@Garban I doubt you're lying about being a registered Independent (same thing I am by the way). What I am skeptical about is if that term honestly describes your overall stance, based on my interactions with you in the past and that you almost always side with one political side, and generally Independents can easily find fault in both extremes. Unless of course that is I missed something there otherwise (you criticizing both extremes that is), which certainly is a possibility.

@Garban That's fine to question local politicians, and not only do I disdain the same Republicans as you do, I also disdain the ones that you favor as well. No arguments from me on the last part there regarding loyalty to country over political parties, although most of the Democratic politicians would also fall into the category of loyalty to the Party over the country as a whole.

In 2016 the Democrats cried foul over Trump winning and claimed his win was illegitimate, and in 2020 the Republicans pulled the same stunt with the stolen Election claim, and both of those claims irritate me.

I admire your honesty as to who you had voted for in the past. Not to divulge any secrets here, but while I did not cast a vote for him I was hoping Obama would beat McCain, which he did, but did not feel the same way about Obama in 2012 regardless of the fact I had disdained Romney too. In 2016 I voted for Johnson, as neither Clinton or Trump were decent or moral choices.

Again, I'm not questioning your claim as to being a registered Independent, I believe that much, but stand behind my original query based on what you had shared above, and looks like I had voted more along the lines of independent/third-Party than you had, in recent times anyways. Not criticizing you either for that, a person needs to be free to vote their conscience, only making an honest observation there is all.

@Garban My positions summed up:
Free speech/expression advocate
Gun rights advocate
Privacy rights
Individualist
Laissez-faire capitalist/fiscal responsibility-conservative
Limited Government intervention in personal life
Lesser taxes
Generally against any sort of bans
Constitutional conservative, to name a few of my right-leaning stances.

As for the left-leaning stances-
Separation of State and any organized religion(s)/social liberal
Pro reproductive rights/bodily autonomy
Gay/bi/trans rights
Legalize recreational drugs
I question the practice known as capital punishment
De-criminalize sex work and public nudity (in my 20s had a side gig as an erotic male performer)
Do away with qualified immunity/limit police power

Regarding the coming Election, conflicted indeed. The Pennsylvania Governor's race choices are poor picks, between Shapiro and Mastriano , with the latter probably being the worst choice being he's a QAnon puppet. Don't care for Shapiro either, but he reminds me a bit more of the liberal type than that progressive nonsense, and he would protect bodily autonomy rights for women. Not yet sure on who the third-Party candidates are. The Senate race is no better, between Fetterman and Oz . Leaning more towards Oz as I suspect he would probably be overall liberal, as opposed to Fetterman who has some extreme views plus recently questionable health concerns. No real decent choices there from the two major political Parties. I like some views from each side, and dislike others from both sides as well, hard to settle on either one of them, for me anyways.

@Garban Hhmm, the capital Ds and Rs were replaced with emojis... The toast glass stands for D Democrat and the rainbow for Republican there.

@Garban Ah yeah, my current avatar. Thought it looked cool so used it for my avatar. Supposedly alot of the puritanical types are offended by Blucifer's appearance. That much is true, a part of the statue had fallen on its creator and killed him. Also using a fake location too at the moment, Area 51, a nod to the video game Deus Ex.

A Republican like that in the state of Florida?? Me thinks you are out of luck on that one...