Would it be fair to call the Democratic Party, a “liberal party”? Would it also be fair to call the Republican Party, a “conservative party”? Probably not, because not all members of the Democratic Party are liberal and not all Republicans in their party are conservative. In the United States, the major parties are “indistinct” in their makeup. This means that the party’s label does not necessarily equate to a party’s ideology. For instance, the Republican Party is made up of conservatives, libertarians, and liberals, while the Democratic Party is made up of liberals, socialists, and conservatives. Many ideological perspectives fit under each party’s label. Contrast that with the major parties in Canada or in the United Kingdom. Each country has a Conservative Party, a variation of a Liberal Party (in the UK, it is called the Liberal Democratic Party), and a Labour Party, which leans in the direction of socialism. You know where each party stands in regards to their ideology. Parties that have definitive ideologies are called “distinct” parties. There are those parties in the United States that are distinct in their ideology. Among those include the Libertarian Party and the Socialist Party USA.
Why aren’t more political parties in the United States “distinct” in their makeup?
Politics Matters 
I would have to do a fact check here but i feel as if this type of party structure in the U.S. can be traced back to the idea of “The catch all party.” The idea of which is simple, by not labeling and forcing ourselves to choose a side, we allow ourselves to maintain a more massive appeal. We effectively are making a grab for the middle ground voters who may vote on one issue or another or purely off chance. By avoiding the “direct” label these parties avoid the ideology argument when it comes to voters, garnering votes, and winning elections.
Because the United States has a strict 2 party system, we jump to the judgement of Republicans being conservatives and Democrates being liberal. Though this is very much not true, most voters are not educated enough of the government to know that there are liberal Republicans and conservative Democrates. We can’t be distinct because we give such a strict image of the two parties. Our politicians can be distinct in their views, but if they are Republican, voters will deem them conservative by association, and not think twice about it. I think for the US we should focus more on the label “Conservative” “liberal” “socialist” and “Libritatian” instead of “Democrat” and “Repulican” because we have made those such definite labels, we kinda screwd over our Politician and our country because the people, I feel, don’t think of searching more into politicians because they label them from the start, and are very against the other party. A “hardcore liberal democrat” could end up voting for a bad democratic nominee just because he is democratic, paying no attention to him being conservative, just that he is labeled democrat. Voters don’t want to research. They want to be told, and when we focus on only 2 labels, we can mislead and confuse voters so much. In the media we should focus more on their stance on the Political bar, instead of their democrat-republican label.
Political parties aren’t distinct with their ideologies because we have become so used to using the two labels, Democrat and Republican. We don’t know the two parties ideologies, and we don’t know other parties exist. Because of this, the candidates switch over to one side or the other depending on which label will win.
I think that because the U.S. is a country made up of many kinds of immigrants, the ideologies and political beliefs vary greatly. For this reason, it would be hard for a party to survive if it has distinct ideologies. Most people can associate themselves to some level to either the democratic or republican parties.
I would say we don’t have many “distinct” liberal parties because our country is way too diverse for such idealized categories. Although we are generally of a two party system, Republican and Democrats, like mentioned in the post, we cannot categorize everyone definitely within both parties.
Most voters in the United States do not have a certain ideology and lay in the middle of the left to right scale; therefore, candidates do not want to show their beliefs directly, because they want to gain as many votes from the citizens as possible. If candidates were more distinct, then the voters would be able to make a more educated vote based on what their beliefs are. The United States citizens will never use a system that is distinct, because there has always been a two party system. Whether this is the right way or the wrong way to do politics is up to the voters to decide.
I agree. Most Americans are in the middle somewhere in their political beliefs.
I think it is because the United States and the people only have a strict two party ideology. People still think that because candidates use labels that they represent that label. The people are used to these labels and when they hear the term socialists and libertarians, they get confused and don’t completely understand. I think this is why Candidates just label themselves as Democrat or Republican because it is simpler. The people could maybe understand if they were all involved in politics but not everyone is interested.
i think that its like this because theres only 2 big parties in the united states. ever since someone was born they were either born into a democratic party or a republican party. it has not change much. since they were born into either one they sometimes do not break out of it. that is why i think there is not more distinct parties
I think it is unfair to call the Republican conservative and the Democrat liberal. The party is usually not distinct parties. A republican is not usually conservative. The Democrat can be both conservative and liberal so is Republican. Libert
The reason that the parties in the US aren’t more distinct is because of the two party system we as Americans have become accustom to. This has made it easier for average people to pay attention to politics one month out of the year and can submit a vote based on familiarity. Another reason is because of this two party system certain issues are associated with the separate parties, making it havoc to separate the ideologies due to the amount of restructuring that the politicians would rather not do,