Independent Voters: Not the Brightest Crayons in the Box

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Those sweet summer children we call “independent” voters are slower than molasses in January. There, I said it. I apologize for the petty insult, but I don’t know how to make it sound any nicer. After the popular votes of five of the last six presidential elections, what other conclusion are we to reasonably derive?

Leftists are not stupid. Leftists are intolerant, fanatical, violent, fascistic, and single-minded in purpose. But they are not stupid. They control the media, the schools, Big Tech, much of corporate America, the IRS, the DOJ, the FBI, the Pentagon, an increasing number of religious organizations, and almost every lever of representative and bureaucratic government, not to mention our physical streets, whenever they want, with zero consequence. Whatever that is, it isn’t stupidity.

Stupidity is maintaining the farce that choosing between democratic republicanism and mob tyranny is a difficult choice for rational citizens. With both parties now on polar opposite sides of the spectrum, the idea that there exists any legitimacy in carefully weighing which side to vote for no longer holds merit. 

Back in the heyday of the Republican Revolution and Clinton triangulation, one could at least feign with sincerity that there was a not insignificant amount of overlap between the two parties’ agendas. Bill Clinton pretended to oppose illegal immigration and to keep abortion “safe, legal, and rare.” Even during the Bush years, Democrats had the sense to mouth platitudes about “supporting the troops” and about how “dissent is the highest form of patriotism.”

The final break came with Obama, when he steered his party sharply left and they never looked back. Since then, the Democrats have moved so far to the left, with no signs of slowing, that the gulf that separates us has reached the point of irreconcilability. They are enabled in this pursuit by the “independent” vote, and this will continue until “independents” show some actual independence by voting for someone other than Democrats for the first time in their lives. More on that later.

There is a petty allure, rooted in virtue-signaling conceit, in trumpeting one’s “independence” in politics. “Independent” voters fancy themselves the true harbingers of logical calculation and cool objectivity, able to see through the dogmatic passions of either party. They wear the undecided-until-the-last-minute mask as if they actually spent the days and hours up to the election carefully balancing each candidate and each issue against the complex, nuanced, intertwining realities of life, and that such considerations could never be fathomed by all those brutes who vote party line.

But the “independent” claim doesn’t hold merit. Most “independents” are low-information leftists. Polling over the last two decades illustrates that “independents” are responsible for pushing not only presidential candidates over the finish line but also candidates in midterm elections. And yet, polling also indicates that “independents” are the least informed voters. 

Furthermore, polling finds that majorities of these “independents” skew leftward on issues of border control, taxes, race relations, drug legalization, and the economy. So the conundrum in which we find ourselves is that each election, we waste millions chasing the breeze of the fabled swing vote, which is, regrettably, the least engaged, the least informed, and which leans reliably leftward.

So calling yourself an “independent” doesn’t elicit the street cred it once did. With the parties so diametrically opposed, and ferociously so, on almost every single issue, the “independent” mantle is now indicative not of courage but of cowardice, not of deliberation but of vapidity, not of intellect but of ignorance.

Let’s run through the past few elections.

If you voted for Obama because you agreed that Americans should be forced to purchase insurance against their will, that government agencies should be weaponized against the citizenry, and that the United States is irredeemably racist, then you’re not an “independent.” You’re a leftist. But if you voted for Obama because you wanted to be able to say you’re hip and edgy and voted for the first black president, you’re also not an “independent.” You’re a shallow narcissist.

If you voted for Hillary because you thought that doubling down on the Obama agenda was just the medicine America needed and that her coronation would irreversibly cement this agenda, then you’re not an “independent.” You’re a leftist. But if you voted for Hillary because you wanted to make some juvenile Swiftie statement about Grrrl Power, you’re also not an “independent.” You’re a shallow narcissist. 

If you voted for Biden because you knew he’d be a willing sock puppet for his radical handlers, so long as they kept massaging his ego with whispers of how smart he is, how underestimated he is, and how he can eat his steamed carrots all by himself like a big boy, then you’re not an “independent.” You’re a leftist. But if you voted for Lunch Bucket Joe because you actually bought into his coal-miner-from-Scranton schtick and you thought he’d bring civility and bipartisanship back to the White House, you’re also not an “independent.” You’re just straight-up gullible.

And if you’re a single-issue voter and you vote Democrat solely to protect abortion, fine. We can thank you for the tanking economy, bail-free criminality, the destruction of women’s sports, Chinese/Russian/Iranian aggression, the crackdown on due process, the laughingstock of our public education, the resurgence of antisemitism and Islamic supremacy, and the millions of illegal invaders currently overrunning our cities. Hope it was worth it to ensure that partial-birth abortion remains taxpayer-funded and available to undocumented teens without parental notification in Nebraska. 

So how are “independent” voters made to see reason? Our middle/upper-class suburbanite “independents” maintain their faux independence by turning a blind eye to the policies they support. They are not directly affected by the factory closures, the armies of illegals, the FBI raids on peaceful pro-lifers, or by some baker getting sued out of business by LGBTQ cancelers. But maybe they’ll raise an eyebrow once their leafy streets are overrun by the beneficiaries of their vote. 

The well-devised practice of busing illegals to blue cities should be expanded to include blue suburbs. Criminals released on no-bail laws should likewise be released into these neighborhoods. Anybody looking to join a police force should do so only in reliably red areas. Republican district attorneys should prioritize prosecutions in red districts. Businesses should continue relocating to red areas.