The Independent Conscience

Before sidetracking into yet another wordy tangent of Indie-Perspective(s), what are the 'givens' here? Independents are a distinct class, a legitimate demographic of student voters, there is an Independent Vote and that vote bears a bloc of constituents that account for more than what's not FBK, Greek, and/or others "connected to the latter or the former by some tie other than membership or subservience...

For years, if not decades, the Machine (through its agents in power) sought to build an iron clad appearance of absolute rule. Campaigning against all odds and eating consecutive losses might have been enough to throw off the Indie-Brass, but to keep the rank-in-file GDI thinking small, the System had to have active "press" & "PR" heads to design, gloss, and mass-market an 'open' on the surface regime, candy-coated-sweet, but vast & intricate, ready to take on any Indie Party and/or pounce on even the most minute defiance.

You'd have to be a fool to think that the Machine is run by one. Even the Keys know they can't run SG alone. In the early days, FBK had to push ODK out of the way -- there wasn't enough pie even then; next FBK only had to worry about pinning Greek houses against each other, but with the advent of Civil Rights and seeing itself forced to accept African Americans and women, the organization had to evolve its strategies; but today, maintaining power is a far more delicate and complex artform.

Elitism at the Florida campus has become far more subtle - or secret, depending on your slant. Still, every so often you have a blunder, take the UF College of Medicine Scandal for instance or go back in history to Jamal Sowell's Endorsement of Mel Martinez, Joe Goldberg keeping UF in FSA, AIPAC ties, Tutor Zone, Premier Productions, SG as buffer between student outrage and UPD headquarters....

You'd have to be a fool if you thought one FBK or even all the fraternities together could keep this little bunch in charge of, arguably, the largest incubator of prospective Floridian politicians-to-be!

For years, if not decades, the Machine wanted the rank-in-file Independent to feel ostracized, a nomad on his own college campus. Green, recycling, more club funding (Frats have houses, students have the Union), libraries open later, extended bus routes (name me an ATO or ZTA that rides RTS except for the Later Gator?), study centers, stripping Gator Growl, FBK, and the Greek Council of disproportionate representation in SG, Radical Rush, the CMC, Hare Krishnas, and protests, guitars on Turlington, non-conformity...

If this blog does anything, hopefully it will dispel the Machine's media power play of painting over all GDI's with brush strokes of defeat and making Independents feels like a scattered bunch of left-outs.