To the editor:

As we enter a new election season, we are faced with the same “choices” of voting for either a Republican or Democrat to represent us. These parties have so sealed the election process that it is an almost impossible feat for a third-party candidate to be competitive. Because of “their” majorities and “their” rules, they were able to pass the incumbency protection bill otherwise known as Campaign Finance Reform.

Yet we see in these parties a growing similarity of their actions in Congress to represent not the voters of the states that send them there but their own “special interest.” These chosen, who come out every election asking for your vote and promise you whatever you want to hear, show very little difference once voted in.

We the people still have the power to send a message of our discontent with the current status quo. Democrats and Republicans have made the legislative rules tough for an independent candidacy. Yet despite the hurdles an independent must jump over and the hoops they must dance through, independents still have a chance. And that chance is your vote.

That the chance is still there offers hope for the independence of “we the people.” If you are tired of there not being a “dime’s worth of difference” between these two majority parties, then consider casting off their labels, register as an independent and vote for true representation.

Let Nov. 4, 2008, be the new Independents Day.

Robert M. Tyler,

Lawrence