'...the parties have never offered less'

The need for leadership has never been greater. Yet, the parties have never offered less.

Why?

Each side (Red vs Blue) only has to offer the public just enough to get in, most of their allegiance is to their backers, the rich and powerful, corporations, corporate associations, interest groups, lobbying groups.

In 2016 Donald Trump had significant appeal to the older low income voters by promising to protect our jobs by building the wall and presumably restricting access by other means as well, and doing something to balance trade. Hillary appealed more to younger people by including a calculator of the amount of college debt they were be forgiven when she got in.

I think that netted Donald overall a few more votes, but our owners got the balance right and the election was so close it got a lot of people became very excited.