You want a culture where citizens are free to express themselves and so live in the openness necessary to the functioning of a successful economy? Israel has a free press much of it openly hostile to the parties in power.
Political folk talk a lot these days about 'messaging' - a neologism designed to describe the way in which parties and politicians consciously characterize their efforts. It is only intended to be positive - i.e. 'Our messaging is designed to show we care.'
The larger meaning here is that mainstream journalists simply cannot talk about things that the two parties agree on this is the black hole of American politics.
I don't for the life of me understand how anybody could contemplate the results of the 2000 election in the US and say that electoral politics doesn't matter any more and that Ralph Nader was right when he said there is no difference between the two parties.
One thing I have learned in my time in politics is that if one of the parties is shameless the other party cannot afford to be spineless.
One thing I have frankly decided is that when it comes to political reform we have two conservative parties in British politics. Both the Labour and Conservative parties have constantly and repeatedly failed to honour promises they have made about reforming cleaning modernising our clapped-out system.
Politics isn't just a game of clashing parties and competing interests. The right reason is to challenge the status quo to serve the common good and to leave this nation better than we found it.
I hate politics. It's slimy. Any job where people pander for votes I don't like. The country has gotten so partisan that if you're not on my side you're the enemy. The only thing I ever try to support is a third party like Unity08. We need more parties and more choice.
First I think more Americans need to declare their independence from partisan politics on both sides. The more that Americans declare their independence the more the parties will have to compete for their votes using reason rather than the hateful appeals.
By 2000 politics will simply fade away. We will not see any political parties.