Political thoughts: I want to split up

[johnhummel]

Right now, there are two parties out there in America, with a few far left/far right groups. You've got your Republicans. Now, at its core, I agree with the idea: small, nimble government that focuses on providing basic services and protection of civil rights. The government stays out of people's lives, makes sure there's a level playing field

Comments

[poet_ninja]

I award your idea one million points. Please implement as soon as possible.

It's way past time.

[dracoangelica]

Why don't we give more power to those small parties that are already in place?

For example...Libertarians.

[johnhummel]

Might work, but my problem with the libertarians is that they're wayyyy over the line. Republicans of the 1970's are all right - but the "let's get rid of the IRS too!" that the libertarians have is frankly unworkable for any kind of federal government.

Maybe it's a start, I guess - support them, then work on them to make them less insane. It's like the green party - I support some of the ideas, but they're so far over to the left that I can't go with them. I'd support the democrats if they didn't act spineless - it's not their policies, it's their inability to stand up for *me* instead of just falling over when someone accuses their members of being a traitor.

[poet_ninja]

See, I always felt like the Libertarians had a good idea that they overdid slightly. The IRS is a clunky, unwieldy tool anyhow, and could use some reworking. If we started with say, a no-reductions bracketed income level tax (based on actual buying power, and not arbitrary numbers) and didn't add layer on layer of byzantine tax law, it could be a lot fewer guys.

And something like that would probably give us more money to play with anyhow.

Of course what I personally want to vote for is a responsible body of moderates who will use our tax money to actually improve things, instead of maintaining a status quo because it buys votes.