Polyarchy
This post is part of Polyarchy, an independent blog produced by the political reform program at New America, a Washington think tank devoted to developing new ideas and new voices.
The racial divisions of the 2016 election are the culmination of a half-century-long political realignment.
The Democratic Party platform offers a laundry list of liberal policy proposals but little change in the types of policies pursued. Trying to accomplish it all is still likely to lead to a voter backlash.
The US has the dubious distinction of having the highest share of lawyers in the national legislature and the highest share of income going to the top 1 percent. Coincidence?
Our political mess is not because political leaders were too weak. It’s because they were too strong and ignored their voters.
Rich America has become more diverse, more highly educated, and more concentrated in industries and places that tend to support Democrats. No wonder Democrats are dong better among the top income earners.
By ignoring the need for a long-overdue increase in staff salaries and instead “holding the line” on the legislative branch spending bill, the senators effectively voted to further empower private lobbyists.
Historically, when these moments of distemper have occurred, they ultimately led to political reforms.
The Kochs are telling us how money actually works in politics — which investments pay off and which ones don’t. Hopefully the rest of us will learn the same lesson.
Ticket splitting can’t save Republicans in Congress — but low turnout might.
Donald Trump is a Republican. But he is not an ideologue or a conservative. Whether or not Republican leaders endorse him will reveal which of these values is most important to them.
Trump arose because the the Republican Party was institutionally too strong for too long, which made it too easy for elites to decide among themselves and take their voters for granted.
The GOP-big business consensus is now being powerfully squeezed by two separate factions within the party, one ultra-conservative, one populist. In the future, the Democrats are more likely to be the party of big business.
The political terrain is shifting. And as it does, strange and new alliances will continue to emerge.
Broken promises is a theme at the center of campaign rhetoric.
There are some problems with how this movement has framed the issues: too much focus on corruption and elections, and too little focus on policy process and the trade-offs of actually governing.
Sanders lost the nomination when he failed to win the support of superdelegates.
A new insider-outsider dimension is not only wreaking havoc on the GOP presidential race. It’s undermining their Republican leadership in Congress, too.
By losing his first presidential campaign to Pat Buchanan in 1999-2000, Donald Trump learned to copy Buchanan’s nativist appeal. His 2016 campaign also has better timing, because the nativist Republican constituency has grown during the Obama years.
The party that is more deeply divided going into the convention always loses the general election.
The worse Democrats feel about the future of the economy, the better they feel about Sanders. Same goes for Republicans and Trump.
How did Republicans go from tough on crime to deeply concerned about mass incarceration?
The forces that have fueled the widening gap between the two political parties are now fueling fights within the parties. These fights will lead to new coalitions in American politics.
Democrats just pivoted to the center and took their base for granted in order to divide Republicans. Expect them to do a lot more of this in the years to come.
Perverse incentives and faulty assumptions created an opening for Donald Trump. Now we have to deal with the toxic assets.
if Trump becomes president, Congress is going to be the one barricade protecting America from a demagogic hurricane of bullying fascism
Max Weber nailed the problem with Donald Trump a century ago — and explained why his ideological flexibility is the most dangerous thing about him.
Here’s why Trump could unwittingly make American politics great again.
Turns out the winnowing strategy was never going to work. Had Republicans used ranked choice voting, they would have already known that.
No theory predicted Donald Trump. But could any theory have?
The most dangerous thing about Donald Trump is not that he might get elected. It’s what he will do to the political process even if he doesn’t.
His plan for Republican control relies on a conservative Supreme Court.
Donald Trump made the election confusing to everyone. This has helped Bernie Sanders a lot.
Here’s why one law professor thinks we should stop talking about corruption.
Looks like 2016 will be another do-nothing year in the Senate.
Big donors don’t support Trump or Sanders. So how did they get so far?
It’s wrong to view Trump solely a Palin-esque right-winger. His greatest appeal may be to people who were always turned off by the war of ideas.
Do you think the candidate you like best in the primaries also has the best shot at winning in the general election? If so, you might be a victim of one of the most common psychological biases.
Yes, Cruz lied about the $1.2 million in low-interest loans he got from big Wall Street banks. But the bigger story is that Congress is full of rich people like Cruz who could secure those kinds of loans.
Rep. Steve Israel (D-NY) is the latest in a long line of retiring members of Congress to complain about the campaign finance system. Maybe in the future, though: less complaining, more reform?