Best idea on the thread. The Founders abhorred political parties, and for the very reason you stated.
I'm sick of being forced to choose between two sides of the same despicable coin. Show me that you're a person who loves this country, and has the same mindset as the Framers, and you've got my vote.
The parties can go to hell.
As a group, we are stuck in the mindset that we can cure our national ills if we elect the right people from the right party.
That idea is the offspring of our early history, in which it was assumed that all would be well if a virtuous people elected virtuous politicians. The first state governments and the Articles of Confederation reflected that ideal. Within a few years it was evident that model was insufficient to secure liberty.
Government must account for imperfect and less than virtuous men.
Just as the desperate people of 1787 recognized that the structure of government was not conducive to freedom, and boldly took the risk of reorganizing their government into one that did, we must acknowledge in 2013 that we face similar circumstances.
As the Framers predicted, absent a Senate of the States, ALL power will eventually flow upward. It is way beyond time for us to acknowledge a mistake, the 17th Amendment.
We must once again return to transcendent truths, that sending some virtuous men and women to political office is an insufficient safeguard, that undivided power will inevitably result in undivided tyranny. To possibly save what remains of republican freedom, power must once again be divided. The 17th Amendment must go.
An Article V amendment convention to restore federalism is the only solution.