My wife has described me as phlegmatic. This word means that you don’t get too excited about the highs and lows in life. While this makes for a boring life at times, it has served me well as an engineer, a business owner, a business coach and a political writer. All these professions require calm under pressure. In our political world, I’ve noticed a different kind of pressure. This is a kind of peer pressure to pick a political side.
The sides are essentially left or right. On the left are Democrats, liberals, and the woke crowd. On the right are Republicans, conservatives, and the anti-woke crowd. In the middle are the centrists. Centrists have deliberately chosen not to belong to the left or the right.
Trending to the Middle
Political party loyalty has been waning since the 1990’s. According to a recent Gallup poll, 41% of the electorate identifies as Independent.
With roughly 30% Democrat, 30% Republican, and 40% Independent, the largest voting bloc is not happy with the choices coming out of either political party.
In our system of representative self-government, it’s disappointing that our largest voting bloc is not represented by partisan politicians.
Lonely in the Middle
If more and more people are classifying themselves as independent, why is it lonely in the middle? This loneliness has a lot to do with our currently polarized environment.
Let me explain.
Here are the decisions to be made in our polarized America:
You either march in a Gay Pride parade, or you are homophobic.
You either care for the poor, or you are for tax breaks for the rich.
You either want universal health care, or you are an uncaring jerk.
You either wave your American flag proudly, or you are un-American.
You either for illegal immigration, or you are anti-immigrant.
Is it any wonder that more and more people don’t want to belong to either side?
While people are moving away from belonging to either group, these groups are driving the media. I know this because I must complete with the biased media. Even marketing consultants for the biased news media understand that “centrist” news doesn’t sell.
If you are Rachel Maddow, Sean Hannity, Mark Levin, Hillary Clinton, Donald Trump, Barack Obama, Glen Beck, or Bill O’Reilly, your books will fly off the shelves. If you are Jon Meacham, David Brooks, Evan Osnos, Steve Kornacki, Thomas Friedman or Mickey Edwards, chances are that few have heard of you.
There is a reason for this unpopularity of the peacemakers vs the fighters. It is the same reason that you will pay $500 for a stadium seat to root for your favorite NFL team. We enjoy rooting for our team in a competitive battle. It is likely that we would not pay to attend an NFL game between two teams that we care nothing about. Why? Because we really don’t care who wins or loses.
Political writers who advocate for balanced decision making are like NFL football games that have no fans.
Core Energy
I learned about a topic called “Core Energy” when I was trained in life coaching. Core Energy is a way that we show up in certain situations. There are seven levels of this energy. Level 1 – Victim; Level 2 – Conflict; Level 3 – Acceptance; Level 4 – Compassion; Level 5 – Opportunity; Level 6 – Synergy; and Level 7 – Total Awareness. If you want to learn more about these energy levels, you can watch my video on YouTube entitled What is Core Energy?
In political discourse, people who belong to either political party operate at Level 1 – Victim or Level 2 – Conflict. At victim, people believe that someone is taking advantage of them and there is nothing they can do about it. They will vote for politicians who promise to make their life better believing they have no power to make their own life better. Conflict is the primary energy level for those who are energized in politics. Conflict is about fighting and competing. Conflict loves political campaigns where the mud is flying, and your side is winning. If your side loses, you will become depressed and angry at the other side.
The higher level that you achieve, the better you will feel about your life and the world around you. At Level 3 – Acceptance, you will ignore politics. At Level 4 – Compassion, you will often have empathy for others and want politicians to help those who are less fortunate. At Level 5 – you are hoping for win/win solutions in political discourse. Sadly, you will be disappointed at Level 5 in politics because Democrats and Republicans are perpetually stuck at Level 2 or Level 1.
The Level 5 Centrists
It is the Level 5 Centrists who write, speak, and try to compel people to see win/win political solutions. Unlike the energized political fighters at Level 2, centrists see opportunity to create solutions that benefit the most people. Here are a few examples:
Immigration – Control the borders to allow the best immigrants to move to the front of the line who will get a better life and will contribute to the U.S. culture and economy.
Economy – Encourage free-market drivers to improve innovation, productivity, while collecting reasonable taxes to pay for needed public services without taking on excessive debt.
Healthcare – Create a healthcare system that lowers healthcare costs through free-market drivers and helps those who can’t afford quality care.
The list can go on and on with viable solutions to our chronic political problems. However, these solutions will not be evident to our polarized politicians. Why? Because if you are at Level 2, you must defeat your opponent. Instead of solving problems, it is your job to prove that your opponent is an idiot, and you are the savior. If your opponent is for universal healthcare, you are against universal healthcare. It doesn’t matter if universal healthcare is good or bad.
How do you Level Up?
Politicians are easy targets. They are all stuck in this Level 2 battle. However, they are stuck there because being a fighter is who 60% of the electorate seem to want. Why? Because, when it comes to politics, we like to fight. If we want politicians who solve problems instead of politicians who win political battles, we must LEVEL UP. This isn’t easy, and I cannot life-coach you through this blog post. However, I do have a few ideas that can help you extricate yourself from Level 2 politics.
The first step is to educate yourself on political topics. It is difficult to find unbiased information on these topics, so you may be stuck reading, watching, or listening to two opposing views, and then deciding the truth for yourself.
The second step is to create a position for yourself on political topics. The key is to create a position based on what you’ve learned about the political topic. This may or may not be supported by your current political party.
The third step is to consider what solutions on the political topic that you’ve chosen will benefit the most Americans. This solution will likely require a compromise in your political or personal ideology. This doesn’t mean that your values have changed, but it does mean that you are aware that others want and need something different than you.
Repeat these three steps for each political topic that is important to you.
You will find that your positions are slightly different than either political party. That’s okay. This means that you are officially unaffiliated with a political party. It also means that you have leveled up from Level 1 or Level 2. In fact, by engaging, you have leveled up beyond Level 3. You are no longer a victim (L1), a fighter (L2) or a bystander (L3). You are a now a contributing member of the U.S. electorate.
Now What?
You may say, “It doesn’t matter how politically aware I am, I still can only vote for one of two politically polarized idiots in political campaigns.” This is true for now. However, this is how new political parties start.
In 1854, the Republican Party was founded because the Whigs couldn’t decide if they were for or against slavery as a political party. In the case of the Whigs, their inability to establish a firm position on slavery spelled their end. In our modern day, either the Democratic or Republican party will fail as the American public becomes more educated on political topics. If you remember the Gallup chart, already 41% of Americans identify themselves as Independent. This means that this large group has already exited both political parties.
If us Americans stop fighting and stop seeing ourselves as victims, we can prompt a change that is comparable to the new political party in 1854 that changed our nation for the better in a short amount of time.
About the Author
Jeff Schuster is an accomplished businessman, engineer, and writer. Three of Jeff's books are attempts at helping people understand and solve political problems that are being made worse by political partisanship. His first book, Trial & Error, is a collection of 14 short stories. ReEngineering Education is a story of innovative education reform in the midst of political corruption. Engineering Unity is Jeff's most recent book published in August 2023 addressing political polarization on wedge issues that politicians use to divide us. You are welcome to join our private Facebook group called Reengineering Politics where we discuss politically polarizing topics in a civil manner.
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