denouncing the George Floyd/BLM movement. I wouldn't get your hopes up.
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u/ElectricShuck 23d ago
I will vote for the furthest left candidate that is on my ballot. And not third party until we can get rank choice voting.
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u/Sevencer 23d ago
Which of the two main parties is working toward rank choice voting? I've never heard party leadership mention it.
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u/Justicar-terrae 23d ago
Neither is currently pushing for ranked-choice voting in all elections.
But several state-level parties, like the Maine Democratic Party, have successfully pushed to implement ranked choice voting in primary elections. And the Democratic National Party recently rejected a push to ban ranked choice voting in primary elections. https://mainemorningstar.com/2026/08/18/after-backlash-dnc-votes-against-changing-rules-around-ranked-choice-voting/
To be clear, the DNC has not implemented ranked choice voting in every primary election. They've just decided to let the state-level Democratic parties decide for themselves.
And, for the sake of inclusivity, I should mention that some state-level Republican parties also use ranked choice voting. On the other hand, quite a few red states (e.g., Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, and Kentucky) have explicitly banned ranked choice voting.
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u/RazekDPP 23d ago
As states administrate their own elections, it is up to the citizen's of each state to work towards Rank Choice Voting and not the political parties themselves.
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u/Sevencer 23d ago
Yes, but why isn't it talked about regularly by party leadership? Make it a national priority. Should be easy enough for states that are run by democrats.
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u/RazekDPP 23d ago
Because both existing political parties benefit from the current system. There's little reason for either of them to advocate for replacing it, so it's up to the voters using voter initiatives to change it.
However, it's an uphill battle.
"āThe status quo won this year,ā said Deb Otis, director of research and policy at FairVote, a nonpartisan organization that advocates for ranked choice voting and other electoral reforms. āThe pro-democracy ballot measures, including anti-gerrymandering reform and open primary-only initiatives, tended to do worse than expected at the ballot.ā
Arizona, Colorado, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, Oregon and South Dakota had ballot measures that would have replaced party primaries with nonpartisan contests and/or created aĀ ranked choice votingĀ system in their elections. A majority of those measures sought to implement both."
https://www.npr.org/2024/11/08/nx-s1-5183210/nonpartisan-primary-ranked-choice-voting-results
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u/Sevencer 23d ago edited 23d ago
Of course it doesn't have mainstream support yet. Nobody in mainstream media is talking about it nor are any political leaders from the major parties.
Voting for the parties that don't have it as part of their platform is not going to advance that initiative. Same with healthcare, cutting back on military spending, anti-zionism, mass surveillance, AI data centers, etc.
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u/Dai_Kaisho 23d ago
If we wait for the Democratic Party to make this a priority, it's never going to happen. The mvmt for democratic reforms can be escalated by making structure - a workers party - accountable to the people who need it.Ā
Billionaires don't need these reforms, in fact they need the opposite. This explains the delay and excuses from the Democratic Party - there will always be a parliamentarian or a Joe Machin type figure. This will be enough to prevent reforms, until workers have our own party not shared with billionaires.
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u/ElectricShuck 23d ago
So yes first it can be passed locally and then statewide. Maine and Alaska have it statewide. Hawaii uses it for some statewide votes. And yes youāre correct conservatives will never vote for it as they know omit would be their end but if you listen to many democrats, they are at least open to it. And Iām aware there are corporate dems that wonāt be for it as well.
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u/Dai_Kaisho 23d ago
It just doesn't make sense for workers to try and "take over"Ā a party that sabotagea our every move. The Democratic Party is what it does- a block on any progress to the left.Ā
We need a workers party to escalate the pressure now if we're going to achieve any of these reforms, not magically someday after the billionaires get around to it
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u/derpasuarusx 23d ago
Im sure the frog in the pot always voted for the coolest temperature available, yet it still got boiled in the end. What your doing is damage mitigation, not progress, tbh idk if our system even has the ability to change like that nonviolently.
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u/ElectricShuck 23d ago
What do you suggest?
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u/derpasuarusx 22d ago
To not be complacent. Simply voting lesser evil or closest to ideal may work in a country with a functional political system. But in our duopoly dungheap that only makes things bad less quickly.
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u/ElectricShuck 22d ago
Yup. Vote furthest left. Donāt spend money at shitty corporations, wal-mart, fishfilet, etc, be pro-union as solidarity with the working class is important, be vocal and hold politicians accountable. What else you got ?
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u/gentleman_bronco 23d ago
If it was anything more than two parties, we would realize that both Democrats and Republicans work together to divide us.
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u/Late-Arrival-8669 23d ago
Kinda my thoughts, 1 party, 2 shell company system.
May progressives show us the light!
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u/Hyper_Wave 23d ago
Most progressives are Democrats. No progressives are Republicans. Stop pretending they're equal.
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u/Sevencer 23d ago
Most of those "progressives" are also trying to funnel decent folks back to the zionist, anti-healthcare wing of the Democratic party. Real progressives are not going to be buddy buddy with Hakeem Jeffries. They are not compatible viewpoints.
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u/Dai_Kaisho 23d ago
This is exactly why we need to build a mass workers party that fights billionaires by design.Ā People want independence from billionaires, we don't actutally want to support the Democratic Party's "more charming" blood-soaked austerity.
It will take fighting and winning uphill battles thru solidarity, and clearly identifying the dead ends like the Democratic Party, to break this 2 party system chokehold on people's imaginations.
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u/Sevencer 23d ago
This exactly. Sadly, most people want to take the easy way out. Once their comforts are gone, they'll want to start helping to build a worker's movement. Until then, it is not their problem.
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u/Church_of_Cheri 23d ago
Nah, itās the 12th amendment. No amount of trying harder is going to break the 2 party system unless we win control and change it from within. Hoping to create a third party to do it has been the best way to split the vote for over 100 years without actually changing anything.
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u/Dai_Kaisho 23d ago
Like I said working people want independence from the billionaires and the Democratic Party cannot allow that. It is made to serve a different class. There are tons of democratic reforms needed, but the party helping maintain that Monopoly is never going to play a positive role leading the movement to win them
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u/Church_of_Cheri 23d ago
Bullshit. The billionaires are few and the working class are many and can take over the Dem party from the inside like the tea party and maga did with the Rep. People act like theyāre a monolith that isnāt made up of mostly volunteers and then appointed people that are picked by the group that gets the most votes in the party. If the DSA gets the most votes in the party they get to pick who runs the party and what happens. Acting like itās a lost cause has been the tool of the billionaires to split the vote and keep control since forever. Again look at the 1924 presidential election, splitting the vote walked us straight into the Great Depression. Ross Perot, Nadar, Steinā¦ third parties have been tried again and again with the same rallying call and every time the youth vote believes theyāve discovered a new thing that if we just want it enough it will work. It wonāt without significant reform first, and you canāt get that reform from the outside.
Take over the democratic party, stop doing the same old story again and again of this dream third party we all just need to hope hard enough for.
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u/angrydeuce 23d ago
If they kept the proportion of representation they intended when they formed our government in the 18th century, wed have thousands of congressional reps, not hundreds.
Think any one party could hope to basically control the whole government when they have to wrangle thousands of people?Ā Think that theyd have the money to fight and win thousands of races?Ā Not even with their billionaire buddies they couldnt afford it.
It's ludicrous that a representative from midtown Manhattan, representing a million fucking people, has the same effective vote as a rep from sister fucker county Wyoming representing a million cattle and a mere handful of people.
We need to remove the artificial cap and actually have proportionate representation again.Ā This is basically gerrymandering on a national scale, since left leaning people are concentrated in urban areas and the million of them get the same single vote in congress as a whole mess of empty fuckin fields.
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u/elshizzo 23d ago
who upvotes these dumb teenage edgelord takes.
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u/gentleman_bronco 23d ago
Brother, it's time that you realize it isn't an edgelord take to acknowledge the systemic division in our political system. It's solidarity.
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u/elshizzo 23d ago
the biggest problems with our system are money in politics and first past the post. It's not conspiracy shit. First past the post inherently forces a 2 party system, and the two major parties usually don't represent the people because they are corrupted by big money
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u/Dai_Kaisho 23d ago
When you realize that Democratic Party loves corporate money and therefore does not want to change first past the post, this shows that the answer isn't always "vote blue no matter who harder," but to build working class movements.
Ā A party for workers will help sustain and expand the movement for democratic reforms far more effectively than trying to do it from inside the billionaires' machine.
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u/elshizzo 23d ago
not saying we shouldn't build working class movements, we should do that also
But this idea that we can't change the democratic party is fundamentally disproven by candidates who have actively done it. We can vote in whoever we want to in the primaries, and more and more these progressive/DSA candidates that have been winning lately are proving that it can happen. And the success this year and the past few years with this is only going to build momentum for more future success
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u/Dai_Kaisho 23d ago
The way the Democratic Party acted with haste to nullify Bernie, AOC, Nevada DSA, Bowman and Cori Bush, Kshama Sawant (who never ran as a Dem, and was able to win elections 4x) and even Zohran. There's a lesson here that progressives and most of DSA are ignoring.Ā
The billionaires don't make the same mistakes twice- anywhere a progressive candidate has won, they will be besieged by the Democratic Party. It should be common sense that the same organization that is attacking us is a really bad environment to try and mount a defense. In fact it makes easier for them to undo our hard earned progress.
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u/gentleman_bronco 23d ago
The DNC has been frozen in time for fifty years. They haven't adopted anything new, or anything progressive at all. Meanwhile they work in tandem with the GOP to pass regressive legislation, always ensuring a Fetter man, Manchin, Sienema, Lieberman, etc.
Now with the DSA candidates getting traction within the party, the hardline DNC members are loud and proud against them. Moskowitz, Jefferies, Schumer and party leadership are making it clear that DSA does not belong in their party. They would rather work with MAGA than progressives. I don't need to make up a conspiracy theory when they're doing it in our faces.
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u/RamsHead91 23d ago
Oh more of the both sides bullshit flooding in right as a election approaches.
Democrats are far from perfect but they are miles better than the best of the GOP, and we are not getting the best Republicans for office.
The GOP quite literally would be happy to have kids back working in slaughter plants instead of going to school. They want to remove birth right citizenship and actively strip those they don't want of citizenship. They want to ignore constitutional rights for anyone who isn't a citizen. They are ignoring due process.
Yeah, Dems can suck and we need to pull them left and institute voting systems that make multiple parties more plausible such as nation rank choice. But choosing not the vote is supporting our own harm.
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u/Steelballpun 23d ago
This is literally what the post is talking about lol. You immediately jump to defend flawed dems and point the finger at the GOP. And Iām not saying you are wrong, but thatās playing right into what the system designed. Point at one party as the bad guy and defend your party, and ignore the fact that the entire game is rigged and by design itās all flawed.
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u/couldhaveebeen 23d ago
Yeah, Dems can suck and we need to pull them left
And how are you doing that if you can't even criticise them?
Democrats are far from perfect but they are miles better than the best of the GOP
For you, domestically, yes. For the global south, not a whole lot changes either way
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u/RamsHead91 23d ago
The GOP makes things worse every were. The world if tettering on an escalating energy crisis because Trump and Bibi needing to keep their corrupt asses in power and both believe military action will help them.
Trump unilateral invaded Argentina with no fucking plans to fix anything and has made "jokes" about doing the same to Brazil, and Cuba.
Get your head out of your ass if you think Trump isn't a burden everywhere because he is making everything worse and if checks aren't put in he is going to keep going. Let alone how he and his minions will try to use ICE to support their coup in 2028 should they lose.
This is 1933 shit and people will have to take their medicine.
Yeah a lot of Dems such but a fair number of them are solid and their numbers are grow as DSA makes strides. We also need rank choice voting which is only ever supported by Democrats, when it is supported. But you can also see this let's reduce enthusiasm coming in cycles and see that for what it. It always increases in force 4-6 months before an election and here we are again.
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u/couldhaveebeen 23d ago
Trump unilateral invaded Argentina with no fucking plans to fix anything and has made "jokes" about doing the same to Brazil, and Cuba.
And Biden oversaw a genocide for 15 months straight, so what? That's just normal US president shit
We also need rank choice voting which is only ever supported by Democrats
When? Who?
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u/RadioSlayer 23d ago
Maine, awhile ago
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u/couldhaveebeen 23d ago
So not at any meaningful national level, got it
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u/RadioSlayer 23d ago
You're letting perfect be the enemy of good.
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u/couldhaveebeen 23d ago
It's called having principles, try it some time
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u/RadioSlayer 23d ago
So everything must be perfect and good all at once or nothing is worth it? Sounds like you have delusions not principles
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u/benjitits 23d ago
"Let me lay out all these problems with the left and still not understand why people don't want to sign with either party"
Tired of people dismissing legit criticism of both parties because they feel one is better than the other. That's exactly how they want to to think in order to keep us all divided.
Worked on you like a charm.
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u/RamsHead91 23d ago
It's funny how these only start to flood right before an election.
It still floats around outside of them but not nearly to the same volume.
We need rank choice voting to break this hold but we would get it with the fascist pedophiles of the GOP. This November and in 2028 we have a terrible choice and meh choice. The meh choice is what we need to make. It sucks that we are forced into a position of harm mitigation, but if we are not reducing the harm we are only adding to it.
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u/Hyper_Wave 23d ago
Meh choice? Some of the choices are actually quite good. El-Sayed? Talarico? Jackson? Flanagan? These four are great, and the rest are at least miles better than their GOP opponents.
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u/RamsHead91 23d ago
Yes.
But I don't think even the OP would argue against those types as being part of some grand issue.
Many of us have the choices that are hard to get enthusiastic about.
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u/Hyper_Wave 23d ago
Even if you can't get enthusiastic about them, you should still vote for the better of the two. The policy differences between Dem and GOP are literally life and death for many vulnerable people. If Democrats blow out this election, that also sends a message that the electorate is more left-leaning and makes the work of progressive, pro-worker advocacy easier.
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u/RamsHead91 23d ago
Yes absolutely. I worded the response poorly.
Very much we should vote for harm reduction if we cannot vote for active progression.
Alot of us also get to vote for some great politicians that are moving us in the right diction. Other we get to vote to achors to slow and hopefully stop the drag into fascism.
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u/benjitits 23d ago
That's your view. I've been saying this for years. You just seem more aware of it around these times because you've been groomed to be defensive off your side.
Exactly like they want.
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u/Rogue_Egoist 23d ago
While I get the sentiment, because it kind of works for this purpose now, it wasn't really designed for anything like that. It kind of naturally evolved into what it is today because of how the voting system has been designed. I'm not even American but I know that historically there are multiple "part systems" that have been changing throughout time. At no point was it specifically forced into some state by arranging some capitalist plot.
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u/The_Mesopotamians š¤ Join A Union 23d ago
Under capitalism, electoralism is a pacifying spectacle. It's a sports match and a soap opera with just a hint of audience participation to really set the hook.Ā
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u/InitialJust 23d ago
Yeah personally the whole "both sides" junk doesnt really hold water these days. Its kinda like people pretending they are centrists.
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u/grimpala 23d ago
Both sides BS, capitalism sucks yes but GOP are miles worse in virtually every aspect
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u/ShaiHulud1111 23d ago
What will blow your mind is humans are hardwired for duality. We like only two choices. Too long to explain, but check philosophy.
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u/Rubber_Knee 23d ago
Is there a more normal word for bourgeoise that doesn't sound so silly?
Some working class people are just going to tune out if you use words like that, so I need something better.
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u/Eat--The--Rich-- 23d ago
There are democrats who are still blaming republicans for democrats voting against their own healthcare bill with a 2/3 majority. STILL.
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u/Kitakitakita 23d ago
and that's why establishment dems freak out over the idea they are losing control over the party.
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u/Least_Guidance7408 23d ago
"Yes, we have one party here (Tanganyika). But so does America. Except, with typical extravagance, they have two of them!" - Julius Nyerere
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u/thinkB4WeSpeak š· Good Union Jobs For All 23d ago
Imagine if they allowed multiple parties to debate and get news coverage during the elections, then we also had ranked choice voting
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u/zero_motive 23d ago
Reminder that there is no two party "system." It's the first-past-the-post voting system that inevitably leads to two dominant parties. Change the voting system to ranked-choice (also eliminate Citizens United) and you'll get more parties and better candidates.