Two famous Churchill sayings go a long way in my opinion to explain the current political gridlock in the US. If you are a Democrats in the US, you cannot help but bewildered by the solid support of some 40% of the American voters and seemingly 100% domination  of the Republican Party by Donald Trump despite his numerous criminal indictments and misdeeds duration his administration.

The first Churchill saying is well known - "Democracy is the worst for  of government except for all others".  The problem is that we tend to only remember well the first half of this saying and tend to get angry at the messy and complex operation of a democratic form of government. We long for the existence of a benevolent dictator as China and other countries have done for thousands of years. Often times these angry and frustration are channeled towards the opposition party or the party in power at the moment. "Loyal oppostion" become "intrasient and subborn oppostion"

The second and lesser known Churchillian saying is "The best arguement against democracy is to talk to the average voter for five minutes". Alternatively, I called it "the down ballet or lazy voter problem". For reasons of practicality, we only have election once a year and Presiden tial election once every four years. To vote in an election takes the average voter often a quarter of a day never mind the obstacles put in by the party in power to discourage voting. Furthermore, it is not practical to have every issue separately voted on using one ballot for a single issue. A single ballot contains multiple complex issue requiring analysis and understanding. Many voter are lazy and don't have the time. So they choose the easy way out and vote the entire party line. In a presidential election, state and local officials' name are placed "down ballot" after the name of the president. Thus, survival of these state and local, officials often and can depend on the popularity of the President as many voter choose the easy way of voting for the party line. Thus, not having the leader of your party against you is an advantage for survivlal. This account for the fact there is virtual total silence from the Republican side despite numerous unprecedented criminal indictments against Trump.  Self survival comes first. Only the very few politicians not running for reelection or retiring dare to speak out. 

Of course, election, democracy and politics are complicated matter. My explanation here offers some aspects not often mentioned. They are not meant to cover everything.