New "Forward" Party: a third party in America that might actually work?

[Tigers!]

This leads to what we see in Israel, where large parties form an alliance with a small conservative religious party who in return demands traffic lights be turned off on the Sabbath.

Wrong. Israel has a parliamentary system, with the prime minister elected by the Knesset. That problem could be avoided I think by electing the executive independently.

Isreal tried that briefly in the 90s. It didn't work out for them for some reason.

They tried changing the balance of power between the Prime Minister and the President. Realised that it was no good and went back.

 

[Bronzeage]

Proportional representation would not make a difference in a system with an executive elected by general vote. Political grid lock is just as likely, leading larger parties to form alliances with smaller, but more extreme parties. This leads to what we see in Israel, where large parties form an alliance with a small conservative religious party who in return demands traffic lights be turned off on the Sabbath.

There can only be one executive, so we won't see President who is 46% Democrat, 32% Republican, 8% Green, and 4% Libertarian.

I don't think it will make much difference even without said executive.

The alternative is as you say Israel--where the small parties get a very disproportionate share of power. I don't believe there is any real answer.

The difference between a parliamentary prime minister and a president is, the prime minister serves at the pleasure of whatever majority exists in the parliament and the president basically serves at the pleasure of no one. This is great when a competent president is in office and very bad when an incompetent president sits at the big desk.

The original intent of the Electoral College was for a small group of white men to sit down in a room where they proceed to argue and make deals until one candidate claims a majority of the raised hands. It was expected to start with multiple candidates and produce only one, especially in the case that no single candidate had the support of a majority of voters, nationwide.

The "winner take all" nature of the Presidency quickly evolved into a two party system because everyone saw the advantage of allying with other groups, but more than that, realized that third place had no place at the table.

 

[Jayjay]

This leads to what we see in Israel, where large parties form an alliance with a small conservative religious party who in return demands traffic lights be turned off on the Sabbath.

Wrong. Israel has a parliamentary system, with the prime minister elected by the Knesset. That problem could be avoided I think by electing the executive independently.

Isreal tried that briefly in the 90s. It didn't work out for them for some reason.

They tried changing the balance of power between the Prime Minister and the President. Realised that it was no good and went back.

I was actually referring to the short period between 1996 and 2001 when the Prime Minister was elected separately from Knesset. According to Wikipedia:

In 1996, when the first such election took place, the outcome was a surprise win for Benjamin Netanyahu after election polls predicted that Peres was the winner.[4] However, in the Knesset election held at the same time, Labour won more votes than any other party (27%). Thus Netanyahu, despite his theoretical position of power, needed the support of the religious parties to form a viable government.

Ultimately Netanyahu failed to hold the government together, and early elections for both prime minister and the Knesset were called in 1999. Although five candidates intended to run, the three representing minor parties (Benny Begin of Herut – The National Movement, Azmi Bishara of Balad and Yitzhak Mordechai of the Centre Party) dropped out before election day, and Ehud Barak beat Netanyahu in the election. However, the new system again appeared to have failed; although Barak's One Israel alliance (an alliance of Labour, Gesher and Meimad) won more votes than any other party in the Knesset election, they garnered only 26 seats, the lowest ever by a winning party or alliance. Barak needed to form a coalition with six smaller parties to form a government.

In early 2001, Barak resigned following the outbreak of the al-Aqsa Intifada. However, the government was not brought down, and only elections for prime minister were necessary. In the election itself, Ariel Sharon of Likud comfortably beat Barak, taking 62.4% of the vote. However, because Likud only had 21 seats in the Knesset, Sharon had to form a national unity government. Following Sharon's victory, it was decided to do away with separate elections for prime minister and return to the previous system.

To me the idea of electing the PM with a separate ballot in a parliamentary multiparty system sound reasonable, but practical results in Israel seem to indicate that it's a clusterfuck. But Israeli politics seem to be a clusterfuck in general so I'm not sure if the election method was the problem.

I think open lists in proportional representation are better than closed lists like Israel, because the latter gives party leaders too much power. I think this is evident from the fact that Netanyahu was still the PM just a few years ago... there is clearly not enough rotation. But countries like Netherlands that have open lists also have crises of government very often, so fragmentation might be the real problem.

This is all theoretical for this disucssion of course because there's no way Americans would accept party list PR. Ranked-choice is a much more likely successor to the current system.

 

[Jayjay]

Proportional representation would not make a difference in a system with an executive elected by general vote. Political grid lock is just as likely, leading larger parties to form alliances with smaller, but more extreme parties. This leads to what we see in Israel, where large parties form an alliance with a small conservative religious party who in return demands traffic lights be turned off on the Sabbath.

There can only be one executive, so we won't see President who is 46% Democrat, 32% Republican, 8% Green, and 4% Libertarian.

I don't think it will make much difference even without said executive.

The alternative is as you say Israel--where the small parties get a very disproportionate share of power. I don't believe there is any real answer.

Technically, the problem isn't disproportionate representation for small parties... it's proportionate representation for small parties. BTW the Israeli system uses D'Hondt that gives slight edge to larger parties, and it's still a mess.

 

[Swammerdami]

Obviously, liberal "extremists" want women to have control over their own bodies

No, that would be libertarian "extremists". So-called liberals want to grant woman control over their own bodies only on the issue where they agree with exercising said choice, not on other issues one might want a right to choose.

What on Earth are you talking about? Many liberals do not want women to have guns, but they don't want men to have guns either.

 

[Metaphor]

Obviously, liberal "extremists" want women to have control over their own bodies

No, that would be libertarian "extremists". So-called liberals want to grant woman control over their own bodies only on the issue where they agree with exercising said choice, not on other issues one might want a right to choose.

What on Earth are you talking about? Many liberals do not want women to have guns, but they don't want men to have guns either.

I suspect he means liberals want women to be able to choose to abort, but they don't want women to be able to choose to take their clothes off for money.

 

[Derec]

The alternative is as you say Israel--where the small parties get a very disproportionate share of power. I don't believe there is any real answer.

Germany's solution to that is the 5% rule - you get in with your proportional share only if you have 5% of the vote. That allows for smaller parties like FDP and Greens to have a say, but avoids hopeless fractioning of the Bundestag.

 

[Swammerdami]

Obviously, liberal "extremists" want women to have control over their own bodies

No, that would be libertarian "extremists". So-called liberals want to grant woman control over their own bodies only on the issue where they agree with exercising said choice, not on other issues one might want a right to choose.

What on Earth are you talking about? Many liberals do not want women to have guns, but they don't want men to have guns either.

I suspect he means liberals want women to be able to choose to abort, but they don't want women to be able to choose to take their clothes off for money.

On that issue, libertarians may be more liberal than "liberals," but "liberals" are generally much more liberal on that issue than "conservatives."
(True, conservatives may be much more likely than liberals to be caught engaging in harassment or other "illicit" sex, but we are speaking here about stated policy positions.)

 

[lpetrich]

I don’t have any respect for a “new” party that wants to parachute in to the CEO spot.

Grassroots. Local offices. County offices. State offices.

THEN you can make a federal plan. Until then, it’s just vanity and it destroys your own aims.

That seems to exclude running for Congress. But I agree with that about the Presidency. The Green Party seems to mainly be a supporter of vanity Presidential runs, and the Libertarian Party likewise.

But there is a political party that does what Rhea wants, and that seems to be very successful: Working Families Party - Fighting for an America that works for the many, not the few.

Checking on Our Candidates - Working Families Party I find lots of local, state, and Congressional candidates, but in only some of the states. The WFP also cross-endorses a lot of Democratic candidates.

 

[lpetrich]

Proportional representation would not make a difference in a system with an executive elected by general vote. Political grid lock is just as likely, leading larger parties to form alliances with smaller, but more extreme parties. This leads to what we see in Israel, where large parties form an alliance with a small conservative religious party who in return demands traffic lights be turned off on the Sabbath.

As if that is typical of a parliamentary system with proportional representation.

Let's look at measurements of strength of democracy like

•  Democracy Index
•  Freedom in the World by Freedom House
•  List of countries by Fragile States Index

I found this combined ordering:

1 Finland, 2 Norway, 3 New Zealand, 4 Sweden, 5 Iceland, 6 Denmark, 7 Canada, 8 Ireland, 9 Switzerland, 10 Netherlands, 11 Australia, 12 Uruguay, 13 Luxembourg, 14 Germany, 15 Japan, 16 Austria, 17 Portugal, 18 Slovenia, 19 Belgium, 20 Estonia, 21 France, 22 South Korea, 23 Taiwan, 24 United Kingdom, 25 Costa Rica, 26 Mauritius, 27 Chile, 28 Czech Republic, 29 Italy, 30 Malta, 31 Israel, 32 Lithuania, 33 Slovakia, 34 Spain, 35 Cape Verde, 36 Cyprus, 37 Latvia, 38 United States, 39 Barbados, 40 Greece, 41 Panama, 42 Poland, 43 Argentina, 44 Croatia, 45 Romania, 46 Mongolia, 47 Trinidad and Tobago, 48 Botswana, 49 Bahamas, 50 Bulgaria, 51 Jamaica, 52 Malaysia, 53 Suriname, 54 Hungary, 55 Namibia, 56 South Africa, 57 Ghana, 58 Grenada, 59 Antigua and Barbuda, 60 Brazil, 61 Dominican Republic, 62 Guyana, 63 East Timor, 64 Singapore, 65 Albania, 66 North Macedonia, 67 India, 68 Peru, 69 Seychelles, 70 Indonesia, 71 Montenegro, 72 Serbia, 73 Belize, 74 Moldova, 75 Tunisia, 76 Paraguay, 77 Ecuador, 78 Colombia, 79 Lesotho, 80 El Salvador, 81 Samoa, 82 Bhutan, 83 Fiji, 84 Senegal, 85 Papua New Guinea, 86 Ukraine, 87 Mexico, 88 Malawi, 89 Thailand, 90 Bolivia, 91 Armenia, 92 Benin, 93 Georgia, 94 Sri Lanka, 95 Philippines, 96 Madagascar, 97 Bosnia and Herzegovina, 98 Guatemala, 99 Liberia, 100 São Tomé and Príncipe, 101 Honduras, 102 Kuwait, 103 Morocco, 104 Sierra Leone, 105 Zambia, 106 Nepal, 107 Gambia, 108 Kenya, 109 Tanzania, 110 Bangladesh, 111 Ivory Coast, 112 Qatar, 113 Turkey, 114 Burkina Faso, 115 Nigeria, 116 Pakistan, 117 Algeria, 118 Mauritania, 119 Jordan, 120 Lebanon, 121 Uganda, 122 Comoros, 123 Kyrgyzstan, 124 Oman, 125 Mozambique, 126 Kazakhstan, 127 Niger, 128 Gabon, 129 Maldives, 130 Iraq, 131 Angola, 132 Togo, 133 Haiti, 134 Mali, 135 United Arab Emirates, 136 Russia, 137 Solomon Islands, 138 Vietnam, 139 Guinea-Bissau, 140 Nicaragua, 141 Eswatini, 142 Cambodia, 143 Rwanda, 144 Brunei, 145 Ethiopia, 146 Cuba, 147 Egypt, 148 Djibouti, 149 Zimbabwe, 150 Bahrain, 151 Belarus, 152 Palestine, 153 Azerbaijan, 154 Cameroon, 155 Guinea, 156 China, 157 Uzbekistan, 158 Saudi Arabia, 159 Iran, 160 Sudan, 161 Burundi, 162 Venezuela, 163 Laos, 164 Tajikistan, 165 Libya, 166 Equatorial Guinea, 167 Turkmenistan, 168 Chad, 169 Eritrea, 170 Myanmar, 171 Afghanistan, 172 North Korea, 173 Yemen, 174 Andorra, 175 Central African Republic, 176 Dominica, 177 Congo, 178 Kiribati, 179 Syria, 180 Marshall Islands, 181 San Marino, 182 Tuvalu, 183 Micronesia, 184 Palau, 185 DR Congo, 186 Saint Lucia, 187 Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, 188 Liechtenstein, 189 F.S. Micronesia, 190 Saint Kitts and Nevis, 191 Somalia, 192 South Sudan, 193 Hong Kong, 194 Monaco, 195 Republic of the Congo, 196 Vanuatu, 197 Democratic Republic of the Congo, 198 Tonga, 199 Nauru, 200 Kosovo

Most of the top ones use parliamentary systems. So if parliamentary systems are so debilitating, then why has that not been very evident?

 

[lpetrich]

That gets me to thinking. In the spring of 2016, Bernie Sanders's Presidential campaign was winding down, and some of his campaigners discussed what to do next. They saw Congressional Republicans obstructing President Obama, and they decided that if Hillary Clinton won, she'd need a good Congress to go along with her. Thus, "Brand New Congress".

BNC's founders originally planned to run its candidates in every open Congressional seat: all of the House and 1/3 of the Senate. They were to run a unified campaign, with unified messaging, like some European-style political party. But they were to run in the two major parties, running as Democrats and as Republicans as appropriate for each district. Bernie Sanders candidates running as Republicans???

I've been unable to find out why BNC's founders decided not to found a new party. But I'm guessing that it was because of the poor track record of such parties. They also wanted to take advantage of the knee-jerk partisanship that is all too common. Win the primary, and you will win the general election in most places.

BNC was less than successful, however, with only 30 candidates in 2018. Of these, 28 were Democrats, 1 Republican, and 1 independent. Of the Democrats, 9 won their primaries, the Republican lost his one, and the Independent didn't have one. All but one lost in the general. That exception: Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, in NY-14. That district is heavily Democratic, so her general-election win was essentially guaranteed by her primary win, and what a primary win it was, against long-time incumbent Joe Crowley.

BNC has continued to exist, fielding candidates in 2020 and 2022, all Democrats, and its offshoot Justice Democrats has done likewise, in 2018, 2020, and 2022.

 

[Jarhyn]

In today's US, the Democrats are distinctly right of centre,

Party of AOC, Presley, Omar, Bowman, Bush et al is "right of centre[sic]"? LMAO!

What dictionary are you misusing such that an attribute of X, Y, Z is an attribute of "the Party of X, Y, Z"?

Hastert, Gaetz and Trump have all committed sexual felonies. Would you write "The party of Hastert, Gaetz and Trump is the party of sexual felons"?

Well, if something is a property of all objects of a set, it is a property of the set of the objects is it not?

 

[Jayjay]

Proportional representation would not make a difference in a system with an executive elected by general vote. Political grid lock is just as likely, leading larger parties to form alliances with smaller, but more extreme parties. This leads to what we see in Israel, where large parties form an alliance with a small conservative religious party who in return demands traffic lights be turned off on the Sabbath.

As if that is typical of a parliamentary system with proportional representation.

Let's look at measurements of strength of democracy like

•  Democracy Index
•  Freedom in the World by Freedom House
•  List of countries by Fragile States Index

I found this combined ordering:

1 Finland, 2 Norway, 3 New Zealand, 4 Sweden, 5 Iceland, 6 Denmark, 7 Canada, 8 Ireland, 9 Switzerland, 10 Netherlands, 11 Australia, 12 Uruguay, 13 Luxembourg, 14 Germany, 15 Japan, 16 Austria, 17 Portugal, 18 Slovenia, 19 Belgium, 20 Estonia, 21 France, 22 South Korea, 23 Taiwan, 24 United Kingdom, 25 Costa Rica, 26 Mauritius, 27 Chile, 28 Czech Republic, 29 Italy, 30 Malta, 31 Israel, 32 Lithuania, 33 Slovakia, 34 Spain, 35 Cape Verde, 36 Cyprus, 37 Latvia, 38 United States, 39 Barbados, 40 Greece, 41 Panama, 42 Poland, 43 Argentina, 44 Croatia, 45 Romania, 46 Mongolia, 47 Trinidad and Tobago, 48 Botswana, 49 Bahamas, 50 Bulgaria, 51 Jamaica, 52 Malaysia, 53 Suriname, 54 Hungary, 55 Namibia, 56 South Africa, 57 Ghana, 58 Grenada, 59 Antigua and Barbuda, 60 Brazil, 61 Dominican Republic, 62 Guyana, 63 East Timor, 64 Singapore, 65 Albania, 66 North Macedonia, 67 India, 68 Peru, 69 Seychelles, 70 Indonesia, 71 Montenegro, 72 Serbia, 73 Belize, 74 Moldova, 75 Tunisia, 76 Paraguay, 77 Ecuador, 78 Colombia, 79 Lesotho, 80 El Salvador, 81 Samoa, 82 Bhutan, 83 Fiji, 84 Senegal, 85 Papua New Guinea, 86 Ukraine, 87 Mexico, 88 Malawi, 89 Thailand, 90 Bolivia, 91 Armenia, 92 Benin, 93 Georgia, 94 Sri Lanka, 95 Philippines, 96 Madagascar, 97 Bosnia and Herzegovina, 98 Guatemala, 99 Liberia, 100 São Tomé and Príncipe, 101 Honduras, 102 Kuwait, 103 Morocco, 104 Sierra Leone, 105 Zambia, 106 Nepal, 107 Gambia, 108 Kenya, 109 Tanzania, 110 Bangladesh, 111 Ivory Coast, 112 Qatar, 113 Turkey, 114 Burkina Faso, 115 Nigeria, 116 Pakistan, 117 Algeria, 118 Mauritania, 119 Jordan, 120 Lebanon, 121 Uganda, 122 Comoros, 123 Kyrgyzstan, 124 Oman, 125 Mozambique, 126 Kazakhstan, 127 Niger, 128 Gabon, 129 Maldives, 130 Iraq, 131 Angola, 132 Togo, 133 Haiti, 134 Mali, 135 United Arab Emirates, 136 Russia, 137 Solomon Islands, 138 Vietnam, 139 Guinea-Bissau, 140 Nicaragua, 141 Eswatini, 142 Cambodia, 143 Rwanda, 144 Brunei, 145 Ethiopia, 146 Cuba, 147 Egypt, 148 Djibouti, 149 Zimbabwe, 150 Bahrain, 151 Belarus, 152 Palestine, 153 Azerbaijan, 154 Cameroon, 155 Guinea, 156 China, 157 Uzbekistan, 158 Saudi Arabia, 159 Iran, 160 Sudan, 161 Burundi, 162 Venezuela, 163 Laos, 164 Tajikistan, 165 Libya, 166 Equatorial Guinea, 167 Turkmenistan, 168 Chad, 169 Eritrea, 170 Myanmar, 171 Afghanistan, 172 North Korea, 173 Yemen, 174 Andorra, 175 Central African Republic, 176 Dominica, 177 Congo, 178 Kiribati, 179 Syria, 180 Marshall Islands, 181 San Marino, 182 Tuvalu, 183 Micronesia, 184 Palau, 185 DR Congo, 186 Saint Lucia, 187 Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, 188 Liechtenstein, 189 F.S. Micronesia, 190 Saint Kitts and Nevis, 191 Somalia, 192 South Sudan, 193 Hong Kong, 194 Monaco, 195 Republic of the Congo, 196 Vanuatu, 197 Democratic Republic of the Congo, 198 Tonga, 199 Nauru, 200 Kosovo

Most of the top ones use parliamentary systems. So if parliamentary systems are so debilitating, then why has that not been very evident?

I think you misunderstood the point being made. The top countries in the list are parliamentary systems with proportional representation, but not with executive elected with a general vote. The first presidential system on the list seems to be Uruguay at position 12.

 

[lpetrich]

• Opinion | Most third parties have failed. Here's why our Forward Party won't. - The Washington Post
• Former Republicans and Democrats form new third U.S. political party | Reuters
• Forward Party
• Renew America Movement
• Serve America Movement

The authors:

David Jolly is a former Republican congressman from Florida and is executive chairman of the Serve America Movement. Christine Todd Whitman is a former Republican governor of New Jersey and co-founder of the Renew America Movement. Andrew Yang is a former Democratic presidential candidate and is co-chair of the Forward Party.

After describing the US's political polarization,

The United States badly needs a new political party — one that reflects the moderate, common-sense majority. Today’s outdated parties have failed by catering to the fringes. As a result, most Americans feel they aren’t represented.

Most third parties in U.S. history failed to take off, either because they were ideologically too narrow or the population was uninterested. But voters are calling for a new party now more than ever.

What do they consider the sensible center?

On guns, for instance, most Americans don’t agree with calls from the far left to confiscate all guns and repeal the Second Amendment, but they’re also rightfully worried by the far right’s insistence on eliminating gun laws. On climate change, most Americans don’t agree with calls from the far left to completely upend our economy and way of life, but they also reject the far right’s denial that there is even a problem. On abortion, most Americans don’t agree with the far left’s extreme views on late-term abortions, but they also are alarmed by the far right’s quest to make a woman’s choice a criminal offense.

Where is this "far left" in politics? Have they been watching Fox News too much? What they call the sensible center is pretty much the mainstream of the Democratic Party.

To succeed, a new party must break down the barriers that stand between voters and more political choices. Accordingly, we will passionately advocate electoral changes such as ranked-choice voting and open primaries; for the end of gerrymandering; and for the nationwide protection of voting rights and a push to make voting remarkably easy for anyone and incredibly secure for everyone.

There is a further reform that they didn't mention: proportional representation. That's used in many nations with higher ratings in quality of democracy than the US.

 

[lpetrich]

From Reuters:

The merger involves the Renew America Movement, formed in 2021 by dozens of former officials in the Republican administrations of Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush, George W. Bush and Donald Trump; the Forward Party, founded by Yang, who left the Democratic Party in 2021 and became an independent; and the Serve America Movement, a group of Democrats, Republicans and independents whose executive director is former Republican congressman David Jolly.

...
The party, which is centrist, has no specific policies yet. It will say at its Thursday launch: "How will we solve the big issues facing America? Not Left. Not Right. Forward."

...
Public reaction on Twitter was swift. Many Democrats on the social media platform expressed fear that the new party will siphon more votes away from Democrats, rather than Republicans, and end up helping Republicans in close races.

...
Taylor acknowledged that third parties had failed in the past, but said: "The fundamentals have changed. When other third party movements have emerged in the past it’s largely been inside a system where the American people aren’t asking for an alternative. The difference here is we are seeing an historic number of Americans saying they want one."

How do they expect a third party to be created? For the Democratic and Republican leaderships to get together and create one?

Rothenberg pointed out that third party presidential candidates like John Anderson in 1980 and Ross Perot in 1992 and 1996 flamed out, failing to build a true third party that became a factor in national politics.

Also Ralph Nader in 2000 and Jill Stein in 2016, both Green Party candidates. That party seems to be more a vehicle for supporting vanity runs for President than a serious political party. Here is what I think is a serious third party: the Working Families Party. It supports local, state, and Congressional candidates, and it does not bother much with the Presidency. Can any other third party point to a similar level of performance? The Green Party? The Libertarian Party? The Constitution Party? The Alliance Party? The Party for Socialism and Liberation?


My first knowledge of the Serve America Movement was from Michelle Caruso-Cabrera challenging Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez in the 2020 Democratic primaries. MCC, like AOC, is a Caribbean Latin American with a hyphenated name, but she was a reporter for CNBC for a long time, and her campaign was heavily supported by Wall Streeters. She even moved from her Manhattan Trump Tower apartment to an apartment in AOC's district, NY-14. It was hard to tell what her platform was, beyond "MCC vs. AOC", though she lambasted AOC about the failed NYC Amazon HQ2 deal. Associating herself with SAM didn't help much either. She admires Ronald Reagan, and some years ago, she wrote a book, "You Know I'm Right", advocating Republican policy prescriptions, a book that had a forward by Larry Kudlow, who served in the Trump Admin.

 

[lpetrich]

I checked on who is in these parties.

About - Renew America Movement -- lots of Republicans like Fmr MA Gov Bill Weld, Fmr NJ GOv Christine Todd Whitman, Fmr VA-10 Rep Barbara Comstock, Fmr RI-01 Rep Claudine Schnider, Fmr VA-05 Rep Denver Riggleman, Fmr AZ-05/08 Rep Jim Kolbe (became Independent), Fmr WI-08 Rep Reid Ribble, Evan McMullin, Anthony Scaramucci, Mary Peters, Chris Vance, Chad Mayes -- no Democrats that I could find, though I lost patience after I got most of those with some partisan association.

Renewers - Renew America Movement

With govtrack.us 2020 ideology scores:
Susan Wild D-PA-07 0.29, Matt Cartwright D-PA-08 0.35, Elissa Slotkin MI-08 0.42, Andy Kim D-NJ-03 0.43, Elaine Luria D-VA-02 0.44, Jared Golden D-ME-02 0.46, Mark Kelly AZ-Sen 0.49, Tom O'Halleran D-AZ-01 0.50, Abigail Spanberger D-VA-07 0.50, Cindy Axne D-IA-03 0.51, Jaime Herrera Beutler R-WA-03 0.56, Lisa Murkowski R-AK-Sen 0.57, Josh Gottheimer D-NJ-05 0.64, Tom Rice R-SC-07 0.66, Liz Cheney R-WY-01 0.68, Dan Newhouse R-WA-04 0.74
No scores:
Clint Smith (I-AZ-05), Evan McMullin (R-UT-Sen), Peter Meijer R-MI-03

A lot of centrists.

They have a "Watchlist" with two candidates, and "Dividers":

Marjorie Taylor Greene R-GA-14, Matt Gaetz R-FL-01, Lauren Boebert R-CO-03, Paul Gosar R-AZ-04, Andy Biggs R-AZ-05, Bob Good R-VA-05, Burgess Owens R-UT-04, Dan Bishop R-NC-09, Jim Jordan R-OH-04, Kevin McCarthy R-CA-23, Madison Cawthorn R-NC-11, Scott Perry R-PA-10


Principles - Renew America Movement - rather general good-government principles

Our Platform - A new party for a new majority. at the Serve America Movement

More detail.

"Problem Solving" - pragmatic and non-ideological.

"Transparency" - pledges to disclose activities and campaign contributions.

"Accountability" - engagement with constituents, rejection of lobbyist contributions or employment, rejection of dark money (PAC's with secret donors), and term limits (12 years or 3 terms, whichever is greater)

"Electoral Reform" - quite a lot:

• Supports public (top 4 or top 5) primaries that are open to all voters regardless of party affiliation
• Supports legislation to require the use of Ranked Choice Voting (aka instant-run-off vote tabulation systems) in all publicly financed primary and general elections
• Supports legislation to end partisan gerrymandering by, for example, creating independent, fully transparent redistricting commissions
• Supports legislation imposing appropriate term limits on legislative offices
• Supports repeal of “sore loser laws,” including rules that make it impossible to run as an independent, after losing a party primary
• Supports legislation to lower the legal barriers for minor party and independent candidates to get their names and candidacies on primary and general election ballots
• Supports removing obstacles to legal voter registration and voting by advocating for automatic voter registration (AVR), same day registration, online registration, early voting, vote-at-home options, and/or by making election day a national holiday
• Supports requiring organizations including so-called super PACs that make expenditures in connection with elections to disclose all donations online and within 24 hours
• Supports eliminating leadership PACs and other ways incumbents and the major parties favor themselves by creating loopholes or favored treatment under current campaign finance laws
• Supports making election law enforcement agencies independent and non-partisan rather than “bi-partisan”

I don't like term limits, but most of the rest of that is good. Reforms - A new party for a new majority. - "Unrig the System"

There is a big omission, however: proportional representation. That would greatly reduce vulnerability to gerrymandering.

Platform - Forward Party, mentioning

• Ranked-choice voting
• Nonpartisan primaries
• Independent redistricting commissions

No mention of proportional representation there either.

Also, Universal Basic Income was dropped from the Forward Party's platform, though it was prominent when Andrew Yang ran for President in 2020.

 

[Bronzeage]

Proportional representation would not make a difference in a system with an executive elected by general vote. Political grid lock is just as likely, leading larger parties to form alliances with smaller, but more extreme parties. This leads to what we see in Israel, where large parties form an alliance with a small conservative religious party who in return demands traffic lights be turned off on the Sabbath.

As if that is typical of a parliamentary system with proportional representation.

Let's look at measurements of strength of democracy like

•  Democracy Index
•  Freedom in the World by Freedom House
•  List of countries by Fragile States Index

I found this combined ordering:
<snip>

Most of the top ones use parliamentary systems. So if parliamentary systems are so debilitating, then why has that not been very evident?

No one said anything about parliamentary systems being debilitating. I said that an executive elected by a general vote will drive political parties to combine until only two remain.

 

[lpetrich]

No one said anything about parliamentary systems being debilitating. I said that an executive elected by a general vote will drive political parties to combine until only two remain.

I said that to try to get a reaction out of people who seem to object to parliamentary systems without stating why they object.


I remember seeing on some podcast Christine Todd Whitman saying that she was sure that some Democrats are involved in this party, but that she couldn't remember which ones. That's in agreement with what I can find out about this expanded Forward Party: it's all Republicans in it, though they endorse some Democrats.

 

[lpetrich]

Opinion | Why Andrew Yang’s New Third Party Is Bound to Fail - The New York Times by Jamelle Bouie

The odds that it will attract any more than a token amount of support from the public, not to mention political elites, are slim to none. It will wither on the vine as the latest in a long history of vanity political parties.

He then proposes what is necessary for a third party to succeed. Not by being a wishy-washy centrist party without much of a platform, but:

The most successful third parties in American history have been precisely those that galvanized a narrow slice of the public over a specific set of issues. They further polarized the electorate, changed the political landscape and forced the established parties to reckon with their influence.

Then explained how first-past-the-post voting, single-member districts, and a strong Presidency give two parties -- parties that are sometimes awkward coalitions of factions that would be separate parties in a parliamentary system with proportional representation. It's good that JB points out structural problems like that.

He then discussed the Free Soil Party of 1848-1854, formed to oppose extension of slavery into the western territories.

... In many respects, the emergence of the Free Soil Party marks the beginning of mass antislavery politics in the United States. It elected several members to Congress, helped fracture the Whig Party along sectional lines and pushed antislavery “Free” Democrats to abandon their party. The Free Soilers never elected a president, but in just a few short years they transformed American party politics. And when the Whig Party finally collapsed under the weight of its own contradictions, after General Winfield Scott’s defeat in the 1852 presidential election, the Free Soil Party would become, in 1854, the nucleus of the new Republican Party, which brought an even larger coalition of former Whigs and ex-Democrats together with Free Soil radicals under the umbrella of a sectional, antislavery party.

JB then continued with the People's or Populist Party of the 1890's. “In the wake of the defeat of the People’s Party, a wave of reform soon swept the country. Populism provided an impetus for this modernizing process, with many of their demands co-opted and refashioned by progressive Democrats and Republicans.” (historian Charles Postel) “By turn of fate, Populism proved far more successful dead than alive.”

On a more sinister note, the segregationist George Wallace won five states and nearly 10 million ballots in his 1968 campaign for president under the banner of the American Independent Party. His run was proof of concept for Richard Nixon’s effort to fracture the Democratic Party coalition along racial and regional lines. Wallace pioneered a style of politics that Republicans would deploy to their own ends for decades, culminating in the election of Donald Trump in 2016.

JB concludes with

The biggest problem with the Forward Party, however, is that its leaders — like so many failed reformers — seem to think that you can take the conflict out of politics. “On every issue facing this nation,” they write, “we can find a reasonable approach most Americans agree on.”

then stating that we can't do that, and that an important issue for political systems is how to handle disagreements.

To add to JB's point, there was a faction that supported the sort of both-sides-bad centrism that the Forward Party seems to support. Around 1860, it was more and more evident that the US was starting to break apart over slavery. Some politicians in the in-between states proposed their own breakaway nation, the  Central Confederacy Some of them proposed the Upper South -- Virginia, Kentucky, Tennessee, Missouri, North Carolina, and Maryland -- and some the Mid-Atlantic states -- Maryland, Delaware, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and New York.

The Central Confederacy was an attempt at centrist compromise between the hard-line support of slavery of the Deep South states and the hard-line opposition to slavery of the New England states. But this attempt at centrist compromise collapsed soon after South Carolina's attack on Fort Sumter in 1861, and the CC's proposed states split between the two sides of that war.

If Today's Politics Had Been in WW2 satirizes "Pundits" with "In the ongoing controversy between Nazism and democracy, the rhetoric on both sides has gotten quite heated, with some independents and moderates bemoaning the acrimonious tone of the war."

 

[Harry Bosch]

No one said anything about parliamentary systems being debilitating. I said that an executive elected by a general vote will drive political parties to combine until only two remain.

I said that to try to get a reaction out of people who seem to object to parliamentary systems without stating why they object.


I remember seeing on some podcast Christine Todd Whitman saying that she was sure that some Democrats are involved in this party, but that she couldn't remember which ones. That's in agreement with what I can find out about this expanded Forward Party: it's all Republicans in it, though they endorse some Democrats.

I don't agree all the way. The republican party has moved well to Whitman's right. In today's republican world, she's a left leaning RHINO at best. The republicans of today are either crazy (Trump, Q, and etc.) or cultural warriors (Desantis and etc.). Not much room today for republican moderates anymore.