The Political Landscape Has Changed

[kentuck]

The Democratic and Republican Parties of 2016 no longer exist. They have transformed themselves into new Parties.

Many in the old Parties have formed an unholy alliance with their former political rivals. The Lincoln Project is only the most obvious to come to mind. But there are millions of others that have switched their loyalties, or are in the process of switching.

Will the Parties change to meet the new realities? That is an open question. Most of the "Lincoln Project" types that voted for Joe Biden, because they simply could not stomach Donald Trump, are still very much conservatives at heart. Will they be accepted into the new Democratic Party?

Conversely, many working-class Democrats were glamoured by Donald Trump. They left the Democratic Party to vote for him. This actually began in 2016 when the same voters that voted for Obama could not bring themselves to vote for Hillary Clinton and switched to Donald Trump. It continued on a larger scale in 2020.

What happens if the Parties cannot adapt to these new voters? Do they withdraw and form their own Parties? Only the future will tell.

We assume that all the 74 million votes that Trump received were bedrock Republicans but it is very likely that there were several million former Democrats in that total. Likewise, we assume that the 80 million votes that Joe Biden received were all Democrats. However, we know that there were many Republicans that voted for Joe Biden. But we don't yet know the total numbers that switched Parties?

What will the new Parties look like in the future? With Democrats and former moderate Republicans forming one coalition and Trump and his unorthodox non-partisans forming the opposition Party, it will likely take a while for the water to clear up and to understand the new political realities, in my opinion.

[Klaralven]

1. Note that on the order of 40% of the public consider themselves Independent

https://news.gallup.com/poll/15370/party-affiliation.aspx

[Ferrets are Cool]

3. I would surmise that about the same percentage consider themselves in good shape but

are actually overweight.

If independants actually made up 40% of the voting population, we would have a 3rd party president.

[Klaralven]

5. The system is heavily rigged against ever allowing a 3rd party to get in the game

There are all sorts of state laws and regulations that institutionalize the Democratic Party and Republican Party and their grip on political power.

[jimfields33]

6. It'd be great to have five choices someday

The two party systems never evolved even though the country did. Isn’t that weird?

[rso]

2. Political parties

Perhaps we will eventually take the multi-Party path, along the lines of the Western European parliamentary democracies.

[brooklynite]

4. Why do you assume anti-Trump Republicans will join the Democratic Party?

There's no basis for this. They supported Biden (and opposed Trump's Senate supporters) as a necessary first step, but they plan is to rebuild the Republican Party, not infiltrate the Democrats.

[intheflow]

7. This analysis excludes the new influence from the Democratic left.

That cultural shift is surely transforming the parties as well.