Bob,

It's not funny, but I had to laugh.

You know I come from the other side of the political spectrum, but I'm as fed up as you are - only at the Democratic Party.

For the first time since I turned 21, I an considering registering as unaffiliated.

We live in a country where you can choose from 65 kinds of toothpaste, an entire aisle of breakfast cereal, but only two people for president.

If I have to choose in 2008 between Hillary Clinton and a guy who thinks the Left Behind series is nonfiction, I'm going to eat my gun.

It used to be who you wanted in office,

Then it was for the lesser of two evils,

Now it's for who will screw up the country less.

Hmmmm.

I hate to say this but I kinda long for the good old days when all I had to worry about was the Soviets.

interesting cy

maybe there is room for a hostile takeover of the democratic wing of the Democrats. While I disagree with many (many, many) of their positions, I have to admire their rock-solid discipline and willingness to fight extremely hard for their goal. Characteristics that have been sorely lacking in the stupid party (GOP) since RR.

But, nah. I am sure the elite in the Dem party ignore their folks as much as the R's do. With gerrymandered seats, free speech limitations, and donation limitations both parties have engineered themselves a pretty sweet deal at the expense of the electorate. Just political karaoke/kabuki with nothing really changing.

I vote for the conservative candidate,while avoiding third parties, but I have not seen one for years. What does the future hold? My guess is more of the same. Can we change it? Only if there is a WE to make the change.

I am not optimistic.

Does it matter anymore? Are there any leaders left in America? I am a conservative and have never considered myself a party.

I have to agree with everyone else. As a conservative, I have felt that the Republicans are only giving us lip service. With this amnesty bill it is obvious that we have been given the finger as well. Watch for them to come up with an emotional topic such as abortion to rally the base.

Dr. Caskey,

You and I have disagreed in the past on things, but on that we agree. The GOP will pull out Gays, God and Guns, just as before, and hope it plays.

In the meantime, the Democrats will run against Bush and the war and promise to buy everyone a puppy.

Conservative, liberal, I don't really care. I just want some honesty and competence. Is that too much to ask?

Mr. Terrenoire,

I think you are on the money. I would even forgive some dishonesty (sometimes needed for security, especially UFO cover ups jk), as long as we had competence. This plutocracy must not continue. We are a democratic republic dag-gumit.

I am hoping for a Conservative Party because that would look nothing like the Republican Party, so who is going to step up and start one, Duncan Hunter, maybe Tom Tancredo though he is a little to isolationist for me but still has good conservative values and really according to Lindsay Graham in a speech before Hispanics http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5sEfrFoAIn4 would call these two guys bigots. I would suggest that gets them extra points.

A guy at work told be deciding between voting republican or democrat is like deciding which toilet to drink from...

Changed from R to Unaffiliated right after the last primary (missed the deadline), although I voted Republican in every race, for much the same reason.

It's been stated elsewhere, and frequently, that the time to worry was when the government refused to stand for re-election.

In indirect ways, that's exactly how things have been going since the escalation of gerry-mandering districts, BCRA, the lawsuits after every election, and now the move to re-design the electoral college vote allocations.

They're too smart to come right out and admit it but the electorate has been given less and less choice with each move.

You can change your voter registration online if you live in California. I just did.

Voter Registration Online

So what now? I reregistered independent almost 12 year ago because I saw this coming. There isn't any liberal/conservative divide in politics anymore. There's corporate friendly bought and paid for polititions on both sides of the isle who bring up trivialities like gay marraige and gun control so we won't notice that the middle and working classes are being sold down the river.
This whole immigration thing is about one thing only: Cheap labor. It started with NAFTA and MFN trade status for China. Thanks a lot Willy. But Bush 41 would have done the same if he'd have stayed in office. And now that there are fewer and fewer living wage jobs they want to open the borders and get scabs who aren't even Americans to take away what's left. And the really nasty part is that even the scabs are getting screwed. They come here because they were promised a better life. What really happens is they have it worse here than if they just stayed home.
The Republicans are not going to do anything about it because most of them are in office via corporate money that they need to stay in office. Tha Dems won't do anything because most of them got where they are by pandering to minority interests.
I hate to say this, because I laughed at him in the eighties, but Ross Perot was right.
So what do we do now?

The Republican's hideous record on gay issues hasn't soured me on them enough to vote Democrat, immigration won't do it either.

I do believe this particular bill is a huge slap across the faces of the American people, I can't believe Bush said this is a "good bi-partisan bill," and I do wish Republicans would behave like Republicans again, but there are many more issues I trust Republicans with than Democrats.

Politicians suck, that's nothing new.

OK. I'm with you. The only choice left to the
voters is for the form of big-government which
we'd prefer. There's no one around who stands for
constitutional principles and limited government.

It's left-wing corruption or right-wing corruption. That's it.

But what-next? Let's suppose we all register as
unaffiliated or independent or whatever our states
call it. Then what? In PA, the only thing that
accomplishes is to give me even less of a voice,
since I can then vote in neither primary.

What will re-registering accomplish? I've already
stopped donating to the RNC, but I'm not going
to switch my registration until there's something
useful I can do with it.

I'm interested to hear where you plan to
go from here.

Well maybe if people stopped voting along party lines and actually voted for the person that best represented their view (I would say issue(s) but that is just as bad as voting for a party) of the world we would not elect idiots like these. None of this is surprising in the least.

For all of those that are registering unaffiliated, can you please tell me that you will at least consider voting for the other party if their candidate best suits your views?