54 The two-party system
potential political influence. Irving Kristol has described the reason for this
as the neocons’ sense of ‘The steady decline in our democratic culture, sink-
ing to new levels of vulgarity,’ which laid the basis of a political alliance with
religious conservatives. On their side many fundamentalist Christians saw a
deeper reason to ally with the neocons. In the words of Pat Robertson, a fun-
damentalist minister and former contender for the Republican presidential
nomination:
Why is America in favor of Israel? Because we have a great history of
biblical belief – Judeo-Christian – and we believe God gave the land to
the descendents of Israel. It was not given to Palestine, it wasn’t given
to so-called Palestinians. It wasn’t given to Saudis or the Syrians. It was
given to the descendents of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob through Joshua.
God said, ‘You step on it and conquer it and I will give it to you.’ We
are looking at a time dating back 3,000 years. This has been the land of
Israel. And it belongs to them. And God is not going to let anybody take
it away from them.This statement reflects the Christian fundamentalist reading of the Bible,
that the establishment of a Jewish state is a fulfilment of prophecy and a step
toward the second coming of Jesus Christ and the apocalypse. This alliance
between fundamentalist Christians, neoconservatives, Bush Republicans
and supporters of Israel was to provide the basis for American foreign policy
at the beginning of the twenty-first century, and it was also to give American
politics, for a time at least, a new and more intense ideological and partisan
character.
Why two parties?
So far we have described American politics as four national parties or wings
floating upon a potentially disruptive multi-party system at the state and lo-
cal level. The disintegrating factors are very evident, but how then do we ac-
count for the fact that there are still essentially only two parties, Republicans
and Democrats? Why is it still meaningful to talk in some sense of an Ameri-
can two-party system? Part of the answer to this question lies in the role
of ideology in the American political system, but undoubtedly institutional
considerations are also very important. From a historical and constitutional
point of view, the greatest force towards the creation and maintenance of the
two-party system would seem to be the existence of the office of the presi-
dency, and the mode of election to it. This is the only truly ‘national’ office
to be fought for; it is the focal point of all national political life. The simple,
obvious fact about the office of president is that only one person can fill it.
The Senate or the House of Representatives could dissolve into a multitude
of factional groups, but only one person can occupy the president’s chair in
the White House.