Newsgroup: it.politica.internazionale
Titolo: Democrazia? Con cavolo!

Se la Russia di Putin e l'Iran non sono democratici perche' solo i
candidati "giusti" partecipano alle elezioni, questa sotto cos'e?
Ralph Nader, nel 2008, non mi piace come candidato, ma questo non
cambia che la democrazia a due partiti NON e' piu' democratica della
democrazia a partito unico.
Ed e' la direzione in cui si sta muovendo anche l'Italia.
http://www.ballot-access.org/winger/iba.html
....
We no longer have vigorous and active third parties because Democratic
and Republican state legislatures passed restrictive laws that make it
exceedingly difficult for third parties to get on the ballot in many
states. These laws usually require third parties to gather signatures
for a petition to be on the state ballot, and they often place strict
deadlines for gathering such signatures.
These restrictions did not emerge overnight. From 1888 to 1931, ballot-
access laws were rather mild. In 1924, only 50,000 signatures on a
petition were required to place a new party on the ballot in 48 states
(a figure that represents 0.15% of the number of people who had voted
in the previous election). During the 1930s, ballot-access laws became
significantly restrictive, as they required new parties to gather more
signatures and file for application earlier and earlier in the
campaign year. Still, it was not until the 1960s that compliance with
ballot-access laws became extremely difficult.
In 1994, a new party that wants to field a candidate in every race for
the U.S. House of Representatives and have the party name appear on
the ballot next to the candidate's name would need to register
1,593,763 members or gather an equal number of signatures. Yet the
Democratic and Republican parties need not collect any signatures to
assure themselves of a place on the ballot, and the number of
signatures needed for individual Democratic candidates to place
themselves on primary ballots in all 435 contests is 138,996 (the
number would be slightly different for Republicans).
True, the severity of these ballot-access laws does vary from state to
state. In Florida, one of the more restrictive states, a party is
defined as one that has persuaded 5% of the state's voters to register
with the new party. This may seem like an easy task, but not since the
early 1900s has a third party in any state ever managed to register 5%
of the voters. Even when people vote for a third party, they don't
want to register with it. The Conservative Party of New York elected a
U.S. Senator, James Buckley, in 1970, but they only persuaded 1.5% of
the voters to register as Conservatives. Similarly, the Connecticut
Party won the office of Governor in 1990, but registered only 0.1% of
the voters.
Florida does offer third parties an alternative: if the new party
cannot register 5% of the voters, then it can get its statewide
nominees on the ballot by submitting 196,000 valid signatures on a
petition (a figure that is equal to 3% of all registered voters). Once
again, this task is harder than it appears. With a single exception
(in California in 1948), no third party has ever met a signature
requirement greater than 110,000 signatures. In fact, Florida's laws
are so stringent that no third party or independent candidate for
Governor has been on its ballot since 1920.
Admittedly, ballot-access laws are harsher for third-party
congressional candidates than they are for third-party Presidential
candidates. No third party has managed to run candidates for the U.S.
House in over half of the nation's districts since 1920. By contrast,
third-party Presidential candidates get on the ballots in all 50
states every so often, which probably misleads the public into
thinking that there is no significant ballot-access problem for third
parties.
In reality, America's ballot-access laws are so stringent, and third
parties are repressed to such a degree, that the U.S. is probably in
violation of the Copenhagen Meeting Document, an international
agreement the U.S. signed in 1990 that requires nations to:
    "Respect the right of individuals and groups to establish, in full
freedom, their own political organizations and provide such political
parties and organizations with the necessary legal guarantees to
enable them to compete with each other on the basis of equal treatment
before the law and the authorities."
How does the U.S. violate this agreement? Suppose that a new party
were founded in 1994, with popular support that equaled that of the
Democratic or Republican Party. In order to contest all the executive
and legislative offices up for election on November 8th, 1994, it
would need to collect about 4,454,579 valid signatures. And some of
these signatures would need to be collected ten months before the
election. By contrast, the Democratic and Republican parties would not
need to submit any signatures to get themselves on the ballots, and
their candidates would need only to collect about 882,484 valid
signatures to place themselves on primary ballots.
The extreme disparity of the burdens placed on old, established
parties versus new parties has no parallel in any other democratic
nation in the world. Indeed, the number of signatures required for
Democrats and Republicans to get on primary ballots is itself too high
in some states, and as a result about 25% of all state legislative
races present the voter with only one candidate on the general-
election ballot.
In Britain, the political science model of a healthy two-party system,
every candidate for Parliament faces the same ballot-access hurdle-- a
simple filing fee. Candidates, regardless of their party affiliation,
are granted two free mailings to all the voters, and every candidate
gets a certain amount of free TV and radio time. There exists legal
equality between all the parties. Yet Britain has a healthy two-party
system, as did America in the 19th century.
There have been attempts to rectify the inequality in America between
established and new parties. A pending bill in Georgia would lower the
number of signatures needed for third-party and independent candidates
for the House of Representatives from 14,000 to 5,000. A similar bill
was recently introduced in Illinois to lower the number of signatures
needed for third-party candidates for the House from 12,000 to 1,000.
Sadly, neither bill is expected to pass.
Perhaps one of the best remedies currently [1994] available is HR
1755, Minnesota Congressman Tim Penny's bill, which would establish a
federal standard of 1/10th of 1% of the last vote cast as the number
of signatures required to place a candidate's name for statewide
federal office on the ballot. One half of 1% would be required to get
on the ballot for the House.
Update 1998: Congressman Ron Paul has introduced new bills on this
subject which have already had their first hearings.
Unfortunately, the U.S. Supreme Court has a rather erratic record when
it comes to decisions regarding the constitutionality of ballot-access
laws. While the court has, on occasion, upheld challenges to
restrictive requirements, it has at other times ignored these same
decisions. In the 1968 case Williams v Rhodes, the court struck down
Ohio state laws that made it virtually impossible for a new political
party, even one that had hundreds of thousands of supporters, to gain
access to the state's Presidential ballot. But in 1971, Jenness v
Fortson upheld Georgia's ballot-access laws, even though these laws
were somewhat more restrictive than those of Ohio. (Ohio's laws,
though ruled unconstitutional, had actually placed more independent
candidates on the ballot than had Georgia.)
The logic of the Court, while varying from decision to decision, can
also be sloppy within the context of a single case. In a 1974 case,
American Party of Texas v White, the Court upheld a Texas law that
barred voters who had voted in a partisan primary from signing a
petition to place a new party on the statewide ballot. It was
rational, according to the Court, to limit voters to a single
nominating act. But voters who signed the petition weren't nominating
any candidates -- the Texas petition for a new party did not even
carry the names of any candidates. Signing the petition simply
indicated the voter's belief that the third party deserved a place on
the ballot.
Despite the importance of third and new parties to our political
system, the topic of restrictive ballot-access laws gets very little
scholarly attention. Groups that are harmed the most by ballot-access
laws tend to lack the clout required to command media attention. What
media coverage there is of the topic is often muddled or misleading.
E. J. Dione, a well-known writer on politics, stated in the May 21st,
1992, edition of The Washington Post that it is "easier than ever for
third-party presidential candidates to qualify for state ballots."
Even though the complete inaccuracy of this statement was brought to
his attention, no correction was made. Scholarly works are often no
better. Third Parties in America, a well-respected book published in
1984 by Princeton University Press, states on page 23, "Ballot-access
laws are now as lenient as they have ever been in this century." But
as was mentioned earlier in this article, the 1924 ballot-access laws
were far less rigid than today's.
The fact remains that active and vigorous third parties play a vital
role in maintaining the health of our two-party system. We need third
parties today, more than ever, if we are to change the "frustrating
and inadequate" political system that Leon Baradat spoke of. Yet if
Professor Baradat and others like him had their way, public financing
and ballot-access laws would be made even more discriminatory toward
third parties. The Federal Government would artificially extend the
Democratic and Republican parties far beyond their natural life cycle,
thus condemning us to ever greater levels of stagnation and voter
apathy. In order to keep our political system healthy, we must once
again allow people the freedom to vote for the qualified candidate of
their choice. Such freedom is not only essential to the health of our
government but also our right as citizens of the United States.
Richard Winger is the editor and publisher of Ballot Access News.

 Ed e' la direzione in cui si sta muovendo anche l'Italia.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_third_party_presidential_candidates%2C_2008
Palmiro Pangloss
-- 
Tarpaulin: Amarcord Cold War
http://tarpaulin.blogspot.com/

 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_third_party_presidential_c.
..
quanti spazi hanno sui mass media tutti quei  candidati messi assieme?

 quanti spazi hanno sui mass media tutti quei  candidati messi assieme?
Quelli che meritano.


 wrote in message 
news:fr47hr$se$1...@tdi.cu.mi.it...

#_amm-esso e non conc-...chi ne stabilisce il merito?
Giano 

 #_amm-esso e non conc-...chi ne stabilisce il merito?
L'elettorato ovviamente.


 L'elettorato ovviamente.
l'elettorato che non sa che esistono perchè non hanno accesso ai mass
media, è un serpente che si morde la coda....
guarda cos'è successo l'ultima volta che un terzo candidato ha potuto
fare i dibattiti presidenziali...
nel 92 Perot prese il 19%, nel 96 niente dibattiti e 8%. Pensi che sia
solo un caso?

 Palmiro Pangloss
#_Non fa' il finto tonto!...John2 parla di accesso ai media.
Ci si accede con una piattaforma di svariati milioni di $ghei, dei quali 
solo una parte marginale di incremento arriva  successivamente 
dall'elettorato.
Giano 

 media
Esiste una cosa che si chiama cursus honorum: ti candidi ad una carica 
locale, fai campagna, vinci. Poi ti candidi ad una carica piu' alta, fai 
campagna, vinci. Poi al parlamento nazionale, etc. Senza contare la 
determinante differenza fatta da esse membro di un partito.
Se domani tu ti candidassi premier, quanta copertura mediatica otterresti?


 John2 parla di accesso ai media.
Anchio.


 Se domani tu ti candidassi premier, quanta copertura mediatica otterresti?
per la par condicio dovrei ottenere la stessa copertura di Berlusconi,
se fossimo un paese democratico.

 no
Eh si, guarda le biografie politiche di pressoche' chiunque abbia una 
carica elettiva.


 carica elettiva.
ok, guardiamo la biografia politica di Berlusconi: mai fatta politica,
3 televisioni, premier. Scacco matto in 3 mosse. Puoi andare...

 ok, guardiamo la biografia politica di Berlusconi
Ah, IYO quella di Berlusconi e' la carriera politica esemplare di un 
uomo politico in un paese democratico? Mi cojoni.


 uomo politico in un paese democratico?
no, è la dimostrazione che il CH è inutile di fronte al potere
mediatico, che crea dal nulla i leader politici.

 no
Appunto, e' un'eccezione.


 Ed e' la direzione in cui si sta muovendo anche l'Italia.
*PIRLA*!
Nessuno impedisce a qualcuno di fare il suo partito e di farsi votare.
Con il partito unico invece non c'e' scelta (anche perche' se ti
permettono di fare il partito, poi ti mettono in galera o dichiarano che
il tuo partito non puo' partecipare alle elezioni).
-Stefano