People who's politics have a populist bent, whether they be progressive or libertarian, often have a tremendous frustration with the existing two party system. This is because the two parties tend toward the monied interests, usually the corporate dominated military-industrial-congressional complex. The two parties often disagree about things around the edges of the empire to give the appearance of left-right paradigm, but on the major things the two parties are in total agreement. America is an empire that must be maintained through the use of a massive military and police force that is tasked with maintaining not peace, but security, wherever American interests are imperilled, or even inconvenienced. The two parties disagree over things that don't matter to the empire, such as reproductive rights, which guns one may own, and choice of marital partners, but on the really big issues, there is only one party. What's a populist to do? What does someone who believes that our government should be more concerned with taking care of the people, rather than the big monied interests do?

In the American "democracy" system, each race is a winner take all race. Whomever gets the most votes wins. Without instant runoff voting or proportional representation, this is the way it is, and this leads to two parties. Any more parties just dilutes the votes, but doesn't change the fact that one of the two major parties will win all the representation for a given jurisdiction. Many third parties in America have come and gone with varying degrees of success. The most successful third party is actually the Republican party. It grew in the mid 19th century as an anti-slavery party and displaced the Whig party. The Bull Moose, the Populist, the Socialist Workers, the Green, the Libertarian, the Reform, the American Independent, the Marijuana, the Constitution, the Unity, and the Boston Tea Party have all had very limited success. Third parties don't work in our current system of winner take all races. What's a populist progressive to do? Join the Green party and old waste my vote, or hold their nose and vote for the least despicable "mainstream" candidate?

The religious fundamentalist populists of the seventies and eighties in America had this similar dilemma as progressives have today. There was no party representing their Christian bible centric view of the world. There were a lot of them, and they were committed to their cause. Did they start a new party? No. They came up with the right solution, at least for them. In my opinion it was bad for the country, but it worked for them. They worked at the precinct, county, and state levels, spent lots of money, and took over large sections of the party that was closest to their interests. We all know how that turned out. Not good for us, but they still have a controlling interest in the Republican party, and it pushes their social agenda. What's a *progressive* populist to do? Armed revolt? Start yet another party where we can all sit around and cheer each other on and lose every election?

Progressives need to take a lesson from the religious right, and work at the grassroots, precinct, county, and state levels and take control of the political party that is closest to our world view. We need to get people involved at all levels of one of the two major parties that would require the least amount of work to transform into a progressive populist party. That would be the Democratic party, of course. The Democratic party is far from perfect, and it's far from being a strong progressive party. It is dominated by monied interests, most of them corporate, and it has the strange idea that if only it tries to be more like the other party, it can win. The party is afraid to take progressive positions because the other party denigrates those positions. Duh. Of course they will. On the other hand, the Democratic party at least professes to support labor, environmental preservation, women's equality and control over their own bodies, and a number of other progressive positions.

Poll the people on the issues, and you'll find that the majority of the people hold progressive, or somewhat progressive positions on health care, jobs and the economy, foreign policy, abortion, gun control, and even taxes if the question is framed the right way. If politicians would take a purely populist progressive stand on every issue, and raise enough money to get their populist message out, then they can win anywhere in the country. Of course the problem is that a candidate that takes a purely populist stance on everything, has a hard time raising money from the "haves" because a populist stand is egalitarian and equitable, and those that have the power don't like egalitarian and equitable, because that means they would have to give up a portion of their money and power. Put campaign finance reform on the list of populist issues, but that's for another day.

I hope this post has explained why we are progressive activists, but work within the two party system to bring about transformation of that system. We must get inside it and transform it, not stand outside and beat on the walls demanding change. The revolution will not be televised, and it's already begun.