Hostility to political opponents sustains what’s left of the legacy parties.
On the opening night of the Democratic National Convention, former First Lady Michelle Obama begged voters to resist the urge to refrain from voting or to vote for third-party candidates. “This is not the time to withhold our votes in protest or play games with candidates who have no chance of winning,” the former first lady exhorted whatever audience, perhaps out of masochism, chose to tune in to the virtual convention. It was a fitting moment of desperation—and one that should be echoed at the Republican convention—given the disdain many Americans hold for the presidential candidates of both legacy parties. Once again, we’re being asked to pick between candidates that just aren’t up to the job. “As both political parties prepare for their conventions, one in four Americans do not think either of the major-party presidential candidates would be a good president,” Gallup noted last week. “The current percentage saying neither candidate would make a good president is the highest on record.” Unfortunately, one of those hopefuls is almost certain to win or retain power over a government that has too much say in our lives. It’s no wonder that in 2016, millions of voters picked Libertarian Gary Johnson or Green Jill Stein or declined to vote at all rather than choose between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump. That year, the Democratic and Republican nominees headed into Election Day “with the worst election-eve images of any major-party presidential candidates Gallup has measured back to 1956.” The 2020 election represents an ongoing demonstration that America’s governing apparatus is trapped in the embrace of the rotting corpses of once-dynamic political organizations. Democratic and Republican Party hearts and minds may have died, but they refuse to loosen their grip on political office—and on voters. And, out of habit or old lessons remembered too long, most Americans dutifully confine their choices to these two moldering options, no matter how unpleasant the task.
