Both political parties have blown it terminally. Too much blind allegiance, too much habitual behavior, too much “well, yeah, this idea really, really sucks, but what else am I going to do, agree with THEM?!”

Both sides have conclusively proven the idiocy of American two-party political gamesmanship. The final nail in the Republicans’ coffin was their willingness to elect someone so obviously shady, tunnel-visioned, power-hungry and incompetent as Rick Scott governor of my home state, simply because he’s a Republican. For the Democrats, it was their insane belief that their president was some kind of wizard with the power to change reality overnight. (Well, that, and the exhausting tendency of many Democrats to believe that “activism” is the same thing as “bitching really loud.”)

There’s just too much baggage associated with both groups, and too much willingness among the members of both groups to be associated with and defined by that baggage.

So I’m not gonna use the words “Republicans” and “Democrats” anymore, because they make me want to vomit bullets. But until everybody evolves past the caricatured reactionary bullshit of the accepted roles, I’m gonna have to call ’em something, I guess.

Those firmly to “the right” will heretofore be known as Vints, because there’s something classically strong and brave and iconoclastic about them, but they’re hopelessly outdated.

And those firmly on “the left” will heretofore be known as Progs, because they’re always in search of new ideas, but most of what they come up with is incoherent and self-indulgent, and goes nowhere.