I get the feeling that the machine realizes that one of its parties has begun to outlive its usefulness and this election will determine which one it is and weed out the loser.
this is why we all need to push for the PSL to show numbers and be loud about those numbers. I've been re-reading Lenin's Left-Wing Communism and had the same thought as you, but that the "weeding out" will only occur out of a political reorientation that is forced on the political structures and Democrats in the form of a rising of a working-class third party which starves them of the margin they need. A circumstance they're already afraid of in general, hence the rampant acts like 3rd-party-crushing and galling propaganda railing against 'spoiling' eg. 'third party votes are votes for trump' and talking over anti-genocide protestors with "if you want trump to win just say so!"
Their rightward slide, psychopathic anti-human policies, and shameless attitudes without a doubt have been and are increasingly so pushing more and more working people previously considered "safe" by them into revulsion over both parties --- and a not-insignificant portion of those who even still vote for Dems are only doing so with held-shut-noses because they're "slightly less awful" than the ostensible 'only other option.' Many of their "constituents" have already or would exponentially start to jump ship to be funneled into a rising working class party who are showing numbers and growing presence to those masses who still believe in bourgeois democracy.
A real working class party posting numbers, alongside the on the ground work PSL does (and will continue to grow in as the contradictions of collapsing imperialism sharpen), will also reactivate more and more of the the huge bloc of 35-50% non-voters that are so impoverished and disillusioned and fed up with the duopoly they justifiably don't bother, who both parties abandoned years ago. These combined acts would irreparably break apart the Democrats' ability to cruise-control into governmental power, or gain and maintain it at all, and do so with the hammer of a working class party of socialist revolutionaries. The bourgeoisie, having at this point only the open-fanged Republican wing as a functioning electoral force, can not ignore this or allow the exodus and funneling of organized and reactivated political agents into the wings of unapologetic communists, and would need to head it off and move to capture as many as they can.
And as the Democrat party has proven itself wholly incapable of overcoming this contradiction and reorienting without rupturing due to its inherent structure and interests and makeup (even Bernie's liberal self was beyond their imagination and tolerance); the ruling class would then be obligated to float a reformist "labor" or "progressive" 3rd party to capture these working class voters; which would cause in the Democrat party and its base a mass split down the middle and a bet-hedging exodus to this new party, with the establishment remnants joining in coalition with the Republicans that they've already nearly merged with policy-wise. (That exodus would itself inevitably cause "democrat-ification" of this new 'labor party' and alienate its "left-wing," and we already would have told them this is going to happen, which is why they need to join us instead). This would break the duopoly in a way that is for the bourgeois politicians both a chaotic retreat and scramble to reconstitute, against the growing offensive of an organized socialist party, who knows them for what they are better than they know themselves. I briefly mention this idea here, too, in the last two paragraphs
A rising PSL doing on the ground work and posting numbers (not remotely "winning" numbers but we don't care about that) of un-ignorably consciously non-democrat-but-engaged working-class voters that would bleed the democrats of their ability to keep power is in my mind the most surefire way to break up the duopoly and create ruptures in the contradictions of the electoral system in a way that benefits the communist movement. And that's if the bourgeoisie even have the acumen to float a 'left' social-democrat party. If they don't, and just maintain the dropped-mask "Holden Bloodfeasts" of the Republican party, we could genuinely build a sort of dual power, backed by the broadest of masses who never in the first place held any illusions of what the Republicans are. If they do float this new Kerensky party that they would need to, well it depends on the conditions. Maybe we can have our own independent coalition with them against the establishment Vampires while retaining freedom to criticize and propagandize and "support them like the rope supports the hanged man", maybe not. One step at a time.
this is why we all need to push for the PSL to show numbers and be loud about those numbers. I've been re-reading Lenin's Left-Wing Communism and had the same thought as you, but that the "weeding out" will only occur out of a political reorientation that is forced on the political structures and Democrats in the form of a rising of a working-class third party which starves them of the margin they need. A circumstance they're already afraid of in general, hence the rampant acts like 3rd-party-crushing and galling propaganda railing against 'spoiling' eg. 'third party votes are votes for trump' and talking over anti-genocide protestors with "if you want trump to win just say so!"
Their rightward slide, psychopathic anti-human policies, and shameless attitudes without a doubt have been and are increasingly so pushing more and more working people previously considered "safe" by them into revulsion over both parties --- and a not-insignificant portion of those who even still vote for Dems are only doing so with held-shut-noses because they're "slightly less awful" than the ostensible 'only other option.' Many of their "constituents" have already or would exponentially start to jump ship to be funneled into a rising working class party who are showing numbers and growing presence to those masses who still believe in bourgeois democracy.
A real working class party posting numbers, alongside the on the ground work PSL does (and will continue to grow in as the contradictions of collapsing imperialism sharpen), will also reactivate more and more of the the huge bloc of 35-50% non-voters that are so impoverished and disillusioned and fed up with the duopoly they justifiably don't bother, who both parties abandoned years ago. These combined acts would irreparably break apart the Democrats' ability to cruise-control into governmental power, or gain and maintain it at all, and do so with the hammer of a working class party of socialist revolutionaries. The bourgeoisie, having at this point only the open-fanged Republican wing as a functioning electoral force, can not ignore this or allow the exodus and funneling of organized and reactivated political agents into the wings of unapologetic communists, and would need to head it off and move to capture as many as they can.
And as the Democrat party has proven itself wholly incapable of overcoming this contradiction and reorienting without rupturing due to its inherent structure and interests and makeup (even Bernie's liberal self was beyond their imagination and tolerance); the ruling class would then be obligated to float a reformist "labor" or "progressive" 3rd party to capture these working class voters; which would cause in the Democrat party and its base a mass split down the middle and a bet-hedging exodus to this new party, with the establishment remnants joining in coalition with the Republicans that they've already nearly merged with policy-wise. (That exodus would itself inevitably cause "democrat-ification" of this new 'labor party' and alienate its "left-wing," and we already would have told them this is going to happen, which is why they need to join us instead). This would break the duopoly in a way that is for the bourgeois politicians both a chaotic retreat and scramble to reconstitute, against the growing offensive of an organized socialist party, who knows them for what they are better than they know themselves. I briefly mention this idea here, too, in the last two paragraphs
A rising PSL doing on the ground work and posting numbers (not remotely "winning" numbers but we don't care about that) of un-ignorably consciously non-democrat-but-engaged working-class voters that would bleed the democrats of their ability to keep power is in my mind the most surefire way to break up the duopoly and create ruptures in the contradictions of the electoral system in a way that benefits the communist movement. And that's if the bourgeoisie even have the acumen to float a 'left' social-democrat party. If they don't, and just maintain the dropped-mask "Holden Bloodfeasts" of the Republican party, we could genuinely build a sort of dual power, backed by the broadest of masses who never in the first place held any illusions of what the Republicans are. If they do float this new Kerensky party that they would need to, well it depends on the conditions. Maybe we can have our own independent coalition with them against the establishment Vampires while retaining freedom to criticize and propagandize and "support them like the rope supports the hanged man", maybe not. One step at a time.