I think that parties or factions necessarily must exist when it becomes logistically impossible to gather everyone together and engage in direct democracy because society is too large and too complex to do otherwise.
The Congressional Progressive Caucus is moving towards new rules where members can be expelled if they don’t vote with the group often enough on key issues. I think that is a good idea.
One of the problems with our Constitution is that the Founding Fathers had this naïve idea that one could build a political system without political parties. That was shown to be an incredibly flawed idea within four years and it hasn’t been fixed for over two centuries.
Is your objection to requirements of party loyalty on within the context of our flawed two-party system or would you object to parties requiring members to adhere to a strict party line within a multi-party parliamentary system?
I would never join a party, but it would all be far less objectionable in a multi-party system.
As it is, it is gross for the parties to demand loyalty as if voters and candidates really have the freedom to find a party they align with. They are essentially part of the government and should be open.
since we’re talking about how old everyone is in the other thread I’ll just point out that I’m old enough that I actually used “plonk” in usenet posts.
