Shrinking center
By Gary J. AndresWashington Times op/edApril 27, 2006
Independent voters -- long a dominant force in the American political zoology -- are evolving into an endangered species. These nonaligned citizens are not only shrinking as a share of the overall electorate, but are also voting less and becoming more ideologically liberal -- all significant factors for the 2006 congressional elections. When modern survey research began tracking partisan identification over a half century ago, independents grew for two decades, peaking during the early-1970s at around 20 percent of the overall electorate. But after topping out around the time of Watergate, partisan- oriented voters began to rise, accounting for a fatter slice of the overall voting population during the past three decades. America's independents declined during that same period, not only in size, but also in their self-identified level of conservatism -- a significant development for partisan tacticians. The University of Michigan's American National Election Study has tracked voter partisanship since 1952. They report that the percentage of independent voters peaked around 10 percent in the mid-1970s and has steadily declined (except for some minor moves up and down along the way). While about 10 percent of voters during the 1970s self-identified as true independents (this percent excludes those who initially say they are independent, but "lean" Republican or Democrat after a follow-up question), that number plummeted to only 4 percent in the last off-year election in 2002. Independents' ideological orientations are also in flux. Conventional wisdom suggests that these voters occupy the middle of the road, falling somewhere between conservative Republicans and liberal Democrats..... more
1 comment:
Took a look at the Hankster (I read it every day). Great job! The great think about having all those article on Independent politics from many sources in one place is that you can see the spin occurring. The guy from the Washington Times (a conservative newspaper owned by the Korean minister Rev. Sung Young Moon.) was using a statistical analysis, that proves what Benjamin Disraeli said about lies "there are three kinds of lies, Lies, Damn Lies, and Statistics." He is probably correct in saying the there are about 4-5% of the electorate who are ideologically (in some since) Independents. We all know how hard it is to break through the two party mind set that political culture dishes up to us on a daily basis. Not many have the intellectual or moral motivation to do the hard work that ideological Independence takes. I am surprised that it is as high as 4 or 5%. What he misses is that 34% or 35% of the electorate choose not to choose a party. They surely could have registered Rebublicrat if they had wanted to. Instead, they registered unaffiliated or independent. At the very least this says " I care enough about politics to register and vote, but I know enough about politics to know that the two major parties don't represent me ". I am surprised that that figure is as low as 34% or 35%. What is depressing is the 50% of those eligible to vote who aren’t registered. At a minimum they are saying "neither of the two major parties represent me and I don't care enough about politics to register and vote".
Post a Comment