Letter: Warring parties is a zero-sum political game

It was heartening to see the Daily Herald undertake a special project to discuss some electoral reforms. In this supremely divided political environment, I have come to believe that undermining the Red/Blue party duopoly should be the primary target of our time and treasure. George Washington and other founders warned us of the danger that political parties posed.

The SCOTUS handed gerrymandering to the states and district maps to often-partisan legislatures. There, the majority party has little to no incentive to cede power in drawing those maps, and we have made it all the more difficult to excise the cancer of gerrymandering. This allows parties to pick their voters instead of voters picking their representatives.

Equally (if not more) critical is the need to implement Ranked Choice Voting (RCV). RCV forces candidates away from the extremes. With RCV in place, we can safely lower barriers to third parties. To round out an anti-partisan agenda, I'd offer the following:

• Implement RCV and lower barriers to third parties

• End partisan gerrymandering

• Reform election financing (reduce dark and corporate funding)

• Remove party affiliations from ballots (lessens blind party-line voting)

• Randomize candidate order or ballots (mitigates advantages of first/last ballot position)

• Consider reform of our Electoral College to be more equitable to the voters.

I have come to believe that no meaningful issue afflicting our republic (and beyond) can be well addressed by the whipsaw of legislative control swinging between two warring parties playing a zero-sum game. Electoral reform, to my mind, is the only way we can leave a better nation to our children and grandchildren.

Mike Bruno, Alderman

Geneva