Why has everything been going in one direction for so long irrespective of which party is in power?

Was listening to a leftist podcast today, a conversation between a random progressive author and Andrew Yang, and something really stuck out to me.

They were talking about how, because the Senate is 50/50 with a Kamala tie-breaker, how important it was for absolutely every Dem Senator to march in lockstep and vote unanimously.

To both libertarians and conservatives at large, that kind of thinking seems so alien. I mean... that's when individual Senators have the most power... the greatest ability to have a stand for principle actually matter. It's easy to vote your conscience when your party has a solid majority and leadership leaves you alone because your vote is irrelevant to the outcome. It's more important to stand up to your own side and when you can actually affect the outcome, not less.

But there's a very simple reason that those on the left are more prone to prioritizing uniformity, and it's not just because they're more collectivist in mindset or groupthink or whatever.

Both Republican and Democrat leadership does a pretty good job twisting enough arms to get all (or nearly all) of their congressmen to toe the party line. But Republicans outside of DC seem at least actively aware that their leadership sucks and often produce bills that are actually harmful and make things worse. Democrats have their own gripes with their leadership, but it's usually along the lines of "they don't go far enough" rather than that "they're going in the wrong direction".

Minarchists and anarchists may fight one another all the time, but at least can form coalitions to nudge things towards the same lean. It's much easier to get everyone on board when the internal debate is between baby steps and boldness rather than where to actually go, and that's about where the Dems are today. That's a much different divide than the libertarians who have conflicting views on, say, abortion or immigration or something, which is more akin to where Republicans are at rn.

Most of the political podcasts I listen to are libertarian... The Fifth Column, Andrew Heaton, Kibbe, stuff from Reason and CATO and Institute for Justice and the like. Maybe some Dave Smith if I'm feeling froggy.

But I try to mix in stuff from Republicans and Democrats relatively often, just to check in on how they're thinking about things to understand them better.

Left talk is the worst. Like... I can listen to a Republican show give opinions I disagree with about immigration or drugs or compromise and still find value in listening to their wrong thoughts.

But listening to leftists act like they haven't seen government grow every single year for decades and that the right has been winning rather than losing every battle consistently and all the rest, like... What world are you even living in? What metric are you using when spending, debt, amount of laws and regulations... Everything... Has been going one direction for so long regardless of which party is in power? Like... I know the left may love victimhood as a virtue, but it's just so bizarre and disconnected from reality that it's hard to understand how they could say these things with a straight face.