Independent Voters: Let's Get This UNparty Started!

Jackie Salit's analysis of independents' support of Obama, health care and the current state of the independent movement... Mass independents are lining up behind Brown in the upcoming special election to fill Ted Kennedy's seat in the US Senate -- ignore the independents at your own peril! ...More and more elected officials are leaving the parties... Why are California minor parties SOOOOO negative on open primaries? ....Bloomberg's investment in the NYC Independence Party -- is Harold Ford looking in the wrong direction? Hmmm......

INDEPENDENT VOTERS

• Swing to the left: new progressives (By JACKIE SALIT, INDEPENDENCE PARTY, Pueblo Chieftan - Southern CO)
• Hard-to-predict independents hold key to election outcome -Polls show Brown ahead of Coakley in that segment (By Brian C. Mooney, Boston Globe)
• His health-care agenda at risk, Obama stumps in Massachusetts (By Paul Kane and Karl Vick, Washington Post)
• In Senate Race, Massachusetts Bucks a Political Stereotype (By MICHAEL COOPER, NY Times)

INDEPENDENT POLITICIANS

• Top stories of December 2009 (ENC Today Kinston NC) Outgoing councilman Jimmy Cousins takes the opportunity to tell all assembled that he is leaving the Democratic Party

OPEN PRIMARIES

• Could Arnold Schwarzenegger Have Won a Closed Republican Primary for California Governor in 2003? (Ballot Access News)
• What’s the Solution to California’s Woes? Commentary: Empowering Independents With a New Open Primary (By Jason Olson, IndependentVoice.Org, La Prensa San Diego)
• Green Party's California gubernatorial candidate steps up (By Jack Chang, Sac Bee)

NEW YORK

• The Cost For Row C: $400K (BY ELIZABETH BENJAMIN, Daily News/Daily Politics)
• Harold Ford courts Suffolk Independence Party (Newsday - subscription required)