<story><title>World food prices hit 10-year peak – FAO</title><url>https://www.reuters.com/business/world-food-prices-hit-10-year-peak-fao-2021-10-07/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>mdiesel</author><text>Yes, a multi-party system if far better. But over time, if the rhetoric is &amp;quot;if you aren&amp;#x27;t for us you&amp;#x27;re against us&amp;quot; and &amp;quot;a vote for SmallParty is a vote for Enemy&amp;quot; we trend towards two. We justify it to ourselves by saying that although we don&amp;#x27;t support everything OurSide says, it&amp;#x27;s far preferable to Them.</text></item><item><author>simongray</author><text>When people have 10 different ideological choices, it doesn&amp;#x27;t matter as much. I&amp;#x27;m pretty sure that the Republican party would be represented by e.g. a Traditional Liberal party, a Conservative party, a National Conservative party, and perhaps small fascist party in any traditional European democracy. And that Traditional Liberal party would also contain a whole bunch of Democrats.</text></item><item><author>mdiesel</author><text>Do they have a safeguard against becoming like the US? By which I mean doubling down on core support base rather than seeking to convert opposition, and using populist rhetoric rather than traditional debate.&lt;p&gt;If not then it is only a matter of time. A new charismatic leader who says the right things emerges, and system is pushed to breaking point. The US might be the first, but Trump&amp;#x27;s lasting legacy will be proving to the world that politics can be played this way.</text></item><item><author>dgellow</author><text>I guess you&amp;#x27;re talking about the US? Or do you have another country in mind? Lot of places outside of the US have a working, multi-party, dynamic political systems and are doing meaningful changes.</text></item><item><author>mise_en_place</author><text>I’m actually not terribly worried about food prices being high. Or the general price level being high. What worries me is there is no political way forward.&lt;p&gt;Politics used to be about compromise. Nowadays it is about wasting as much time as possible, while not making any meaningful policy changes. This will come back to bite our elected officials at all levels.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>pjc50</author><text>&amp;gt; &amp;quot;a vote for SmallParty is a vote for Enemy&amp;quot;&lt;p&gt;This is only really true in FPTP systems. In any of the transferable vote or alternative vote systems that&amp;#x27;s far less of a problem.</text></comment>
<story><title>World food prices hit 10-year peak – FAO</title><url>https://www.reuters.com/business/world-food-prices-hit-10-year-peak-fao-2021-10-07/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>mdiesel</author><text>Yes, a multi-party system if far better. But over time, if the rhetoric is &amp;quot;if you aren&amp;#x27;t for us you&amp;#x27;re against us&amp;quot; and &amp;quot;a vote for SmallParty is a vote for Enemy&amp;quot; we trend towards two. We justify it to ourselves by saying that although we don&amp;#x27;t support everything OurSide says, it&amp;#x27;s far preferable to Them.</text></item><item><author>simongray</author><text>When people have 10 different ideological choices, it doesn&amp;#x27;t matter as much. I&amp;#x27;m pretty sure that the Republican party would be represented by e.g. a Traditional Liberal party, a Conservative party, a National Conservative party, and perhaps small fascist party in any traditional European democracy. And that Traditional Liberal party would also contain a whole bunch of Democrats.</text></item><item><author>mdiesel</author><text>Do they have a safeguard against becoming like the US? By which I mean doubling down on core support base rather than seeking to convert opposition, and using populist rhetoric rather than traditional debate.&lt;p&gt;If not then it is only a matter of time. A new charismatic leader who says the right things emerges, and system is pushed to breaking point. The US might be the first, but Trump&amp;#x27;s lasting legacy will be proving to the world that politics can be played this way.</text></item><item><author>dgellow</author><text>I guess you&amp;#x27;re talking about the US? Or do you have another country in mind? Lot of places outside of the US have a working, multi-party, dynamic political systems and are doing meaningful changes.</text></item><item><author>mise_en_place</author><text>I’m actually not terribly worried about food prices being high. Or the general price level being high. What worries me is there is no political way forward.&lt;p&gt;Politics used to be about compromise. Nowadays it is about wasting as much time as possible, while not making any meaningful policy changes. This will come back to bite our elected officials at all levels.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>Vinnl</author><text>I&amp;#x27;m being an armchair politicologist here, but parties that do that tend to get isolated by the other parties, as a result don&amp;#x27;t get to govern, and as a result don&amp;#x27;t grow further. The fact that parties are destined to cooperate also forces them to tone down the &amp;quot;if you aren&amp;#x27;t with us you&amp;#x27;re against us&amp;quot; rhetoric.</text></comment>