Opinion of taking party membership off of ballots

[Damocles]

No. One of the core and essential functions of political parties is that they help solve the problem of adverse selection. As a voter, you are expected to make a choice about what sort of policies you would like, without necessarily having perfect information. When you vote for a party candidate, you can generally be sure what the candidate stands for.

If they’re a Democratic candidate, they probably favor things like progressive taxation, environmental regulations, and affirmative action for minorities.

If they’re a Republican candidate, they probably favor lower taxes across the board, fewer regulations, and generally laissez faire economics and social policies.

Pretending parties don’t exist is like sticking your fingers in your ears and going, la la la. Pretending that groups of people with similar ideas won’t join up and form an organization to economize on campaign costs and advocate collectively for shared policy planks is ludicrous.

They are an inevitable outcome of virtually any representative democratic system and rather than fight them, it is critical that major and minor party candidates compete in a political system that is fair to all of them.