by Stephen Pate

Created on: December 13, 2009   Last Updated: December 15, 2009

Americans are losing faith in government.  This can be seen in the political turmoil of the tea parties and protests for healthcare.  Americans feel they should have more say in government.  But what can the people do about it?

Well, for one, people should remember that they cannot always get their way.  The reason why the American political system works so well is because it allows for individual freedoms.  The Founding Fathers wanted a separation of powers not just for the government but a balance of power among our citizens.  Rather than having one group of people be supported by and dominating over another group of people, American government would consist of a number of groups each competing for different political actions.  It was hoped that such a system would help foster liberties and freedoms rather than oppression and tyranny by the government.

So perhaps one thing Americans should do is develop empathy for others, especially those who are different from them.  We should change our expectations of government and realize that the government isn’t just their government but that of their neighbors as well.  They should also realize that their neighbors deserve as much of a voice in government as they do.

This is important to remember since another important change we could realize is that our two-party system is not work at all.  Divided between Republicans and Democrats, liberals and conservatives, American politics are extremely polarized.  This makes our politicians extremely polarized, which they have to be in order to get the votes to be elected.  But our politicians aren’t polarized because of our two-party system; our politicians are polarized because of our voting system.

The voting system that is most often used in the United States is winner-take-all.  Under this system, whoever receives the most number of votes wins the elected office.  This is why we have a two-party system, as a split in a conservative or liberal party would allow the other side to win an election.  This is known as Duverger’s Law.

This was the case in the 2009 special election for the 23rd New York congressional district to replace its member in the House of Representatives.  Conservatives were split between Dierdre Scozzafava of the Republican Party and Doug Hoffman of the Conservative Party.  Both were running against Bill Owens, the Democratic Party candidate.

While Diedre

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