[Rogarn]

Ive heard a few remarks on the tendencies of INTJ's to lean to a certain political party, and would like to know if there is any truth to these claims.

So, which of the three political parties do you feel you match with best(i realize that people will not agree with everything the large party agrees to).

[Warrior]

You will soon be getting a lot of responses wanting to know why you left all the other parties off the list. Did you do that intentionally to focus on only these three choices?

[Rogarn]

I did intentionally want to focus on only these three choices. These are the largest political parties in the United States at this time, and therefore represent the largest population and power(in terms of influence).

[Booko]

	Originally Posted by Warrior To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.
	You will soon be getting a lot of responses wanting to know why you left all the other parties off the list. Did you do that intentionally to focus on only these three choices?

Well, "Independent" does function rather like "Other" and people can specify in the thread. *shrug*

I'm pretty much of the school that sees our two major parties these days as representing whomever helps get them elected and not their constituents.

---------- Post added 09-10-2010 at 01:03 PM ----------

	Originally Posted by Rogarn To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.
	I did intentionally want to focus on only these three choices. These are the largest political parties in the United States at this time, and therefore represent the largest population and power(in terms of influence).

It's also what polling focuses on. Let's face it, the alternative parties are not that statistically significant.

[BobG]

Too bad CNN finally dropped their 2000 election poll from their website as ancient history.

Looking at party affiliation and ideology gives some interesting results. Ideology has remained constant:

2004:
Liberal - 21%
Moderate - 45%
Conservative - 34%

2008:
Liberal - 22%
Moderate - 44%
Conservative - 34%

2000 yielded similar results, but the poll isn't available anymore.

2004:
Democrat - 37%
Republican - 37%
Independent - 26%

2008:
Democrat - 39%
Republican - 32%
Independent - 29%

2000 continued that trend. Dems stayed relatively constant for all 3 elections. Republicans have steadily decreased while Independents have steadily increased.

You can see the results of moderates exiting the Republican party by the increasingly conservative rhetoric. While Dems obviously benefited from anti-Bush sentiment in 2006 and 2008, they haven't done much to attract disillusioned Republicans.

Personally, I consider myself barely Republican any more. I may still be registered Republican, but the R's barely outweigh the D's in any given election. We keep nominating guys like Ken Buck and Doug Lamborn.
To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.

[Judoka]

Neither side both these parties suck and hurt america further. I got the feeling it's like professional wrestling (sold out) and less about improving America.

[Napalmcloud]

I agree that I like neither party, but do vote republican. Basically, I lean to the right of the big shots in the republican party, like former President Bush and Senator McCain. May come as a surprise to some, but Pres. Bush wasn't extremely conservative on a lot of issues.

So I take the lesser of two evils, and hope that it will all work out in the end.

[BobG]

	Originally Posted by Napalmcloud To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.
	May come as a surprise to some, but Pres. Bush wasn't extremely conservative on a lot of issues. So I take the lesser of two evils, and hope that it will all work out in the end.

I agree. I had few differences with him ideologically.

Which is why I eventually broke down and voted for him in 2000 in spite of my doubts about nominating a candidate whose only accomplishment was having the same name as his daddy (who actually was a good President). I sometimes wonder how our recent history would have been different if George W and Jeb's names had been swapped. Jeb at least worked in his life, while George lived the party life of a spoiled rich kid.

[rwm4768]

Independent is a very broad category, and I think that is probably where most of us INTJs will fall.

Personally, I tend toward the Republican Party, more because I dislike them less than because I actually agree with them. I find I'm more of a libertarian (but not Libertarian), so the way the Democratic Party is going right now is something with which I can't agree. There has been way too much government intrusion into the economy, and it seems like the Democrats never took an economics course while they were in college.

But I'll stop now before I get completely off topic.

[Rogarn]

Thank you all for the input, though i wish more people would have voted so i could see a greater range. I feel that personally i lean very slightly right, and will... barely choose republican as the lesser of two evils. I dont believe many people in the government, republican or democrat, have ever taken an economics course.. Sad times.. sad times.

[freeeekyyy]

	Originally Posted by Rogarn To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.
	Ive heard a few remarks on the tendencies of INTJ's to lean to a certain political party, and would like to know if there is any truth to these claims. So, which of the three political parties do you feel you match with best(i realize that people will not agree with everything the large party agrees to).

Independent isn't a political party.

[BobG]

Not only is Independent not a political party, designating yourself an independent when you register is the equivalent of giving up. Unless you live in a state with an open primary, then you're abdicating any opportunity to select which candidates will run in the general election. In the general election, you'll be given a choice between a candidate too far to the left for your tastes and a candidate too far to the right for your tastes.

The smartest option is to pick a political party to register under and use your vote in the primary to influence the candidates that party nominates. Considering how few people vote in primaries, your vote in the primaries carries a lot more weight than your vote in the general election.

[Amphorian]

Originally Posted by BobG To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.

Not only is Independent not a political party, designating yourself an independent when you register is the equivalent of giving up. Unless you live in a state with an open primary, then you're abdicating any opportunity to select which candidates will run in the general election. In the general election, you'll be given a choice between a candidate too far to the left for your tastes and a candidate too far to the right for your tastes. The smartest option is to pick a political party to register under and use your vote in the primary to influence the candidates that party nominates. Considering how few people vote in primaries, your vote in the primaries carries a lot more weight than your vote in the general election.

I find this the biggest problem by far and why Republicans and Democrats hold such a strong seating in all branches of government. Instead of educating oneself on all candidates including third parties and independents and voting accordingly people insist on a two way race. This type of thinking has led the United States of America into an increasing hell hole.

For the record I'm an Independent that leans Libertarian and that'd rather vote for Democrat over Republican. (The Republicans have been controlled by the far right for too long and over spend just like the Democrats do. And I for one am not going be told how to live my private life by religious groups.)

Get educated about your choices and stop bending to this two party political power. Vote and make a difference. Then make sure whom you vote for is held responsible for all actions. Fracture the whole political realm if need be.

[saberu]

	These are the largest political parties in the United States at this time, and therefore represent the largest population and power(in terms of influence).

	the alternative parties are not that statistically significant

The radical islamic party has very few members and a whole lot of political power.

[ischuldt]

There have been similar posts to this in the past. Libertarian seems to be the most common political party INTJs identify with, although many don't like the idea of being labeled as any particular ideology.

I myself am a left leaning libertarian.

[larkin]

	Originally Posted by saberu To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.
	The radical islamic party has very few members and a whole lot of political power.

Speaking of citations needed. Where does this political party have power?

[Pragmatist]

I very much anticipated the majority would choose Independent. Mostly because INTJ's are too intelligent and observant of systems to deny the fact that neither party actually does what they say. Honestly, if Republicans and Democrats actually stuck to their supposed philosophies, I'd say generally speaking that Republicans are better for the Economy and personal Privacy, and Democrats are better for progressive social changes. Neither would do a perfect overall job, but they'd do a hell of a lot better than they actually do when we elect them. They're all the same, whether they say "Democrat" or "Republican" they're really "Corporate."

[Tristan]

Even if I'm not in full accordance with their platform or what the elected politicians actually do when they get in office, I'm perfectly fine with being labeled republican. It beats the alternative of being labeled independent. Based on some polling and a lifelong procession of anecdotal evidence, my perception is that the Independent group is overwhelming left-leaning. The greatest single portion of them seem to be culturally liberal, and fiscally... well, they just don't care or don't know very much fiscally. A disaster of education and priorities, frankly.

My voting philosophy is long-term. "Hope and change" is a sham: in a nation of hundreds of millions of people, with fairly longstanding traditions of governance, you simply aren't going to see things get reorganized, built ground-up, purged, or reverted overnight. There is no point in throwing your vote away on a fringe politician who has no chance of winning. Pick from among candidates who stand a chance. If there's a neck-and-neck race, take a side in it. In the long run, you'll exert far more power voting for democrats and republicans than independents.

I'd like to see the United States return to being a nation of builders and merchants, of rugged individuals and rogues. If I wanted dynastic political families, guilds, entitlements, and socialism, I could live pretty much anywhere else. But as I said, "hope and change" is a sham, so I don't feel so thoroughly betrayed when the people I vote for don't bring this about overnight.

[larkin]

	Originally Posted by Tristan To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.
	I'd like to see the United States return to being a nation of builders and merchants, of rugged individuals and rogues. If I wanted dynastic political families, guilds, entitlements, and socialism, I could live pretty much anywhere else. But as I said, "hope and change" is a sham, so I don't feel so thoroughly betrayed when the people I vote for don't bring this about overnight.

Oh, sure. It would take at least a couple of years of consensus building and thoughtful legislation for a political party to return the nation to being one of "builders and merchants, of rugged individuals and rogues." But at least it's a practical political platform worth pursuing, by made possible all those non-dynastic political families and the lack of corporate entitlements in the Republican party.

[stuartcnz]

As someone not from the States, My understanding of the choices offered in this post is limited. An observation that I would make though, is that voting is even more important than who you are voting for. I find it hard to understand how such a proudly democratic country, who extolls the virtues of democracy can have such a low voter turnout.

For a country to retain democratic representation, it requires people to actually exercise their vote, regardless of how effective or otherwise they think it to be.

[BobG]

	Originally Posted by Tristan To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.
	I'd like to see the United States return to being a nation of builders and merchants, of rugged individuals and rogues. If I wanted dynastic political families, guilds, entitlements, and socialism, I could live pretty much anywhere else. But as I said, "hope and change" is a sham, so I don't feel so thoroughly betrayed when the people I vote for don't bring this about overnight.

I think the make-up of the Republican and Democratic parties would have to change, which is unlikely given the impact of television and the internet.

There's a saying that's still used: "All politics are local."

That statement isn't as true today as it once was. There was a time when where you lived was the primary factor in what was important to you politically. As a result, your Congressmen reacted to the local populace and probably weren't terribly far apart even if they belonged to different parties.

Whatever their differences, they weren't as large as the difference between your Congressmen and Congressmen from other parts of the country. A Western Republican and Western Democrat were closer together politically than a Western Republican and an Eastern Republican.

Having liberals and conservatives in both parties made for a more interesting dynamic. Sharing the same political party promoted at least some cooperation between Congressmen from different parts of the country, while being from the same party promoted at least some cooperation between opposing parties from the same region. Having more routes to cooperation created better chances to get things done.

In fact, having your biggest fights between conservatives and liberals of the same party was very effective. No matter how bad the fights were, their fellow party members would remind them that they all belonged to the same party and help them work out some sort of compromise. That doesn't happen when the biggest differences are between enemies - i.e. opposing parties.

The nation started regrouping in the late 60's. For example, the South didn't suddenly go from being liberal to being conservative. They were always conservative. They just switched from being Democratic to being Republican. It's becoming more and more a situation where all Republicans share the same ideologies and all Democrats share the same ideologies.

Not completely, though. There's still the holdover Northeast Republicans that many Westerners and Midwesterners would mistake for Democrats. And there's still a few holdover Western/Midwestern Democrats that people on the East Coast would mistake for Republicans.

That sort of situation is just becoming a lot more rare.

The result? Less routes for cooperation means less gets done. Heck, we're reaching the point of having a serious shortage of judges because the Senate can't even accomplish something as mundane as approve judges.

[yoginimama]

Democrat here.

If there were any realistic short-term hope of breaking up the two-party monopoly in this country, I'd be a Green, but I don't think there is, so I soldier on as a Democrat.

Why?

1) It's the party of Jimmy Carter, one of the seriously most awesome human beings of the twentieth century.

--He wiped out a hideous disease almost singlehandedly:
To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.


--Here's a hilariously profane piece from the Onion purporting to represent what Jimmy Carter SHOULD have said in 2008:
To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.


Key line:

	"Funny thing about me: I actually fucking know shit! Not like these goombas trying to weasel their way into the White House. I practically wrote the book on collapsing bridges, inflation, and the working poor, fuck-o. I even got a degree in nuclear engineering or some shit."

From the mouths of satirists....

2) They did not start the whole "welfare queen" meme.

3) They're at least sort of trying to help the poor, the middle class and the environment.

4) They're less squicked by gays, atheists, straights who (admit that they) use birth control, and minorities.

5) Back during the civil rights era, they were willing to lose the South to stand on principle. It was their Crowning Moment of Awesome.

6) Of course, it was also their Dethroning Moment of Suck, because when they did indeed lose the South, the country started its descent into the right-wing nightmare from which it may never recover.

7) However, the choice itself was a Kobayashi Maru--lose the South, or betray a fundamental principle of equality and justice (one so basic that even the most firebreathing wingnuts claim to support it, even though they mysteriously oppose almost all the means, such as busing and Affirmative Action, to bring it about). There was no way to win. They chose to stand with the powerless. Gotta love 'em for that.

[BobG]

	Originally Posted by yoginimama To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.
	1) It's the party of Jimmy Carter, one of the seriously most awesome human beings of the twentieth century.

That has an interesting connection to today.

Jimmy Carter's main campaign tactic was to walk around with that big hick smile saying, "I'm not from Washington! Heck, I've never even seen the White House!"

How many tea partiers are essentially campaigning on the same theme?

That's actually kind of scary. While I have a lot of respect for Jimmy Carter as a person, he was totally pathetic when it came to leadership abilities. Hell, you listened to him talk about the problems in the US and you wanted to just give up and die.

[LaoTzu]

I'm a Canuckistani, but were I American I would consistently vote Dem until the Greens looked like a possibility.
Voting for the GOP does NOT make sense for anyone earning a middle class income.

[Tristan]

I think the two parties are dissimilar. Profoundly. The difference doesn't recommend one party over the other, but I feel it's better to be painfully aware of something than to comfortably kid yourself.

• The democrats are a coalition of identity groups with wildly variant priorities. Women, gays, academics, media, financial institutions, organized labor, blacks, lawyers, hispanics, and many more: some of these are in outright conflict-of-interest with one another. It's almost miraculous that such a coalition exists and manages to put forward candidates. It works by allowing each group to emphasize its own particular sphere of interest in the overall platform, and operating under the premise of broad respect for diverse aims and "united we stand."
  
• The republicans, while still essentially a collection of identity groups, appear to be far more cohesive. There is but a single, most gigantic, rift in the republican party: cultural conservatism. And it's a single ideological split, not a branching logistical fracture. Every single candidate the republican party puts forward is defined by the party itself by which side of this split he holds. Among the elected officers, there are basically those who speak for the money (my guys :D) and those who speak for the social order. To bridge this divide, republicans opt for "head" over "heart."

My perspective is definitely biased. Feel free to dispute it with your own perceptions. But it seems to me that in the case of democrats, the identity groups define the party and most directly influence its actions. In the case of republicans, the cultural rift defines the party and most directly influences its actions. I believe it models out why both parties resort to simply throwing bones to their own dogs, and highlights their particular reasons for betraying their principles.



...Now for some responses.


@BobG
I'm not going to commit on the notion that the government was better off then, when "all poilitics [were] local," than it is now. While everyoone had a local fixation, the ability of national democrat and republican politicians to "get things done" shattered the balance of power between the federal government and the states. Now that the federal government controls such an absurd percentage of the national wealth, the stakes are too high on that level. This turns every mundane procedure, such as approving a supreme court judge, into a political dogfight. In Justice Marshall's time, what the hell did it matter? John Adams' "Midnight Judges" scandal was misgovernance of epic proportions, but of miniature consequence, compared to if it had happened today. If we ever need to ask why today's elections eat up so many billions of special interest dollars, we can just look at the sheer scale of their consequences. The federal government wasn't always this important.

Originally Posted by larkin To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.

Oh, sure. It would take at least a couple of years of consensus building and thoughtful legislation for a political party to return the nation to being one of "builders and merchants, of rugged individuals and rogues." But at least it's a practical political platform worth pursuing, by made possible all those non-dynastic political families and the lack of corporate entitlements in the Republican party.

Did you read the post, or just the truncated part? Actually, did you even read that? Or just lift the words piecemeal? Should I spoiler the surprises to accommodate your reading exigencies?

( Show Spoiler )

I didn't say anything would be better if we all just voted Republican.

	Originally Posted by LaoTzu To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.
	I'm a Canuckistani, but were I American I would consistently vote Dem until the Greens looked like a possibility. Voting for the GOP does NOT make sense for anyone earning a middle class income.

I think I know what you're getting at. I also think it's gutless, humiliating, and immoral to just gun for other peoples' money. Using a vote doesn't make it any more virtuous than using an actual gun. This attitude is so harmful to the survival of a just society, I think, that I cited it as the number one reason for our economic collapse in the related
To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.
.