That is a problem, but the larger problem is people don't have an informed vote. They vote for a party straight down without considering what they really support, or what the unintended consequences of those things are.
The other half of this is there is so little choice that a voter does have. On the national level it's just over one bit of information per year. Over 12 years - 3 presidential races, 6 congressional reps, 4 senators. I'm not counting primaries because while they can shape policy, they can just as well unshape policy from people voting strategically ("electable"). And a voter can only vote in half of the primaries, so primaries are already part of the dynamic ushering people into these packaged sports teams of the major parties.
In addition to the obvious fixes like Ranked Pairs voting, I'd say we need a Constitutional amendment bringing back independent agencies with their heads being directly elected rather than merely picked by whomever wins the presidential race. For example you shouldn't have to balance your guess of how you think one president will treat the ATF vs the NSF. Or the President shouldn't have any power over the Attorney General, as it's the Attorney General who should be prosecuting a criminal President, rather than merely being a lapdog in the criminal conspiracy. A race for each agency would also create focus on each agency head's actual results, rather than how the current guy is using a round-robin of all these different departments to create a tough-looking spectacle in one area, only to move on to another one when the actual results start becoming apparent.
We also need the right to recall for all national politicians, for obvious reasons.
The other half of this is there is so little choice that a voter does have. On the national level it's just over one bit of information per year. Over 12 years - 3 presidential races, 6 congressional reps, 4 senators. I'm not counting primaries because while they can shape policy, they can just as well unshape policy from people voting strategically ("electable"). And a voter can only vote in half of the primaries, so primaries are already part of the dynamic ushering people into these packaged sports teams of the major parties.
In addition to the obvious fixes like Ranked Pairs voting, I'd say we need a Constitutional amendment bringing back independent agencies with their heads being directly elected rather than merely picked by whomever wins the presidential race. For example you shouldn't have to balance your guess of how you think one president will treat the ATF vs the NSF. Or the President shouldn't have any power over the Attorney General, as it's the Attorney General who should be prosecuting a criminal President, rather than merely being a lapdog in the criminal conspiracy. A race for each agency would also create focus on each agency head's actual results, rather than how the current guy is using a round-robin of all these different departments to create a tough-looking spectacle in one area, only to move on to another one when the actual results start becoming apparent.
We also need the right to recall for all national politicians, for obvious reasons.