From Strategic Culture
By David Kearns
''But the polarization of politics in the US is a myth. (1) While the parties have amplified their rhetorical venom against one another over the last decade, and while they have become more intransigent on policy questions that divide them, over the last few decades both of them have occupied positions increasingly off to the right, as measured on the spectrum of politics in developed nations over the course of the last 100 years. There is no Left at all in the US political establishment. Further, as surveys of popular opinion on key issues demonstrate with regularity, the two parties now stand well to the right of the electorate. It follows, therefore, that the self-moderating mechanism of the two-party system has broken down, and that the democratic dimension of the US system is nearly impotent. The explanation for this is no mystery: in the absence of regulations limiting spending in election campaigns, candidates depend ever more on donations from deep-pocketed individuals or corporations. In turn, politicians do the bidding of their donors, the lion's share of whom militate for policies that will transfer wealth upward. Inexorably, this dynamic has produced a degraded, extremist ideological climate that trumpets the virtues of the free market and maintains as much silence as is possible regarding government giveaways and corruption in favor of large corporations.''
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