I’ve spent the last several days reading articles and listening to talking heads blither and blather using the flip terminology and I’ve finally reached my boiling point. I suppose this was a long time coming as the flip terminology has been in use for who knows how many years now.

This seat flipped this way and that seat flipped the other way. Let me tell you something you already know, blue and red aren’t the only two colors on the spectrum.

Flip Terminology Perpetuates a Falsehood

Flip is a term that essentially means a choice between two things. Flipping a coin is the origin of the word. When the flip terminology is used repeatedly in political dialog, the message is clear. You have only two choices. When one doesn’t emerge with electoral victory then the other must win. You are limited in your options to these two choices.

This is part and parcel of one of the major problems with our entire system. The powers that be convinced us it’s a two-party system. It’s either this way or that way. Newsflash, it’s not. There are other parties out there, other candidates out there, other voters out there. Not everyone is willing to be the victim in this flip fantasy.

Even within the two parties there are very different ideologies. In the Republican party the traditional, conservative, right-leaning libertarian were crushed by the new era big government involved in every aspect of your life populists because they know better. The traditional centrist, compromise democrats now face the same issue with populist democratic socialist who are tired of the elite running roughshod over the working person.

Republicans and Democrats are Bound by this Ideology

There are plenty of Republicans that, by-and-large, have major problems with the party candidate and the same goes for Democrats. But, because we’ve been convinced of the duality of the system, of the flip terminology, Democrat and Republican voters frequently vote for candidates they despise. I hate the guy or gal but at least she or he’s not a libtard or retardicon.

Newsflash, they are libtards and retardicons and you voted them into power because you believe the flip terminology.

The wings of each of the main parties are so ideologically opposed to each other they should be considered separate parties. We’ve been convinced that they must remain a single unit in order to defeat the other party.

This belief is so embedded in our political culture that it became a self-fulfilling prophecy. We’re so devoted to voting against one party that we willing accept horrors from our own. This is not a recipe for a country that will succeed. It is absolutely the recipe for a country that is failing and will continue to do so unless something changes.

I wrote a novel with this idea as the theme. That the protagonists were given a choice between two things but only when they realized they had more options did they find their way.

Tom Liberman