The future of political parties in United States Part 3
S.: I wanted to go back to your assumption that it may be the end of this season, the U.S. four games. I wanted to offer a purely speculative model that they will be not four, but three: the extreme Democrats, extreme Republicans, and their Central parts are combined into one in one form or another. Is it possible?
B.: I think that is possible. Again, among Republicans this obstruction, inability to manage reluctance to run the country, of course causes a certain amount of indignation and alarm. In principle it is possible that there will be some kind of centrist party that wants to promote some kind of agenda in American politics and Economics, and the radicals will move left. Will a group of young people, mainly a socialist, which Sanders sells, say, an industrial country of the first decades after the Second world war and this fascist group of white older people, the losers in the modern era of high technology, which will be grouped around Trump.
MS: Sam, what do you think?
G.: I think that the split within the democratic party very much exaggerate. We would, probably, especially reviewers, to identify the phenomenon of trump with the phenomenon of Sanders. In fact, if you look at the exit polling of the democratic primaries, we see that the vast majority of people who vote in these primaries for the Sanders – from 70% and above ready for the General elections to vote for Clinton. Same thing with the other hand. There are different opinions which of them is better, but there is a common denominator that both it will come down in some sense. The split with the Republican party is much more ideologically much more evil and deep. So if you can anticipate the split of the Republican party, does nothing of the kind expected at the level of the voters, not the candidates, not activists.
S.: as for the Republican party, talks about her split continue since Mrs. Palin, maybe a little before. While it does not end there. Another thing is that after all of the caliber of Sarah Palin can’t compete with Donald trump.
G.: to be honest, I think there are enough smart people in that party to understand that the third party in this system the chance is very small, so it is better to fight for power within their party than to split it. Just, that fight is delayed for a long time and will continue. On the one hand, it is right that we are so horrified by trump, but we forget that, again, neither Cruz nor Rubio is no better. They allow themselves such statements, which in the absence of trump also look quite shocking.
S.: In any case, they agree to a public debate with the fact that to punish the families of terrorists is a good idea, as well as a wall on the border with Mexico to build at the expense of Mexico’s budget, too, no one is going. But this is really out of the realm of populism. Strictly speaking, if we assume that the result of all these collisions Mr. trump really will be in the White house, generally speaking, not obvious how much of what he promised during the election campaign, will reach at least the discussion in Congress or the Senate, not to mention the practical implementation.
I propose to speculate a little regarding the political system of the United States as a system. How can you say that the situation is definitely deserving of the description of the crisis or pre crisis how American system of checks and balances, valves, nomination of candidates, the division into two mainstream parties, and all the rest anyway remains behind, as far as she’s safe for now, if we talk about how it will evolve in the next fifty years?
B.: We can only look at what happened. As economists, when you look into the future, you can only make a prediction from the past to see how events unfolded in the past and project it into the future. The American system has existed for nearly 250 years virtually unchanged. Expect it to change as a result of trump, it would be quite early. It is very stable system and has proven its stability, when the country had grown from 13 States to 50, from a small agricultural colonies turned into a huge global superpower. But I think that it will never happen and the system will not collapse and the country will not change, neither can we, because everything changes, everything comes to an end. As it happens, it’s impossible to think. In fact, let’s say, Sanders also offers things that require quite a consensus, which is also unlikely to be discussed in Congress, the Senate, especially if they continue to dominate the Republicans. Both the radical wing offer things not quite realistic, at least in today’s American context.
MS: Sam, what do you think? It is not about the collapse, the collapse of the modern political system, but its deep correction, the need for which is long overdue. If the system is 250 years old if it was built in the days when you had 13 States and there was no Internet, then perhaps you can slightly pull up somewhere nuts to adjust?
G.: Actually it is changing, not institutionally, but by the behavior of people’s perception of politicians, in relation to politicians and politics in General. Now it is completely different than it was even 20 years ago, not to mention the fact that 120 years ago. The relationship between the Federal government and States are constantly changing, evolutionarily, the constitutional court changes, the approach to the Constitution. Thing is, I think, is not that the system can go somewhere. The system of checks and balances strong enough to prevent any excesses, abuses or large scale arbitrary power.
On the other hand, we see the paralysis of the system, which we normally can’t get to the adoption of any budgets, to deal with those issues that all agree need somehow to be addressed – health, education and so forth, because it is easier for electoral success to deal with obstructionism, rather than lawmaking. The hope is that sooner or later the people will get tired. But the ones we see, especially trump, as angry – not lovers, and politicians and the status quo in Washington, significant progress is not like, do not want compromises, I want to insist on, to be able to call things by their proper names, swear, mostly.
S.: It is Remarkable, of course, that at the end of the conversation sounded “gruel”, which has repeatedly promised to show America. America saw her repeatedly and is still standing, much to the dismay of people who don’t like her. Let’s see what it will achieve. I suspect that the topic of the us elections, before the elections, we’ll return repeatedly, and that’s it for today.