While I agree with what I view as the broad premise that @vibecaster.eth is suggesting here, it’s not that there’s literally one unified party. It’s that two parties drive voters to ever more polar extremes on wedge issues in order to obscure how aligned they are on so many of the much deeper fundamentals of governance. That dynamic is exactly what Sam Rosenfeld describes in The Polarizers: polarization becomes the organizing logic of politics, not a byproduct. Look at where the parties quietly converge: • Broad acceptance of market-first economic theory • Deference to corporate power and financialization • Reluctance to seriously challenge monopoly concentration • Persistent underinvestment in public goods paired with tax complexity that favors capital • Bipartisan normalization of an expansive national security state • Structural resistance to labor power outside moments of crisis • Shared hostility to electoral reforms that would threaten the duopoly (ranked-choice voting, easier ballot access, proportional representation) The fights we do see – culture, identity, symbolic legislation – are real and consequential for people’s lives. But they also function as cover. They keep voters locked into existential fear of the other side while the underlying economic and institutional architecture remains largely untouched. That’s not a conspiracy; it’s a system incentive problem. When both parties depend on polarized activist coalitions to mobilize voters, compromise becomes betrayal and governance becomes secondary to signaling. So yes: there are real differences. But the reason it can feel like “one party” is that on the questions that most directly shape material outcomes and long-term power, the range of acceptable disagreement is remarkably narrow. https://farcaster.xyz/vibecaster.eth/0x188a00a9 https://farcaster.xyz/eirrann.eth/0x9b030fe5