Independents Are a Sleeping Giant Part 2 – How We Limit Our Own Success
by Alex Hammer
In Part 1 of Independents Are a Sleeping Giant I talked about how Independents represent a large section of the electorate but a minute slice of elected representation. I discussed in rather general terms the role that such a disconnect may play in our government overall.
For example, I noted that:
“We’ve shortchanged ourselves as a nation by ceding our collective non-partisan, solution-oriented strength to those with partisan interests.
It’s not that we have the government we deserve, but rather the government we have allowed.”
The Next Step
In this piece, Part 2, I offer a few thoughts in regard to ways in which, as Independents and Moderates, we may limit our own reach and power.
Certainly, many obstacles have been put in the path of third party candidates by the powers that be and much can and should be written about that (and has to a certain degree) but with the volume of Independents already in existence in this great nation we must also be limiting ourselves in some ways to not have already gotten further than we have.
The latent political power of Independents, largely unorganized, represents a sleeping giants of individuals disenfranchised by partisan politics and seeking greater solutions from government.
First, is it a strength or a weakness — or both — that as Independents we are a pretty heterogeneous lot. While some Independents might well be very eager to organize to carry greater political punch, my feeling is that any such political collaboration would have to be very grassroots and organically organized in order to be effective.
As Independents we just don’t like to be told what to do. Even from each other.
As it should be.
The last thing that Independents and Moderates would want, it seems likely, is to be part of one more party, bureaucratic and rigid in nature.
The Nature of Change
Change sometimes occurs imperceptibly for some time, incrementally but also spontaneously as well, reflecting growing discontent over the status quo.
From a distance water that is one degree above freezing looks pretty much the same, perhaps, as water that is one degree below showing beginning signs of boiling, but the internal dynamics of the two are of course quite different.
Independents internal heating up has also been occurring, but how close or far away we are from boiling – that is, from demonstrating a qualitative change from our prior state, perhaps nobody knows.
The discontent of Independents over the political status quo can be very individualistic and take a variety of forms. I don’t feel that it is my place, or that of anyone really, to attempt to definitively say what those forms of change by Independents collectively across the country ought to be.
Over time, some consensus in regard to the structure of such changes may be reached. But I do have some thoughts, generally, in this regard.
Political change can occur at a variety of entry points. Independent representatives can be elected at the local, State or Federal level. My state, Maine, has had two Independent Governors, and I am seeking now to become the third (I can receive support nationwide). Unity08 was an attempt to form a bipartisan Presidential ticket. Ross Perot, John Anderson and others have made individual Presidential efforts in modern times.
Some change agents focus on addressing the political obstacles in election laws and practices that make running as anything other than a D or an R much more difficult. For example, CUIP and http://independentvoting.org/about/ together “are a national strategy, communications, and organizing center working to connect and empower the 40% of Americans who identify themselves as independents…We do not aspire to be another special interest. Independents seek instead to diminish the regressive influence of parties and partisanship by opening up the democratic process.”
Independents, Democrats and Republicans
Because we live in a society in which the individual is becoming increasingly empowered (both politically and overall) relative to “the authority” or “the system”, you, me and all of us as individuals will increasingly be determining factors of our own and collective political lives. Citizens gave the Congress back to the Democrats in 2006, adding the Presidency in 2008. But can either the D’s or the R’s really reach the level of meaningful changes that voters vote for? (My take on that question:
“Too Small to Fail”: President Obama and the Dilemma of Political Parties (Guest Voice) )
It seems to me, that if enough Independent and Moderate voices reach out within their individual sphere of influences that over time an Independent consensus, not necessarily beholden to movement status, will organically grow.
This site, The Moderate Voice (TMV), for example, has many voices, structurally connected, but serving a variety of overlapping audiences in aggregate.
Please step back for a moment and think about how powerful such aggregated voices could be. As more and more pockets of such critical mass develop and grow — for example thousands of sites like TMV perhaps but each unique — collectively they will amass a volume of voices that dictate real political reform.
Independents are a major, perhaps the major, block of voters, but we’re currently so fragmented as to be politically essentially invisible in our own right, seen instead solely as contributors to D’s and R’s.
America 2.0
I do not feel that Independents need joint platforms, party-like in nature, on which we can seek to agree. And yet perhaps there may over time evolve some principles extractable across the many Independent and Moderate circles of influence which will become better known.
An Independent Bill of Rights, perhaps, if you will.
What is your Independent Bill of Rights? I ask every one of you.
The rise in numbers of Independents signifies, I believe, a growing recognition among this portion of the electorate, and perhaps among the electorate to some degree as a whole, that something better exists beyond a conforming to “politics as usual” as evidenced by both major parties fundamentally.
If that wasn’t the case, there wouldn’t be the unending cries for real political change.
Something more fundamental would have already occurred by now.
The Future is Now?
I believe that as a nation, collectively we have some idea, known but perhaps not well defined, of where we wish to go. But we just don’t seem to know how best to be able to get there.
Independents in particular, if you agree, have perhaps been most pushed into a political system incongruous to us.
Only square pegs available for round holes.
Independents are a giant that is indeed still sleeping because while we are large in numbers we are collectively, still, perhaps, too self-unaware. What defines us? What are our core principles? What are th similarities and differences between us?
Organic developments of such understandings take time. Perhaps our evolving political awareness — and thus power — as Independents reflects not only a desire to act politically as we judge best but also to understand and communicate such actions as well, in language that is developed, rich and well understood.
And appreciated and shared.
Independents are a sleeping giant in this country.
And we’re starting to stir.
Alex Hammer is an Independent candidate for Governor of Maine who believes in the saying that “there is nothing more powerful than an idea whose time has come”.