Extremely from what I see as an outsider, other countries may dissolve into two main parties and smaller parties surrounding them but Americans have conditioned to see everything as a 'YES/NO' answer for politics, when the answer is 'both parties are scum, you need more independents'.
The last guy that came close was Perot and after the Republicans tried to blame him for Bush's loss (not on he was gonna raise taxes) and the same happened with the Bull Moose party which actually dud split the vote and why we got Wilson (time machine assassination target no 1). That's the issue is any third party is accused of being a spoiler for the main two.
That's better but breaking into state let alone national may be an immovable wall, because the main parties designed it that way.
The most successful one who did this was Trump but that was because he was well known beforehand, had lots of resources and charismatic to know how to play to an audience. And he just usurped the Republican presidency.
In the American system citizens vote for a slate of policies - the major negotiations happen between the voter and the parties. In many-party / proportional systems people vote for a party they like and that party then goes and negotiates with other parties and forms coalitions.
In the end compromises and deals have to be made, but in a parliamentary system you've delegated your negotiation power to party apparatchiks.
What is a Pirate Party's policy on abortion? They may not even tell you. What are they going to trade to keep VPNs legal? No idea.
Lots of Americans would vote for a Border Wall Party, but what other policies would the BWP have? Don't know. The more narrow the party is the more voters are abdicating all their other positions. The American system doesn't always produce the best results on a specific issue, like a border wall, but on the whole it represents voters better than proportional systems.
Extremely from what I see as an outsider, other countries may dissolve into two main parties and smaller parties surrounding them but Americans have conditioned to see everything as a 'YES/NO' answer for politics, when the answer is 'both parties are scum, you need more independents'.
The last guy that came close was Perot and after the Republicans tried to blame him for Bush's loss (not on he was gonna raise taxes) and the same happened with the Bull Moose party which actually dud split the vote and why we got Wilson (time machine assassination target no 1). That's the issue is any third party is accused of being a spoiler for the main two.
That's better but breaking into state let alone national may be an immovable wall, because the main parties designed it that way.
The most successful one who did this was Trump but that was because he was well known beforehand, had lots of resources and charismatic to know how to play to an audience. And he just usurped the Republican presidency.
In the American system citizens vote for a slate of policies - the major negotiations happen between the voter and the parties. In many-party / proportional systems people vote for a party they like and that party then goes and negotiates with other parties and forms coalitions.
In the end compromises and deals have to be made, but in a parliamentary system you've delegated your negotiation power to party apparatchiks.
What is a Pirate Party's policy on abortion? They may not even tell you. What are they going to trade to keep VPNs legal? No idea.
Lots of Americans would vote for a Border Wall Party, but what other policies would the BWP have? Don't know. The more narrow the party is the more voters are abdicating all their other positions. The American system doesn't always produce the best results on a specific issue, like a border wall, but on the whole it represents voters better than proportional systems.