In the wake of the elections  of November 3, 2008 we noted the dramatic swing of the independent voter.  Who are these voters and why do they refuse to ally themselves with one of the two major parties?  I confess up front that this is my sense and perception and I do not propose to support this with any legitimate research.

The independent is fiscally conservative and socially tolerant. This would make them libertarian but they are not dogmatically so.  They do realize that there is a place in foreign affairs for the military whereas the more dogmatic of the libertarian would categorically condemn foreign military adventures.

The social tolerance explains their willingness to support a black man with a distinctly ethnic name.  They are tolerant of ethnic diversity and I guess they are probably about evenly split on the subjects of gay marriage and abortion rights.

The independent is a realist.  He realizes that there is a continuum of socialistic government policy and individual liberty and is only likely to become mobilized when he sees a move to an extreme, which he probably now sees. When 48% of the population received more in benefits that they pay in taxes it is extreme in any reasonable view. The independent recognizes that there is evil in the world and that there is a time when violence must be employed.

The independent is civil.  The demonization of one party by the other, the name calling, and the negative campaigning alienates the independent. In a display of uncivil discourse they hear only the emotion and not the message.

The independent is rational.  He does not blindly follow a party line if it does not make sense. He is skeptical of radical change, but willing to question policies that no longer work. He understands that taking money from one person and giving it to another does not create wealth. In fact it is more likely to destroy it. He understands that the economic laws that govern his household are not dramatically different than the economic laws that govern our nation. Wealth must be earned, and debt must be repaid- one way or another.

The independent understands the role of government and its limits. He understands that life is imperfect, often unfair, and frequently uncertain.   He understands that government policies that seek to solve all our problems and counter the laws of nature often end in tyranny.

The independent is not necessarily the same as a populist.  The independent is more likely to compromise than the populist, less likely to have a single issue litmus test, and less likely to campaign actively, put a bumper sticker on their car or attend a ‘Tea Party.’

The independent is less tied to a principled philosophy and thus is more likely to be swayed by appearances and charisma. By not being attached to a party he is more likely to change if his candidate disappoints.  This explains the voter swing in VA and NJ.

The independent is more likely to change priorities in crisis.  After 9/11 they became hawks. After the financial meltdown they became economics Keynesians. After the bailouts and nationalizations they became fiscal conservatives.

The independents are honest and expect the representatives to be honest as well.  Transparency and bipartisan efforts were promised by this administration and they are not keeping their promise. They are intolerant of the corruption that is plaguing the party in power. They are even more intolerant that the party leaders tolerate the blatant corruption of a Charles Rangel or Chris Dodd.

The Republican populists that challenged the party leaders in NY district 23 are probably correct that the Republicans cannot win by being a lighter version of Democrats. But they also cannot win by ignoring the wishes and motivation of the independents. The alliance between the independents and populists in matters of sound economics and limited government will not necessarily include a mandate on social issues the independents oppose.

The radical policies of the current administration have energized the Republican base more than the attractiveness of any specific candidate to represent them.  Centrist Democrats in the White House or in Congress may have rendered a figure like Sarah Palin irrelevant.  Combined with the flexibility (or fickleness) of the independents the Right has quickly regained a footing many recently thought was unrecoverable.

The Senate election in Massachusetts may signal much more that dissatisfaction with the current administration; it may signal and end to partisan politics as we have known it.

Given the euphoria and high expectations at Obama’s election in the midst of the worst financial crisis in half a century, it was already difficult not to disappoint. Given the generalities that accompany a campaign and the utter lack of experience he was elected more as an act of faith and hope than for noted qualifications and solutions. Wedding pictures fade.

The first year is often a learning year for a president. Many errors in judgment can be corrected and lead to a successful term and re-election. But this first year has been a year of firsts. The tea party movement should not have been taken lightly. This was a bottom up political movement. Protesters were neither praising or condemning parties; they were condemning their actions.

Independents have been critical  to election outcomes in our last 50 years.  Independents offer an accountability that party loyalists do not.  Unfortunately they also have fewer clear principles that accompany party affiliation. They can be swayed by charisma; they elected Obama.  And on January 19, just more than year later, they rejected him.

The rise of the independents may be heralding a new age that renders both political parties irrelevant. The reaction to Ben Nelson’s capitulation on health care from his own state was a note on the change coming. Anti incumbent attitudes are nothing new. But when the opportunity came to turn them out we usually found that unpopular incumbents were always those in other states and districts; we tended to tolerate our own as long as they ‘brought home the bacon’.

Nebraska ended that. They soundingly thrashed Nelson in spite of the lucrative special deal he made for his constituents. This should have alarmed the administration more than Brown’s victory.

Brown’s victory was a vote against the style as well as the substance.   When George H. Bush broke his clear pledge (“Read my lips”) and raised taxes he lost the independents and many of his own party. The independents do not like blatant lies and promises broken.  Obama promised bipartisanship and tried to force through one of the biggest changes in a decade with no Republican support.  He promised transparency yet closed door meetings with no press were common. He promised a five day posting period to review all legislation yet thousand page bills were voted on with little to no time to read them.

He was going to shun special interests yet cut special deals with unions.  Did he think nobody would notice?

If a bill has merit, it doesn’t need bribes and closed doors to pass. The more they bribed and gave into special interests the more it was rejected.  All the speeches and interviews only made it worse.

The voters have a sense of fairness and truth.  They expected more of it and get less. That a party with bigger majorities in both houses than their opponents have had in a century could not get a major bill through signals that either that their bills stink or that they are politically incompetent.

Among the many comments on last Tuesday’s race was Charles Krauthammer’s noted in  the Washington Post.  Read it here.

An excerpt:

“The ‘08 election was a historical anomaly. A uniquely charismatic candidate was running at a time of deep war weariness, with an intensely unpopular Republican president, against a politically incompetent opponent, amid the greatest financial collapse since the Great Depression. And still he won by only seven points.”

HKO comment- I agree with Krauthammer, but there is another dynamic. The growth of the independents shows a disaffection with party politics in general or more likely a common belief in reasonable government that is not represented yet by either party.  The problem with independents is that they rarely carefully define their principles and they are often attracted by appearances and thus quick to express disappointment or buyer’s remorse. I think this is expressed in Tuesday’s election in VA and NJ.

I sense that many independents that voted for Obama are having buyer’s remorse.

The danger of being independent is not having to define your position or governing philosophy beyond being ‘independent.’ For better or worse the parties do state a party platform and are in some limited sense held accountable to it.  As a candidate for that party you may reject part of the platform but you are associated with stated positions.  You may be a pro life Democrat or a pro choice Republican, but even that that says more about your political position than being ‘independent.’

The revolution within the Republican Party in the New York District 23 race where the Republican grass roots rejected the anointed party candidate, Dede Scozzafava, and supported Doug Hoffman shows the power of a grass roots movement.  But a grass roots movement has a similar problem of defining what it is that the party leadership has done to alienate them.

Do the independents or the populists support a more libertarian smaller government without the nationalization of major industries, 1990 page health care bills that no one has a chance to read, huge deficits, higher taxes, endless corruption, and endless government ‘programs’?   Or is it about the politics of religion and abortion?

Personally I believe it is the former. I believe that the leaders in DC are so insulated from the average voter and tax payer that they are clueless.  They surround themselves with the like minded and are only exposed to those views that support their own statist visions.  When they see a real populist uprising they assume they are wingnuts, dittoheads, manipulated from some sinister force, or otherwise not worthy of serious consideration.

The uprising may be a force without a voice, but to be effective it must define itself and stand for something.  Without standing for something we will fall for anything.

We have already done that.