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> Independents — who are somewhere in the middle This seems factually wrong? Maybe most independents are in between the two parties, but not all. Look at Berni
by Miner49er 5y ago
> Independents — who are somewhere in the middle
This seems factually wrong? Maybe most independents are in between the two parties, but not all. Look at Bernie Sanders for example, I would say he's to the left of the Democratic party.
I thought maybe the Gallup poll they are referencing had a weird definition of an independent requiring it to be between the two parties, but I'm not seeing that either.
- theandrewbailey 5y agoAren't independents people who haven't declared any party affiliations? They are usually in the middle, but could have extreme Democrat or Republican views.
- rootusrootus 5y agoMany of the people I know who are independent (like myself) have strong views, and largely lean one way or the other, but hate the party anyway. I feel this way about the party I most closely align with. We share a lot, but I really don't care at all for how they go about things, or what they consider is the highest priority. So I'm an independent, but I don't want to be associated with them.
- pessimizer 5y ago> They are usually in the middle Is there any evidence for this, or even definition of this? I'd define it as swing voters who tend to mix up their ballot between the two parties, and I'd be surprised if the percentage of people who did that broke double digits.
- Miner49er 5y agoThat's my point, but the article says they are in the middle between Democrats and Republicans. They could be anywhere on the political spectrum, however.
- _ttg 5y agoYour hunch is right. The "moderate middle" trope is a product of lazy pundits and independent voters are actually all over the ideological map - https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/the-moderate-middle-is-a-myth/ https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/the-moderate-middle-is-...