Tim Walz made a great speech on May 31. As he pointed out, the working class voters gave a primal scream. They elected a horrible person because they were at the end of their rope. All hell breaking loose was better than what they’ve had for decades. Many will change their minds when they find Donald Trump does not make America great again; that he just cares about personal wealth and autocratic power. But that will just put us back where we started.

As long as the two parties have a stranglehold on our democracy, nothing will really change for working people. At least, it hasn’t in my lifetime. The point is the moneyed class controls both parties. What we need is good old American competition in our politics. First, let’s have open primaries; that is, one ballot with all of the candidates running, regardless of party. Voters vote for one person. The top five vote-getters go on to the general election. Second, the general election uses ranked choice voting. You rank the candidates: first choice, second choice, etc. You vote for who you really want. If your first choice gets the lowest number of votes, you haven’t thrown your vote away, because your second choice now becomes your first choice, etc. Your vote will always count right up to the time one candidate gets more than 50% of the votes. The most popular candidate wins. With real choice, maybe government by the people won’t perish from the earth.

Dan Stuart Alden

Greenfield