Speaker 1: Do you want to be an American? I want to
Speaker 1: hear this is seven out of WLW. This is interesting.
Speaker 1: A record high forty five percent of adults in America
Speaker 1: identified as political independence last year, and that number looks
Speaker 1: like it's going to grow this year in twenty twenty six.
Speaker 1: But an equal share of adults now consider themselves a
Speaker 1: twenty seven percent Democrat, twenty seven percent Republican, a forty
Speaker 1: five percent independent. What the hell does that mean? Actually?
Speaker 1: And the independent percentage has increased in the past fifteen
Speaker 1: years unt around forty percent, but we haven't seen this
Speaker 1: level like in a long long time. What's driving this
Speaker 1: whole thing. Joining the show is polster and political advisor.
Speaker 1: That'd be the legendary Kevin Burton from Crosstown Consulting in
Speaker 1: northern Kentucky. keV, I doing I'm.
Speaker 2: Doing pretty good, Scott, Thank you for that introduction.
Speaker 1: Yeah, the legendary in your legendary at this point, this
Speaker 1: is I mean I look at this and go, okay,
Speaker 1: forty five percent independent. I consider myself that I tend
Speaker 1: to lean to the right, but at the same time
Speaker 1: more libertarian. I'm kind of an amalgamation of different things,
Speaker 1: but I vote with my conscience, not because I want
Speaker 1: to be part of a movement, and I've yet to
Speaker 1: see a movement that I would be part of, because
Speaker 1: I think there's a certain amount of corruption and also
Speaker 1: a glasshouse's nature, and also having to go against some
Speaker 1: ideals in order to compromise. And maybe I'm a little
Speaker 1: too stubborn to do that. But it seems like I'm
Speaker 1: in the majority here at this point. And what does
Speaker 1: this mean for the Democrats and Republicans? Of twenty seven
Speaker 1: percent are Democrats, twenty seven percent of Republicans. They take
Speaker 1: up all the oxygen in a room.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And the reason why independence have grown is because
Speaker 2: of the primary. So in Kentucky you have a close primary,
Speaker 2: so only DS can vote for d's, only rs can
Speaker 2: vote for rs. Eyes can't do anything. In Ohio you
Speaker 2: can do say, you know, you can do different things.
Speaker 2: If you're an eye. You can vote to the Democratic primary,
Speaker 2: you can vote to the Republican So each state is different,
Speaker 2: but the primaries always result in the most extremes on
Speaker 2: both sides, and that's why it's driven more independent because
Speaker 2: to win a primary, you're usually looking at ten, twelve
Speaker 2: fifteen percent turnout in off year elections, which frankly, the
Speaker 2: only people who usually vote on those are people.
Speaker 1: Who are really riled up.
Speaker 2: So you're going to have the extremes on both sides.
Speaker 2: So it has pushed more people to the middle. Now,
Speaker 2: when you do campaigns, though, there's usually about eight to
Speaker 2: ten percent that are completely non leaning, and those are
Speaker 2: the core flippers for independence.
Speaker 1: How you win elections? Okay, obviously they're important in the
Speaker 1: election themselves. Some of the old adage about you always
Speaker 1: campaign to the extremes and you governed from the middle, Well,
Speaker 1: that that sentiment's been gone for a while now, that's no,
Speaker 1: that has been true in a while. No o, not
Speaker 1: at all. I mean, which turns more people in independence.
Speaker 1: But again, if that's the way the system is designed,
Speaker 1: it feels like a fruitless effort, is it. Well it is.
Speaker 2: And this is where it's kind of ironic that the
Speaker 2: only time both Democrats and Republicans work together is to
Speaker 2: squash any third party.
Speaker 1: Right. We talked about redistricting in Ohio and Democrats all
Speaker 1: worked up, Well, what about states or Democrats? Well that's different.
Speaker 2: Well, and you know for every California there's an Alabama
Speaker 2: and vice versa.
Speaker 1: So you know.
Speaker 2: The bulk of people, and you know you hear this
Speaker 2: with in your communities.
Speaker 1: You know you're at a bar, at.
Speaker 2: A church, ninety percent of people just common sense things.
Speaker 1: And that's what.
Speaker 2: You're seeing with forty five percent of people identifying as
Speaker 2: independents and the twenty seven percent you know to an
Speaker 2: R or D, you're really seeing just kind of people
Speaker 2: where I think are.
Speaker 1: Just tired of just being tired of politics. Yeah, yeah, exhausting.
Speaker 2: Yeah, can we just get back to being like, hey,
Speaker 2: I might not agree with you, but it's okay.
Speaker 1: Yeah, we want to make politics boring again?
Speaker 2: That that should be the next slogan for anyone, right right,
Speaker 2: Make politics boring?
Speaker 1: Yeah, make politics b You don't talk about religion and politics, Well,
Speaker 1: now we talk about both. And it's exhausting, quite honestly
Speaker 1: when you start looking at the numbers. Though inside the
Speaker 1: over forty five almost half the country, for god's sakes,
Speaker 1: call themselves independence, and let look where we are when
Speaker 1: it comes to the poop slinging on both sides. Gen
Speaker 1: z Ors, though in particular, declare their independencity a much
Speaker 1: higher rate fifty six percent than millennials did when they
Speaker 1: were that age of forty seven percent. What does that
Speaker 1: mean in the long term.
Speaker 2: Well, okay, so millennials to gen Z. You also got
Speaker 2: to remember for millennials, for most of them, they were
Speaker 2: in college or high school when Obama came in, So
Speaker 2: like I would take that with a little grain of salt.
Speaker 2: A lot of gen Zers, you know, they still lean
Speaker 2: or considered themselves a Democrat when push comes the shelf.
Speaker 2: So out of the poll they did forty eight percent
Speaker 2: of them considered themselves a Democrat for considered them Republicans.
Speaker 2: And I think it's just simply like you see the
Speaker 2: Bernie Sanders, the AOC, the Mindannie wing, where frankly they
Speaker 2: didn't get a fair share from the Democratic Party. And
Speaker 2: I think that's why more and more people are just saying,
Speaker 2: you know what, I'm just going to be an independent
Speaker 2: and on the Republican side, you know, they're that was Trump.
Speaker 2: I mean, Trump didn't feel like he was getting a
Speaker 2: fair shaken twenty sixteen, which was a lifetime ago, but
Speaker 2: you know, he was an outsider running.
Speaker 1: Are independence basically socialists and misplaced populars?
Speaker 2: Yes, I mean, you know, because like when you're running
Speaker 2: an election, basically both ours and d's they have these
Speaker 2: softwares and they're billion dollars softwares and they basically put
Speaker 2: algorithms and it's way above my pay grade. But there's
Speaker 2: like one hundred and thirty sub sections and everything, and
Speaker 2: I'll give you a score. So let's say is zero
Speaker 2: is a conservative, one hundred is a Democrat. So it
Speaker 2: will say if I typed in Scott Swan, let's say
Speaker 2: your score was twenty seven, that would mean that you
Speaker 2: have a high probability of voting Republicans. So when you're
Speaker 2: running these elections, especially with independence, you look at the
Speaker 2: around ten percent of the independents who really swing the election.
Speaker 1: Those are the people who you hear, you.
Speaker 2: Know, they voted Trump, Biden, Trump, Obama. And that's and
Speaker 2: that's where elections are really one. They're one on the margins.
Speaker 2: And that's the margins, the eight to ten percent non
Speaker 2: leaning independence.
Speaker 1: You've got your twenty seven percent of hardcore conservatives, twenty
Speaker 1: five percent twenty seven percent hardcore progressives. In order to
Speaker 1: tiff that that split, you need to draw that ten percent,
Speaker 1: got it, Yeah.
Speaker 2: Because out of out of the other thirty five, basically
Speaker 2: you can split that seventeen percent both ways and they're
Speaker 2: going to lean.
Speaker 1: To the last of lean to the right.
Speaker 2: So it's all about about that ten percent number who
Speaker 2: really decides federal elections.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and I guess that ten percent is on the
Speaker 1: seesaw going okay, well who do I who? As opposed
Speaker 1: to who do I really like?
Speaker 2: Who?
Speaker 1: Who do I who do I hate? Least it's the
Speaker 1: way we look at that. And I guess that ten
Speaker 1: percent is that why we will not see or do
Speaker 1: you think we'll never see another two term present again?
Speaker 1: For that reason? And I guess, I mean, you can
Speaker 1: seck you know, Trump's second term technically, but you know
Speaker 1: Biden was in the middle of that, so we just
Speaker 1: swung back and forth. Is that why?
Speaker 2: I mean? But also I would say both Trump and
Speaker 2: Biden are kind of outliers. I mean, Biden was going
Speaker 2: to be eighty three years old and Trump's gonna be,
Speaker 2: you know, the same, And it was COVID, So I
Speaker 2: would say, let's see one more president before we make
Speaker 2: that claim, because both of them are kind of different
Speaker 2: from the majority. But yeah, it's very very hard if
Speaker 2: you look at presidential approvals really since the invention of
Speaker 2: cable news, but really social media, it's almost impossible to
Speaker 2: stay above fifty percent approval. So it's going to make
Speaker 2: it harder and harder to govern, and just harder and
Speaker 2: harder to block out the noise.
Speaker 1: Yeah, okay, gotcha. So Trump's first term, we got the
Speaker 1: anti trumpers go, hey, we need something. We're tired of
Speaker 1: this guy. We brought Biden in. Four years later, we
Speaker 1: got tired of Biden, we brought Trump back. And I'm guessing,
Speaker 1: you know, with the midterm and then three years from now,
Speaker 1: are we going to rebel against the Republicans and voted
Speaker 1: Democrat in.
Speaker 2: Well, but that's also the great thing of those countries.
Speaker 2: There's checks and balances.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean it is.
Speaker 2: You know, you might not like it, but that's that's
Speaker 2: how we've always been and hopefully that's how we always
Speaker 2: will be. You know, when one tide gets too strong,
Speaker 2: the people speak up right and vice versa. So if
Speaker 2: you ask me today, yes, the midterms would probably look
Speaker 2: really good for the Democrats as of today, and.
Speaker 1: Then we'll see what happened. I mean, again, this has
Speaker 1: been one year. I can't have three more years, and
Speaker 1: it just seems like it's getting more and more viral.
Speaker 1: You know, since we're going at each other even harder,
Speaker 1: and every day feels like it's a year. As far
Speaker 1: as news goes, there's definitely been a change the last
Speaker 1: number of years relative to that. And Trump, of course,
Speaker 1: is a whirlwind of activities, always doing something. Certainly every
Speaker 1: day there's something new, for sure, and either you're excited
Speaker 1: by that or turned off by it, but everyone definitely
Speaker 1: has an opinion on it. I look at the general
Speaker 1: racial breakdowns. Gen Zer fifty six percent identifies independence, Millennials
Speaker 1: a majority, gen X my generation forty plus percent identifies independence.
Speaker 1: When you get downe to the baby boomer silent generation,
Speaker 1: it's right around thirty three percent. How much does that change?
Speaker 1: It just seems like the older you get, the more
Speaker 1: accepting you become of a party. And maybe you know
Speaker 1: what this whole identity politic thing where people will not
Speaker 1: question the person they voted for, even if it's a contradiction,
Speaker 1: they won't point that out. In many ways, that seems
Speaker 1: to be case you just as the older you get,
Speaker 1: the more set in the ways you are and you
Speaker 1: want to be part of that community. And does that
Speaker 1: change with future generations where their identity isn't politics.
Speaker 2: Well, but you also got to remember, if you're a
Speaker 2: baby boomer or definitely a silent generation, you really grew
Speaker 2: up in a whole different world. You didn't have twenty
Speaker 2: four to seven news for the longest time, the Internet
Speaker 2: you didn't really have, and definitely non social media. So
Speaker 2: I think, you know, social media in the twenty four
Speaker 2: hour news has just changed everything. It's made politics a constant,
Speaker 2: you know, I think going forward. I mean, so when
Speaker 2: you're running an election, generally speaking, I always tell people
Speaker 2: to kind of block out people sixty and above if
Speaker 2: they're an independent or a Democrat or a Republican, because
Speaker 2: their minds are already made up.
Speaker 1: If you've voted eight.
Speaker 2: Straight elections for one party, it's gonna be really, really
Speaker 2: hard to try to convince you to switch because you're
Speaker 2: kind of said in your ways.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, you know.
Speaker 2: We can't teach an old dog new tricks.
Speaker 1: Sorry, old people. Well, you look at brand loyalty, mean
Speaker 1: you know that that has died, that died some time ago.
Speaker 1: To with younger generations, you know, used to be like
Speaker 1: I'm a tied man, I'm a Republican man, I'm a
Speaker 1: you know, whatever it might be. Younger people don't have
Speaker 1: those loyalties unless it's sad.
Speaker 2: That's about it.
Speaker 1: That's true, that's true. Well, you know that's more of
Speaker 1: a cost issue than anything, because you know, if you
Speaker 1: decide I'm going Android, your tablet, your laptop, your desktop,
Speaker 1: your handheld, your mobile, all that stuff is now you
Speaker 1: got to swap it all up. He's Kevin Burton Polster
Speaker 1: of Northern Kentucky here, and we're talking about a new
Speaker 1: study that came out from Gallup. They do this every year.
Speaker 1: A record high forty five percent of US adults identify
Speaker 1: as political independence. In the past year, twenty seven percent
Speaker 1: each edfin themselves as Democrats or Republicans, and that that
Speaker 1: middle part, that independent part, becomes critical in elections, He said,
Speaker 1: about ten percent ten percent will decide the election either way,
Speaker 1: which is why we go back and forth the days
Speaker 1: of FDR where we have multiple terms feel like that
Speaker 1: is it's definitely in the past unless something else changes too.
Speaker 1: Taking into account America's party identification of that match out
Speaker 1: with the twenty seven percent forty seven percent identified as
Speaker 1: Democrats or said they're a independent, it's forty two percent
Speaker 1: with the Republicans. That's a three years I think that
Speaker 1: broke a three years stretch in which Republicans held a
Speaker 1: an edge and party affiliation. Is that something that also
Speaker 1: changes or is the Republican party in decline and once
Speaker 1: the Democrats take power at some point that just swings
Speaker 1: the other way.
Speaker 2: I mean, it's I mean, the Republicans are in charge now,
Speaker 2: and that's why, you know, I mean, people always it's
Speaker 2: the backup quarterback syndrome. You know, if things aren't going well,
Speaker 2: you're always yearning for the backup quarterback. And then once
Speaker 2: the backup quarterback comes in, you're like, well, there's a
Speaker 2: reason why I didn't want him in.
Speaker 1: The first place.
Speaker 2: So, I mean, that's just a give and take of
Speaker 2: you know, leading. It's so impossible now to actually get
Speaker 2: above fifty in.
Speaker 1: Party registration or approval.
Speaker 2: You know, you go back to George W. Bush right
Speaker 2: after nine to eleven, he had an eighty seven percent
Speaker 2: approval rating.
Speaker 1: That's on the I can't even press about that. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: and that was probably at the time, and oh my god,
Speaker 1: you know, because Lincoln had a probably a bad exemplar. Washington,
Speaker 1: for example, had a ninety nine percent. Yeah, and no,
Speaker 1: that makes sense too, because as divided as we are,
Speaker 1: the conservative ideology advantage is shrunk to just seven points.
Speaker 1: That's the smallest ever. And again I think that's just
Speaker 1: in the case what you're talking about here. And I
Speaker 1: don't know if that I think it could be though,
Speaker 1: that Trump is redefining what conservative means. I'm not even
Speaker 1: sure what conservative means anymore. O.
Speaker 2: Well, I mean, you know it doesn't mean a small government,
Speaker 2: no small government because exactly so. But you know, Democrats
Speaker 2: have really had to come to Jesus meeting kind of
Speaker 2: this last year. You know, it was a really bad
Speaker 2: messaging point for you saying, you know, Trump is a
Speaker 2: threat of democracy when you didn't even have a primary.
Speaker 2: And I think that's the number one reason why Trump
Speaker 2: won because as he took away, they're not the number
Speaker 2: one thing to use against him when you didn't allow
Speaker 2: an open primary.
Speaker 1: Yeah, where does social media go from here? In the
Speaker 1: Digital Agency mentioned information fragmentation, declining trust, and institutions like
Speaker 1: journalism did that'll also fuel the independent identification?
Speaker 2: Well, I mean that's the I think irony is that
Speaker 2: as we've gotten more educated, we're actually headed more towards
Speaker 2: like another dark age. You know. I also do think
Speaker 2: there's a little bit of kind of a pushback, especially
Speaker 2: with millennials and gen Z. I don't really see a
Speaker 2: lot of millennials on Facebook anymore, right, I feel like
Speaker 2: that time kind of passed for them, you know, in
Speaker 2: a lot of ways. I wonder in you know, fifteen
Speaker 2: twenty years, when we look at the effects of social media,
Speaker 2: how people looked at the cigarette companies in the nineties
Speaker 2: or the early two thousand, the effect of gone.
Speaker 1: Right, it's just so the the polars and camps even more,
Speaker 1: you know, it's declining to some degree.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 1: As an aside here, I have a family members they
Speaker 1: moved recently and not one of their neighbors, and the
Speaker 1: first question out their mouse was are you Republican? Because
Speaker 1: everybody in the streets Republican. And he used to be like, oh,
Speaker 1: we're Catholic? Are you Catholic? You know where need to
Speaker 1: go to high school? Things like that, and now it's
Speaker 1: it's probably been that way for a while. But I
Speaker 1: think that's kind of interesting, Like that's that's the whole identity,
Speaker 1: right is I'm a Republican or I'm I'm a progressive whatever.
Speaker 1: It might be. More Republicans and progressives here in Cincinnati,
Speaker 1: but you get the.
Speaker 2: Idea well, and you even see that now people will
Speaker 2: be like, well, I don't want to watch this actor or.
Speaker 1: Listen to this thing.
Speaker 2: It's like, as long as they're going to commit a
Speaker 2: crime like r Kelly or P Diddy, like I think,
Speaker 2: I think you're all right. You can disagree with them,
Speaker 2: but if they still make good art, like just go
Speaker 2: with it.
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, Well like back when Senators Carry Right and
Speaker 1: Teresa Hines Kerry and people were boycotting Heinz ketchup on Mike. Look, yeah,
Speaker 1: I don't care the politics, but the only ketchup in
Speaker 1: the world is Heines Ketchup. I'm sorry. There's a lot
Speaker 1: I would put up before I would boycott Heinz Ketchup.
Speaker 1: He is a Kevin Burton Polster advisor with Crosstown Consulting
Speaker 1: in Northern Kentucky. All the best, thanks to the inside,
Speaker 1: Appreciate you, Thank you, Scott. Enjoy the warm before the
Speaker 1: cold hits us again on Wendy but warms go feel
Speaker 1: good this weekend, Get out and enjoy it. We have
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