I just listened to a Freakonomics episode about the business of the political party duopoly the other day. How federal politicians operate to preserve their institution first and foremost, and that the continued growth of the political industrial complex only serves to profit the parties at the expense of the democracy.
Fundamentally the US needs constitutional amendments to break the duopoly and return elections to being about people instead of parties, but for that to happen you would need a super majority of state legislatures to force an amendment and that is nigh impossible as well given how state governments are modeled off the federal but don't have the safety valve to try to repair the democracy with competitive and diverse elections - a vast majority of states are functionally ruled by one party with supermajority and in perpetuity and would never propose changes that would harm them federally.
The sea between getting a few members of congress or states to support restoring democracy and having the super-majorities required to actually see it done are so vast and the opposition so wealthy, connected, and influential I've never heard anyone propose a legitimate strategy to see it done, because the damage has already in large part been done - even if a super-majority of citizens agree with reform, that has no influence on the behavior of any legislature they elect. You would need to co-opt one of the major parties in ways their charters expressly prohibit and their incumbents will block.
Fundamentally the US needs constitutional amendments to break the duopoly and return elections to being about people instead of parties, but for that to happen you would need a super majority of state legislatures to force an amendment and that is nigh impossible as well given how state governments are modeled off the federal but don't have the safety valve to try to repair the democracy with competitive and diverse elections - a vast majority of states are functionally ruled by one party with supermajority and in perpetuity and would never propose changes that would harm them federally.
The sea between getting a few members of congress or states to support restoring democracy and having the super-majorities required to actually see it done are so vast and the opposition so wealthy, connected, and influential I've never heard anyone propose a legitimate strategy to see it done, because the damage has already in large part been done - even if a super-majority of citizens agree with reform, that has no influence on the behavior of any legislature they elect. You would need to co-opt one of the major parties in ways their charters expressly prohibit and their incumbents will block.