LH

When the Old G says "Yes, everything was fine until the Democrats divided us by claiming everything Bush does is wrong" it sounds very like he's saying "Bush ok, Dems not ok."

And thus when he says "The only way to solve this is to do away with the two party system." it sounds very like "Let's just keep the one ok party." Ein Volk.

You say, "I also want to get rid of parties...ALL of them...and vote for individuals instead. Several independent individuals in each district. How is that less democratic than voting for a f**king Democrat or Republican?"

Well, I never said that would be less democratic. In fact I've often thought this would be ideal. And here of course comes the "but." But how do you keep people from forming alliances, teams, committees -- *parties*?

When I was about ten years old we had elections in school. We voted on class officers, and on playground rules, and of course we had no parties. Then our teacher came serpentlike into our classroom and taught us something about politics. He had a group of us form what he called a "caucus," and we found that by working together we could swing the elections the way we wanted, though we were a minority. I suspect some of the adults in your district would discover the same thing, and before long you'd have parties and maybe machine politics.

I do believe people are basically good, but I also believe they are self-seeking and competitive. At least until you change the culture. Some of them even then. For your system to work you'll have to transform us all into something like the Hopi indians.

clint