<Snipped quote by Keyguyperson>
You seem to be making the assumption that independents occupy the middle of the political spectrum, perched precariously between the Republicans on one side and the Democrats on the other. That isn't true. Independents are independent not because they are moderates, but because neither of the two major parties in U.S. politics appeal to them.
Independents can be extremists. Segregationists and people calling for the U.S. government to employ nuclear weapons against Pyongyang will likely consider the GOP too far to the left for them. Communists of all stripes, and folks advocating for the U.S. to dismantle its nuclear arsenal entirely, will likely consider the Democrats (especially Hillary) to be as good as right-wing extremists. They are as far from the middle ground as possible, but are all independents.
Aside from the occupiers of the extremes, you also have independents with esoteric beliefs, neither right nor left but definitely not mainstream. Protectionists are still a relatively visible dempgraphic, both in left and right wing circles. Circling back to the topic of discussion, Trump has laid down some heavy rhetoric to the goal of pursuing that group in particular.
Appealing to the centre is not the same as appealing to independent voters.
I'm not just basing it off of assumptions about political views based off of a common misunderstanding of how politics works caused by never really studying anything aside from the American two party system, I'm basing that assumption off of the fact that the polls indicate that independent voters generally have a highly unfavorable view of Trump. While they tend to be independent because they don't agree with either of the parties and vote third-party due to their dedication to their own beliefs, someone as (apparently) extreme as Trump would surely force some independents to change their vote to a Democratic candidate in order to avoid having Trump as president. At the same time, the extremely low popularity he has with independents would most likely cause less of them to choose to cast their vote for him.
I reread my last post, and yeah, I did sort of sound like I was making the "Politics is just Republicans, Democrats, and people who can't make up their mind until the big day, rite guis?" assumption. Sorry about that, I definitely didn't intend it. While I'm not as good as some people with understanding politics, I'm also not
quite that ignorant of how things work.
<Snipped quote by Keyguyperson>
Hillary won't do much. She isn't that sort of candidate. She will play what seems prudent at any given time. Her gun talk now is because the gun issue is where Sanders is inconsistent. If she runs nationally, she will tone down the gun talk. If she becomes President, she will make less out of it than Obama has. Obama is the type of guy who is determined to make a name for himself, but Hillary seems perfectly fine playing ball with the powers that be.
Also, I am not convinced Bloomberg would take all of Clinton's voters in a Sanders/Trump/Bloomberg match-up. He'd take some, and He'd take some of Trumps from those moderate Republicans who really don't like Trump, but a lot of Clinton's votes come down to name recognition. Bloomberg is certainly a recognizable name, but not in the "Synonymous with Democrat" way that Clinton's name is. Plus, if Bloomberg runs third party, he is going to run at a disadvantage in that he isn't going to have a guaranteed voter base. I don't know who would win in that case, but I really doubt it would be Bloomberg. My gut instinct says Sanders wins, but I have a bit of a blind eye for the guy since I'm currently in his camp. He seems to be able to withstand Clinton's attacks, the question is if he will be able to withstand the Republicans. And of course, it is entirely possible we haven't seen the full extent of Trump's expert media game.
Hillary pretty much is incapable of making that sort of drastic change anyways. The only reason she would be so divisive is because most of the people who would do something about that sort of thing would assume it would be right around the corner, and in a much more imminent way than all the "Obama is going to take our guns!" conspiracy theories. The whole "All the Hillary voters" thing was really just an exaggeration, which is something I do far too often (especially on the internet, where we communicate entirely through text). I still think that most of her voters would support Bloomberg, and that some Republicans would as well. Given how divisive both Trump and Sanders are, I'd say that a high-profile third-party candidate like Bloomberg would have an equal shot, to the point of being a likely winner.
Then again, I'm solidly in Bernie's camp, and when you combine that with me being either mildly pessimistic or in complete despair depending on the time of day, you get Bloomberg winning. So maybe it's just me not wanting to believe that things I consider good can happen.
