Independent Voters of America: The 40% Solution
Channel: IndependentVotersUSA
Date: 2012-03-27

The two major political parties have spent a lot of time and effort trying to convince their own members and the media that independent voters have a
minimal effect on elections.

And because independent voters are by definition swing voters, we decide every close election.

The two parties can't control independent voters the way they control candidates and members of their own parties. Both Democrats and Republicans have a vested interest in trying to make independents feel like outliers in the political system and in convincing us to stay home on election day. Both parties believe that if you can remove independents from the equation, whichever party turns out more of its partisan members will win.

The Democratic Party, the Republican Party and their candidates may claim they want everyone to vote, but in reality, they only want voters they can predict and track to take part in elections. They would be perfectly happy if only three people voted in any given election... as long as two of those three people voted for their candidates.

As far as the two parties are concerned, independents are hard to find, expensive to contact and persuade, and impossible to predict and control. We are the free agent "wild cards" in America's partisan, gridlocked political process. And that means we are America's best hope to bring more voices and more choices into our political system, force progress, and bring a new accountability to our government and the people we put in charge of it. Join us and help make it happen.