Or I sure as heck got that going on.
CNN published an article on cnn.com titled: “See the five
types of independents that have big implications for American politics”
There are four authors listed at the top of the article and
on the surface tries to paint a pretty good picture of independents in this
country, yet only comes up with five types of independents as the main point.
And as I say, independents are now the largest political
group in this country over Republicans and Democrats. They break the
independents into five categories starting with “upbeat outsiders” I start with
this group first also because of this statement from the article:
Upbeat outsiders are the most
likely of our five groups to say a major reason they consider independent is
that they agree with Democrats on some issues and Republicans on others. More
than half also say that distaste for the two parties is not part of why they
call themselves independent. Most of them (group called upbeat outsiders) land
as true independents who do not lean toward either party. Those who do lean are
slightly more Republican than Democratic.
Two points here, one is most of this group which represents
22 percent of the total of independents. (be careful, not 22 percent of the population
but 22 percent of the group the authors identified as independent). I break
them out with this sentence for two reasons. One the majority of the 22 percent
say they are true independents and two the ones that lean, lean Republican.
I wish they had asked not if Republican or Democrat, but if conservative or
liberal. This is a minor thorn in my side so lets move on.
One of the main reasons for this study was to determine what
are swing votes now and they came to the conclusion what in recent historical
context were swing voters, no longer exist. This I have been saying in the
wrong way for too long.
I keep harping on independents as independents knowing we
aren’t swing voters anymore. I just never clarified the distinction in my posts.
The group I want to touch on the most is what they call the
disappointed middle. This is the group most of my public policy is trying to
reach. This group says they have voted for a third party or independent
candidate previously and seven in ten say the economy is an important issue for
them. According to the author’s study and methodology this group makes up 16%
of the total of independents. I think this may be incorrect and I wish I knew
how they did the questionnaire for the whole study.
A good proportion of the study the authors listed as
Democrat lookalikes and Republican lookalikes and for your benefit the Democrats
ran 24% to 16% over the Republicans. My question is why aren’t they Democrats
and Republicans so again I question why didn’t they use the terms conservative
and liberal for the questions, yet I don’t know what their questionnaire looks
like to criticize this point. And on a
side note, you can call me out because I say most Americans are closer to the
center or center right than liberal which goes back to my conservative and
liberal terms versus using Democrats and Republicans because the two parties
right now will feel the effect of how people feel about them currently.
Another group or the final group is the checked out group.
And in my thinking they are actually part of the disappointed middle, but more
so, hence the concept that they are checked out and again this is the group I
am trying to reengage with my public policy ideas. If they thought someone was
fighting for them they might become engaged. According to the authors 9 in 10
of this group says no one in politics speaks for people like them. And this
helps to emphasize why I say we need new parties.
They know they need something new, but mainstream media and
current social media blocks rational outside voices. The mainstream media whether
left or right doesn’t want the competition and social media is so filled with
hate, conspiracies or finger pointing, it just turns them off. This paragraph
is my thoughts.
One other tidbit is that half were younger than other
independents.
Now this post is a super condensed version and what I
consider important discussion of the article so take that with a grain of salt,
yet if you go back and read through the whole thing I think I have touched on
the main points of some of the problems.
First we still label democrat against republican instead of
saying liberal and conservative which is why I think the two lookalike groups
are misnomers. Second the majority of the country is independent which states
the two parties are not reaching the majority of this country. Third quite a
large percentage of this country is ready for something new. And so many people
are checked out because again no one is reaching out to them.
On a side note, the end of the article touches on methodology,,
but does not include a copy of the questionnaire or at least one I found to
click on.
So finally people keep asking me why do we need new parties,
well this study touches on it, but doesn’t go down the path of saying how do we
reach these groups. My answer as you know is we need something new. And on occasion
I say if you completely overhaul the two current parties you can possibly
achieve my goals. Otherwise with the entrenchment of the parties elites that
isn’t going to happen so we need to remove the requirement we live in a two
party system and move forward.
The duopoly has failed us. This study by showing you can
identify independents and begin to break them down into categories touches on my
ideas the parties are failing by not just reaching out to them, yet more importantly
not offering them better solutions.
There is much to discuss here and I touch on it throughout
my posts, yet I am glad this study was published because if you can see how the
duopoly is diminishing as political forces then you can begin to ask yourself
what do we do different.
Cheers
No comments:
Post a Comment