I have always considered that the general closeness of elections in two party systems was a function of the calibration of the parties’ policies to public opinion. Both parties end up on either side of the mean and conduct a tug of war trying to persuade those who aren’t committed a priori to the political bent of either one. What is different about the current US situation is that this no longer is the case. Instead of a bell curve we have a political dromedary: two humps with a small number of moronic or apathetic voters in the “saddle”, who end up being… in the saddle. Instead of the majority being around the mean and moving with the tides of fortune, you get tribal affiliation driving most of the dynamic and the actual policy positions (policies? What policies?) are barely relevant. This is a form of dysfunction never considered by the founders of democracy.